House of Lords
The House of Lords known as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is else by heredity or official function. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster; the full name of the house is the Right Honourable the Lords Spiritual and Temporal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled. Unlike the elected House of Commons, members of the House of Lords are appointed; the membership of the House of Lords is drawn from the peerage and is made up of Lords Spiritual and Lords Temporal. The Lords Spiritual are 26 bishops in the established Church of England. Of the Lords Temporal, the majority are life peers who are appointed by the monarch on the advice of the Prime Minister, or on the advice of the House of Lords Appointments Commission. However, they include some hereditary peers including four dukes. Membership was once an entitlement of all hereditary peers, other than those in the peerage of Ireland, but under the House of Lords Act 1999, the right to membership was restricted to 92 hereditary peers.
Since 2008, only one of them is female. While the House of Commons has a defined number of seats membership, the number of members in the House of Lords is not fixed; the House of Lords is the only upper house of any bicameral parliament in the world to be larger than its lower house. The House of Lords scrutinises bills, it reviews and amends Bills from the Commons. While it is unable to prevent Bills passing into law, except in certain limited circumstances, it can delay Bills and force the Commons to reconsider their decisions. In this capacity, the House of Lords acts as a check on the House of Commons, independent from the electoral process. Bills can be introduced into the House of Commons. While members of the Lords may take on roles as government ministers, high-ranking officials such as cabinet ministers are drawn from the Commons; the House of Lords has its own support services, separate from the Commons, including the House of Lords Library. The Queen's Speech is delivered in the House of Lords during the State Opening of Parliament.
In addition to its role as the upper house, until the establishment of the Supreme Court in 2009, the House of Lords, through the Law Lords, acted as the final court of appeal in the United Kingdom judicial system. The House has a Church of England role, in that Church Measures must be tabled within the House by the Lords Spiritual. Today's Parliament of the United Kingdom descends, in practice, from the Parliament of England, though the Treaty of Union of 1706 and the Acts of Union that ratified the Treaty in 1707 and created a new Parliament of Great Britain to replace the Parliament of England and the Parliament of Scotland; this new parliament was, in effect, the continuation of the Parliament of England with the addition of 45 MPs and 16 Peers to represent Scotland. The House of Lords developed from the "Great Council"; this royal council came to be composed of ecclesiastics and representatives of the counties of England and Wales. The first English Parliament is considered to be the "Model Parliament", which included archbishops, abbots, earls and representatives of the shires and boroughs of it.
The power of Parliament grew fluctuating as the strength of the monarchy grew or declined. For example, during much of the reign of Edward II, the nobility was supreme, the Crown weak, the shire and borough representatives powerless. In 1569, the authority of Parliament was for the first time recognised not by custom or royal charter, but by an authoritative statute, passed by Parliament itself. During the reign of Edward II's successor, Edward III, Parliament separated into two distinct chambers: the House of Commons and the House of Lords; the authority of Parliament continued to grow, during the early 15th century both Houses exercised powers to an extent not seen before. The Lords were far more powerful than the Commons because of the great influence of the great landowners and the prelates of the realm; the power of the nobility declined during the civil wars of the late 15th century, known as the Wars of the Roses. Much of the nobility was killed on the battlefield or executed for participation in the war, many aristocratic estates were lost to the Crown.
Moreover, feudalism was dying, the feudal armies controlled by the barons became obsolete. Henry VII established the supremacy of the monarch, symbolised by the "Crown Imperial"; the domination of the Sovereign continued to grow during the reigns of the Tudor monarchs in the 16th century. The Crown was at the height of its power during the reign of Henry VIII; the House of Lords remained more powerful than the House of Commons, but the Lower House continued to grow in influence, reaching a zenith in relation to the House of Lords during the middle 17th century. Conflicts between the King and the Parliament led to the English Civil War during the 1640s. In 1649, after the defeat and execution of King Charles I, the Commonwealth of England was declared, but the nation was under the overall control of Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of England, S
George Pratt, 2nd Marquess Camden
George Charles Pratt, 2nd Marquess Camden, KG was a British peer and Tory politician, styled Viscount Bayham from 1794 to 1812 and Earl of Brecknock in 1812–1840. Pratt's father was Viscount Bayham, eldest son of Charles Pratt, 1st Earl Camden, his mother was daughter of William Molesworth of Wembury, Devon. In 1821, Brecknock became Tory Member of Parliament for Ludgershall for Bath in 1830 and for Dunwich in 1831, he was a Lord of the Admiralty from 1828 to 1829. On 8 January 1835, he was called to the House of Lords in his father's barony of Camden and was married that year, on 27 August, to Harriet Murray, the daughter of George Murray, Bishop of Rochester, his wife was made a Lady of the Bedchamber and they had eleven children. In 1840, Camden inherited his father's titles, he was appointed a Knight of the Garter in 1846 and Lord Lieutenant of Brecknockshire in 1865. He died at his country seat, Bayham Abbey, near Tunbridge Wells on 6 August 1866, having a few days earlier presided at the annual meeting of the Kent Archaeological Society at Ashford.
