The Office
The Office was situated in Chancery Lane, London, near the Holborn end. The business of the office was to enrol commissions, pardons, patents, warrants, etc., that had passed the Great Seal in addition to other business in Chancery. In the early history of the Court of Chancery, the Six Clerks and their under-clerks appear to have acted as the attorneys of the suitors. As business increased, these under-clerks became a distinct body, and were recognized by the court under the denomination of sworn clerks, or clerks in court. The advance of commerce, with its consequent accession of wealth, so multiplied the subjects requiring the judgment of a Court of Equity, that the limits of a public office were found wholly inadequate to supply a sufficient number of officers to conduct the business of the suitors. Hence originated the "Solicitors of the Court of Chancery.” The Office also facilitated Chancery claims by impoverished litigants, litigants in forma pauperis, including children and those suffering from mental illness.
The “Six Clerks” were abolished by the Court of Chancery Act 1842 following the reforming work of Edwin Wilkins Field.
Read more about this topic: Six Clerks
Famous quotes containing the word office:
“The dissident does not operate in the realm of genuine power at all. He is not seeking power. He has no desire for office and does not gather votes. He does not attempt to charm the public, he offers nothing and promises nothing. He can offer, if anything, only his own skin—and he offers it solely because he has no other way of affirming the truth he stands for. His actions simply articulate his dignity as a citizen, regardless of the cost.”
—Václav Havel (b. 1936)
“No people is wholly civilized where a distinction is drawn between stealing an office and stealing a purse.”
—Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919)