statutes on the same subject, all grants or leases from the crown of any royal manors, messuages, lands, tenements, rents, tithes, woods or other hereditaments for any longer term than thirty-one years (t), are in general, and subject to certain exceptions, declared to be void. [And no reversionary lease can be made, so as to exceed, together with the estate in being, the same term of thirty-one years: that is, where there is a subsisting lease, of which there are twenty years still to come, the crown cannot grant a future interest, to commence after the expiration of the former, for any longer term than eleven years. The tenant must also be made liable to be punished for committing waste; and the usual rent must be reserved, or, where there has usually been no rent, one third of the clear yearly value (u).] In modern times, the superintendence of this branch of the royal property has been vested in commissioners appointed for the purpose, whose designation is that of the Commissioners of Woods, Forests, and Land Revenues (v). IV. [Hither might have been referred the advantages which used to arise to the king from the profits of his military tenures, to which most lands in the kingdom were 34 Geo. 3, c. 75; 48 Geo. 3, c. 73; 1 & 2 Geo. 4, c. 52. (t) See 48 Geo. 3, c. 73, s. 3. (u) In like manner, by the civil law, the inheritance or fundi patrimoniales of the imperial crown could not be alienated, but only let to farm. Cod. 1. 11, t. 61. (v) 14 & 15 Vict. c. 42, s. 1. By this act the board of commissioners previously established by 2 & 3 Will. 4, c. 1, under the style of "Com"missioners of Woods, Forests, Land "Revenues, Works and Buildings," was divided into a board of "Com"missioners of her Majesty's Woods, "Forests, and Land Revenues" (with power to the crown to appoint in lieu of them, a "Surveyor-ge ings." As to the powers of the former board, see 15 & 16 Vict. c. 62. To the latter board belongs inter alia the management of the royal parks in and near London. (14 & 15 Vict. c. 42, s. 21.) See also as to "Victoria Park," 14 & 15 Vict. c. 46; and as to "Battersea Park," 14 & 15 Vict. c. 77. As to the pleasure grounds on Kennington Common, 15 & 16 Vict. c. 29. As to the public statues within the Metropolitan Police District, 17 & 18 Vict. c. 33. [subject, till the statute 12 Car. II. c. 24, which in great measure abolished them all; the explication of the nature of which tenure has already been given in a former book of these Commentaries (w). Hither also might have been referred the profitable prerogative of purveyance and preemption; which was a right enjoyed by the crown of buying up provisions and other necessaries, by the intervention of the king's purveyors, for the use of his royal household, at an appraised valuation, in preference to all others, and even without consent of the owner and also of forcibly impressing the carriages and horses of the subject, to do the king's business on the public roads, in the conveyance of timber, baggage, and the like, however inconvenient to the proprietor, upon paying him a settled price. A prerogative which prevailed pretty generally throughout Europe, during the scarcity of gold and silver, and the high valuation of money consequential thereupon. In those early times the king's household, (as well as those of inferior lords,) were supported by specific renders of corn and other victuals, from the tenants of the respective demesnes; and there was also a continual market kept at the palace gate to furnish viands for the royal use (x). And this answered all purposes, in those ages of simplicity, so long as the king's court continued in any certain place. But when it removed from one part of the kingdom to another, (as was formerly very frequently done,) it was found necessary to send purveyors beforehand, to get together a sufficient quantity of provisions and other necessaries for the household; and, lest the unusual demand should raise them to an exorbitant price, the powers before mentioned were vested in these purveyors; who in process of time very greatly abused their authority, and became a great oppression to the subject, though of little advantage to the crown; ready money in open market (when the royal residence was more permanent, and specie began to be plenty), being found upon experience to be the best proveditor of any (y).] And (w) Vide sup. vol. I. p. 189. (x) 4 Inst. 273. (y) Blackstone adds here (vol. i. p. 288, citing Mod. Un. Hist. xxxiii. [having fallen into disuse during the suspension of monarchy, King Charles at his restoration consented, by the same statute, (12 Car. II. c. 24,) to resign entirely these branches of his revenue and power; and the parliament, in part of recompense, settled on him, his heirs and successors for ever, the hereditary excise of fifteen pence per barrel on all beer and ale sold in the kingdom, and a proportionable sum for certain other liquors. So that this hereditary excise, the nature of which shall be further explained in the subsequent part of this chapter (a), now forms the fourth branch of her majesty's ordinary revenue.] V. Another branch of the ordinary revenue of the sovereign [is usually reckoned to consist in the profits arising from his forests. The nature of forests has been sufficiently explained in a former book of these Commentaries (b). What