His titles passed to his eldest son, Earl of Brecknock. Cokayne et al; the Complete Peerage Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by the Marquess Camden
John Pratt (judge)
Sir John Pratt was an English judge and politician. He was Lord Chief Justice of England from 15 May 1718 until 2 March 1725, he was appointed as an interim Chancellor of the Exchequer on 2 February 1721 until 3 April 1721. He was the son of Richard Pratt of Oxfordshire. After matriculating at Magdalen Hall, Oxford, on 14 March 1672–3, he migrated to Wadham College where he was elected scholar in 1674, Fellow in 1678, he graduated B. A. in 1676, proceeded M. A. in 1679. Pratt was admitted on 18 November 1675 a student at the Inner Temple, where he was called to the bar on 12 February 1682, he appeared for the Crown before the House of Lords in Sir John Fenwick's case, 16–17 December 1696, before the House of Commons for the new East India Company in support of the petition for a charter on 14 June and 1 July 1698. He was made serjeant-at-law on 6 November 1700, was heard by a committee of the House of Commons as counsel for the court of exchequer against a bill for curtailing the fees of the officers of that court on 25 February 1706.
On 17 January 1710 Pratt was assigned, with Sir Simon Harcourt, as counsel for Henry Sacheverell, but declined to act. On 20 December 1711 he appeared before the House of Lords in support of the patent conferring an English dukedom on James Douglas, 4th Duke of Hamilton. On 28 December 1711 he was returned to parliament for Midhurst, for which he sat a silent member until the dissolution which followed the accession of George I. Meanwhile, on Lord Cowper's recommendation, he was raised to a puisne judgeship in the court of king's bench, was sworn in accordingly on 22 November 1714 and knighted. On the question of prerogative submitted to the judges in January 1718, whether the custody of the royal grandchildren was vested in the Prince of Wales or the king, Pratt concurred with the majority of his colleagues in favour of the Crown, he was one of the commissioners of the great seal in the interval between the resignation of Lord-chancellor Cowper and the seal's transference to Lord-keeper Parker.
He succeeded the latter, 15 May, as lord chief justice of the court of king's bench, being sworn of the Privy Council on 9 October. In the case of Colbatch v. Bentley, in 1722 he resisted the combined influence of Sir Robert Walpole and Lord Macclesfield, which Bentley had enlisted in his interest. Walpole could only explain it by supposing that Pratt was conscious of having "got to the top of his preferment", his treatment of the Jacobite Christopher Layer has damaged his reputation. Pratt bought, about 1705, the manor of Stidulfe's Place, which he renamed Wilderness, in the parish of Seal, Kent, he died at his house in Great Ormond Street, London, on 24 February 1725. Pratt married twice. By his first wife Elizabeth, daughter of Henry Gregory, rector of Middleton-Stoney, Oxfordshire, he had issue four daughters and five sons. By his second wife Elizabeth, daughter of Hugh Wilson, canon of Bangor, he had four sons and four daughters, his heir was his fourth son by his first wife. Charles Pratt, 1st Earl Camden was the third son by the second marriage.
