of the rights of the accused, the rights and safety of the public have in a measure been lost sight of. The Legislature can give great assistance. Is there any good reason why the criminal pleadings should not be as plain and simple as the pleadings at law? Time and statutes have changed the pleadings in civil actions, so that to-day the pleaders state their claims in language readily understood by the layman. Should the indictment be more involved? The office of each is to inform the defendant of that which he is charged with having done or failed to do.
Such unnecessary technical requirements are the source of serious public harm.[1] This has been recognized from early times. Lord Hale observed, "That in favor of life great strictnesses have been in all times required in points of indictments, and the truth is that it is grown to be a blemish and inconvenience in the law and the administration thereof; more offenders escape by the over easy ear given to exceptions in indictments than by their own innocence, and many times gross murders, burglaries, robberies, and other heinous and crying offences escape by these unseemly niceties, to the reproach of the law, to the shame of the government, and to the encouragement of villany, and to the dishonor of God. And it were very fit that by some law this overgrown curiosity and nicety were reformed, which is now become the disease of the law, and will I fear in time grow mortal without some timely remedy."[2]
Other writers have recognized the need of thorough change, and repeatedly have expressed their opinions in unmistakable language. In England, nearly forty-five years ago. Parliament passed an act[3] which brought relief. The workings of the criminal courts under
- ↑ The recent case of Com. v. Wheeler, 162 Mass. 429, furnishes an example of the technical strictness of the law of criminal pleading to-day. The defendant was indicted for breaking and entering. The indictment began in the usual way: "Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Worcester ss." It then described the defendant as of Buckland, in Franklin County, and set forth that the offence was committed at "Westminster, in said county." The court held that the indictment should have been quashed by the Superior Court, because it did not allege with sufficient certainty that the offence was committed in Worcester County. The court said: "While the court knows that there is a town named Westminster in the county of Worcester, there is no allegation that the offence was committed at the town of Westminster, but simply at Westminster, which is not alleged to be a town or place within the county of Worcester."
- ↑ 2 Hale, P. C. 193.
- ↑ 14 & 15 Vict. c. 100. Administration of Criminal Justice Improvement Act, Aug. 7, 1851. There is a call for still further change in England. Since this article was placed in the hands of the printer, there has appeared in the Law Quarterly Review for April an article on indictments, by H. L. Stephen, advocating greater simplicity and brevity.
