On The Nineteenth-century British Judicial Reform

In the two Centuries after the Glorious Revolution of the seventeenth century,the british judicial system maintained the original feudal nature and the duality legal system of common law and equity and there has not been a substantial transformation. By the early nineteenth century, with the process of the industrial revolution, the ills throughout the judicial system has been developed to a extend where people could not tolerate: Disorganized Court, unclear temporal jurisdiction, mechanical proceedings, tedious proceedings and so on. Apparently this backward judicial system has been unable to adapt to the needs of the rapid-developing industrial society. Meanwhile, with the development and expansion of the bourgeoisie and the influence of liberal political and legal thought, the whole community has been aware that the judicial system has reached such a point where it had to be changed.On this background, Britain carried out a judicial reform for more than forty years. This paper briefly introduces the social background ? ideological background and institutional context of the British judicial reform in nineteenth century; It focuses on Britain reforming the original proceedings and the court system in nineteenth-century through the development of a series of written laws, changing the original common law proceedings, equity law proceedings, appellate procedures, setting up new county courts, magistrates' courts, divorce courts, probate courts and the Supreme Court. Through a series of reform measures, Britain changed the traditional british legal system vastly and established a modern judicial system. At the same time, Britain get rid of the Concept of "Proceeding is more important than rights" and established a principle, which is "judicial procedures shall apply to judicial purposes". In a word, the impact of the british judicial reform in nineteenth century exceeded any other reforms in british history. Based on the content and impact of this reform, the nineteenth century of Britain was also known as "the century of the reform".