Of Pratt's daughters by his first wife, the second, married Sir John Fortescue Aland. Armory v Delamirie 1 Strange 505 Lord Chief Justice Lord Camden Attribution This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: "Pratt, John". Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900
Coat of arms of the London Borough of Camden
The coat of arms of the London Borough of Camden is the official heraldic arms of the London Borough of Camden. The arms were granted on 10 September 1965; the borough was formed by the merger of three former boroughs, the Metropolitan Borough of Hampstead, the Metropolitan Borough of Holborn and the Metropolitan Borough of St. Pancras, symbols from their old coats of arms were taken over to the new borough arms; the red cross on a silver field is the cross of St. George, present in the former coat of arms of Holborn and represents the patron saint of two parishes there and their churches, the churches of St. George the Martyr, Holborn and St. George's, Bloomsbury; the gold mitre, like that in the former coat of arms of Hampstead, refers to the Westminster Abbey which held the Manor of Hampstead for six centuries up until 1539. The black chief with three silver scallops is the same as the chief in the former coat of arms of Holborn and scallops were present in the arms of St. Pancras; the mural crown in the crest is a common heraldic symbol for local municipal authority but in these arms it is a reminder that Camden is adjacent to the old city wall of the City of London.
The elephant is taken from the arms of Marquess Camden, since Camden Town is named for the first Earl Camden, father of the first Marquess Camden. An elephant like this was present in the shield in the coat of arms of St. Pancras, but the wreath of holly around its neck in the Camden crest is taken from the coat of arms of Hampstead and from the old seal of the vestry in Hampstead; the supporters are derived from the arms of Lincoln's Inn and Gray's Inn, both situated in the borough. The supporters are both differenced by a collar bearing three mullets and hanging from each is a heraldic fountain; the three mullets of each collar symbolise the three boroughs merged to form Camden while their total number, represent the number of old parishes in Camden. The fountains reflects the name of Holborn, originally'old bourne' or may represent the canals and waterways of the borough; the motto,'non sibi sed toti', is Latin for'not for self but for all'. It was used by Holborn. Arms: Argent on a Cross Gules a Mitre Or a Chief Sable thereon three Escallops Argent.
Crest: On a Wreath of the Colours issuant from a Mural Crown Argent a demi Elephant Sable armed Or about the neck a Wreath of Holly fructed proper. Supporters: On the dexter side a Lion and on the sinister side a Griffin Or each gorged with a Collar the dexter Argent charged with three Mullets Sable the sinister Gules charged with three Mullets Or and pendent from the collar of each a Fountain. Motto:'NON SIBI SED TOTI' - Not for self but for all. On a Roundel tierced in pairle reversed Gules Azure and Sable fimbriated Or an Elephant's Head erased Argent armed Or
George III of the United Kingdom
George III was King of Great Britain and King of Ireland from 25 October 1760 until the union of the two countries on 1 January 1801, after which he was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland until his death in 1820. He was concurrently Duke and prince-elector of Brunswick-Lüneburg in the Holy Roman Empire before becoming King of Hanover on 12 October 1814, he was the third British monarch of the House of Hanover, but unlike his two predecessors, he was born in Great Britain, spoke English as his first language, never visited Hanover. His life and with it his reign, which were longer than those of any of his predecessors, were marked by a series of military conflicts involving his kingdoms, much of the rest of Europe, places farther afield in Africa, the Americas and Asia. Early in his reign, Great Britain defeated France in the Seven Years' War, becoming the dominant European power in North America and India. However, many of Britain's American colonies were soon lost in the American War of Independence.
Further wars against revolutionary and Napoleonic France from 1793 concluded in the defeat of Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. In the part of his life, George III had recurrent, permanent, mental illness. Although it has since been suggested that he had bipolar disorder or the blood disease porphyria, the cause of his illness remains unknown. After a final relapse in 1810, a regency was established. George III's eldest son, Prince of Wales, ruled as Prince Regent until his father's death, when he succeeded as George IV. Historical analysis of George III's life has gone through a "kaleidoscope of changing views" that have depended on the prejudices of his biographers and the sources available to them; until it was reassessed in the second half of the 20th century, his reputation in the United States was one of a tyrant. George was born in London at Norfolk House in St James's Square, he was the grandson of King George II, the eldest son of Frederick, Prince of Wales, Augusta of Saxe-Gotha.
As he was born two months prematurely and thought unlikely to survive, he was baptised the same day by Thomas Secker, both Rector of St James's and Bishop of Oxford. One month he was publicly baptised at Norfolk House, again by Secker, his godparents were the King of Sweden, his uncle the Duke of Saxe-Gotha and his great-aunt the Queen of Prussia. Prince George grew into a healthy but shy child; the family moved to Leicester Square, where George and his younger brother Prince Edward, Duke of York and Albany, were educated together by private tutors. Family letters show that he could read and write in both English and German, as well as comment on political events of the time, by the age of eight, he was the first British monarch to study science systematically. Apart from chemistry and physics, his lessons included astronomy, French, history, geography, commerce and constitutional law, along with sporting and social accomplishments such as dancing and riding, his religious education was wholly Anglican.