we now refer to are only the profits arising to the sovereign from hence, which consist principally in amercements or fines levied for offences against forest laws] in the forest courts. But as these courts have long fallen into total disuse (c), it is needless to allude further to this branch of the revenue. VI. [The profits arising from the sovereign's ordinary courts of justice] make another branch of his ordinary revenue. [And these consist in fines imposed upon offenders, forfeitures of recognizances, and amercements levied upon defaulters (d): and also in certain fees due to the crown in a variety of legal matters.] But the receipts on the latter account have, by the effect of recent improvements in the administration of justice, been considerably reduced. And 220), that the powers of purveyance have declined in foreign countries as well as our own; and, particularly, were abolished in Sweden by Gustavus Adolphus, toward the beginning of the seventeenth century. VOL. II. (a) Vide post, p. 569. (c) As to the forest courts, vide post, bk. v. c. vi. (d) See 3 & 4 Will. 4, c. 99, containing provisions for the more speedy recovery of fines, penalties, &c. N N almost all these profits have, in process of time, been granted out to private persons, or else appropriated to certain particular uses, so that little of them is now returned into the royal exchequer. VII. We shall class together, as a seventh branch of the sovereign's ordinary revenue, his right to royal fish, wrecks, treasure-trove, waifs and estrays. Our reason for so classing them is, that they are all of the nature of bona vacantia, or things found without any apparent owner; and vest in the crown, by way of exception from the general rule of law. For, by that general rule, bona vacantia are considered as returning, as it were, into the common stock of mankind, and consequently belong (as in a state of nature) to the first occupant or finder; though he is bound, before he appropriates them, to take reasonable pains to discover the former owner, whose right remains, unless they were designedly abandoned by him (e). The particular subjects of claim, however, which are above enumerated, are all held to vest in the crown; the true general origin of which peculiarity probably is, (though with respect to some of them other particular reasons are assigned in the books,) that they were formerly of sufficient value, or of sufficiently frequent occurrence, to attract attention, and to be made the subject of particular regulation; while the other cases of finding were, from their insignificance, neglected, and left to the operation of the ordinary rule of law. The regulation which it was thought proper to make was, that of allotting them to the crown, either [to prevent the strife and contention which the mere title of occupancy is apt to create and continue,] or else [to provide for the support of public authority in the manner the least burdensome to individuals.] In point of fact at least, we find that while the property in all bona vacantia is in general vested in the finder, it is annexed, in the particular instances above enumerated, to the supreme power in the state (f). To (e) Britt. c. 17; Finch, 177; Armory v. Delamérie, Str. 505; Merry v. Green, 7 Mee. & W. 623. consider these instances more particularly. And, first, in the case of 1. Royal fish. These are [whale and sturgeon, which, when either thrown ashore, or caught near the coast, are the property of the sovereign, on account (as it is said in the books) of their superior excellence (g). Indeed, our ancestors seem to have entertained a very high notion of the importance of this right, it being the prerogative of the kings of Denmark and the dukes of Normandy (h); and from one of these it was probably derived to our princes. It is expressly claimed and allowed in the statute De Prærogativa Regis (i); and the most antient treatises of law now extant make mention of it; though they seem to have made a distinction between whale and sturgeon, as was incidentally observed in a former chapter (k).] 2. Shipwrecks are also [declared to be the king's property, by the same prerogative stat. 17 Edw. II. c. 11, and were so, long before, at the common law. It is worthy observation, how greatly the law of wrecks has been altered, and the rigour of it gradually softened in favour of the distressed proprietors. Wreck, by the antient common law, was where any ship was lost at sea, and the goods or cargo were thrown upon the land; in which case these goods, so wrecked, were adjudged to belong to the king: for it was held, that, by the loss of the ship, all property was gone out of the original owner (7). But this was undoubtedly adding sorrow to sorrow, and was consonant neither to reason nor humanity. Wherefore it was first ordained by King Henry the first, that if any person escaped alive out of the ship, it should be no wreck (m); and afterwards, King Henry the second, by his charter (n), (g) Plowd. 315. It is said, in the Case of Swans, 7 Rep. 16 a, that a swan is, in like manner, a royal fowl; and that all those the property whereof is not known, do belong to the king by his prerogative. (h) Stiernh. de Jure Sueonum, 1.2, N N. c. 8; Gr. Coustum. c. 17. (i) 17 Edw. 2, c. 11. (m) Spelm. Cod. apud Wilkins, 305. (n) 26th May, 1174; 1 Rymer's Fœd. 36. 2. |
