ROBERT FFRENCH SHERIFF, Esq.,

OF THE INNER TEMPLE; Q.C. LEEWARD ISLANDS;

STEVENS AND SONS, LIMITED,

119 & 120, CHANCERY LANE,

Law Publishers and Booksellers.

PREFACE.

No compilation of the Laws of Gibraltar has hitherto been attempted, but in 1851 the enactments then in force were collected together and bound in a single volume, without accurate observance of the date of their publication. The Laws since 1851 have never been consolidated or published by authority in a collective form, and great and increasing inconvenience has been thereby occasioned to the Courts, the practitioners, and the public.

By an Order of Her Majesty in Council, dated the 3rd August, 1886, the revision and consolidation of the Gibraltar Laws were authorized, and the publication of an edition of such Laws was sanctioned.

It would, however, have been a mistake to have compiled the ancient and prolix enactments contained in the volume of 1851 in their existing form, some of them dating so far back as 1815, and relating to Quarantine, the Titles to Lands, the Administration of Justice, the Revenue, Aliens, and other important subjects. As a preliminary step, therefore, all such laws have, with one or two exceptions, been repealed and replaced by recent legislation in pari materiâ. This entailed the framing and

enactment of numerous Orders in Council and Ordinances, which, whilst materially lightening, as well as modernizing, the statute-book, formed, together with the Laws enacted. subsequently to 1851, a large mass of subject-matter fit for compilation.

The present volume is the outcome of such compilation, and of an attempt to substitute order for confusion,to produce, for the first time, an edition of the Laws in such a form as would render a reference to them simple and easy.

The Index has been deemed an essential part of the work, and an endeavour has been made to render it sufficient for practical reference without inconveniently swelling the size of the volume by unnecessary minuteness of detail.

No Schedule was practicable or required of the English Acts which have been put in force in Gibraltar, so far as they may be applicable and when no local provision exists, by virtue of the Order in Council dated the 2nd February, 1884. This Order extended a previous Order to the like effect passed in 1867. It is left to the legal tribunals to determine when the English law is applicable, and mature experience has shown that neither difficulty nor conflict of opinion has arisen in applying it upon occasion.

As the laws of Gibraltar are for the most part modelled after Imperial legislation, the Courts possess the advantage and assistance of judicial decisions in the United Kingdom as a guide, and of the standard text-books as a reference.

The omissions sanctioned by the Order of 1886 to be made from the Laws have been so made whenever practicable without impairing the clearness or continuity of the text.

Imperfections will, no doubt, be discovered in the volume; but it is hoped that the care which has been bestowed upon the contents has prevented the occurrence therein of serious errors, and that it may prove of service to the Government, the Courts, and the people of Gibraltar who are second to none of Her Majesty's subjects in their respect for the laws, and their lawabiding principles.

I am indebted to the Colonial Secretary, CAVENDISH BOYLE, Esq., C.M.G., for several valuable suggestions in passing the work through the press, of which I have gratefully availed myself.

LONDON,

15th October, 1890.

R. FFRENCH SHERIFF.