At age 10, George took part in a family production of Joseph Addison's play Cato and said in the new prologue: "What, tho' a boy! It may with truth be said, A boy in England born, in England bred." Historian Romney Sedgwick argued that these lines appear "to be the source of the only historical phrase with which he is associated". George's grandfather, King George II, disliked the Prince of Wales, took little interest in his grandchildren. However, in 1751 the Prince of Wales died unexpectedly from a lung injury at the age of 44, George became heir apparent to the throne, he inherited his father's title of Duke of Edinburgh. Now more interested in his grandson, three weeks the King created George Prince of Wales. In the spring of 1756, as George approached his eighteenth birthday, the King offered him a grand establishment at St James's Palace, but George refused the offer, guided by his mother and her confidant, Lord Bute, who would serve as Prime Minister. George's mother, now the Dowager Princess of Wales, preferred to keep George at home where she could imbue him with her strict moral values.
In 1759, George was smitten with Lady Sarah Lennox, sister of the Duke of Richmond, but Lord Bute advised against the match and George abandoned his thoughts of marriage. "I am born for the happiness or misery of a great nation," he wrote, "and must act contrary to my passions." Attempts by the King to marry George to Princess Sophie Caroline of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel were resisted by him and his mother. The following year, at the age of 22, George succeeded to the throne when his grandfather, George II, died on 25 October 1760, two weeks before his 77th birthday; the search for a suitable wife intensified. On 8 September 1761 in the Chapel Royal, St James's Palace, the King married Princess Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, whom he met on their wedding day. A fortnight on 22 September both were crowned at Westminster Abbey. George remarkably never took a mistress, the couple enjoyed a genuinely happy marriage until his mental illness struck, they had 15 children -- six daughters. In 1762, George purchased Buckingham House for use as a family retreat.
His other residences were Windsor Castle. St James's Palace was retained for
Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales
The Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales is the Head of the Judiciary of England and Wales and the President of the Courts of England and Wales. The officeholder was the second-highest judge of the Courts of England and Wales, after the Lord Chancellor, but became the top judge as a result of the Constitutional Reform Act 2005, which removed the judicial functions from the office of Lord Chancellor, altered the duties of the Lord Chief Justice and changed the relationship between the two offices; the Lord Chief Justice ordinarily serves as President of the Criminal Division of the Court of Appeal and Head of Criminal Justice, but under the 2005 Act can appoint another judge to these positions. The Lord Chief Justice's equivalent in Scotland is the Lord President of the Court of Session, who holds the post of Lord Justice-General in the High Court of Justiciary. There is a Lord Chief Justice of Northern Ireland, successor to the Lord Chief Justice of Ireland of the pre-Partition era. For the entire United Kingdom judiciary, there is a President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom, though that court does not have final jurisdiction over Scottish criminal law.
The current Lord Chief Justice is Lord Burnett of Maldon, who assumed the role on 2 October 2017. Each of the three high common law courts, the King's Bench, the Court of Common Pleas, the Court of the Exchequer, had its own chief justice: the Lord Chief Justice, Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, Chief Baron of the Exchequer; the Court of the King's Bench had existed since 1234. In 1268 its foremost judge was given the title of chief justice before when one of the justices would be considered the senior judge, fulfil an analogous role; the three courts became divisions of the High Court in 1875, following the deaths of the Lord Chief Justice and Lord Chief Baron in 1880, the three were merged into a single division creating a single Lord Chief Justice of England. The suffix "and Wales", now found in statutes and elsewhere, was unilaterally appended by holder Lord Bingham of Cornhill between 1996 and 2000; the Constitutional Reform Act 2005 made the Lord Chief Justice the president of the Courts of England and Wales, vesting the office with many of the powers held by the Lord Chancellor.
While the Lord Chief Justice retains the role of President of the Criminal Division of the Court of Appeal, the CRA separated the role of President of the Queen's Bench Division. The CRA provides that he or she is chosen by a specially appointed committee convened by the Judicial Appointments Commission. Category:Lord Chief Justices of England and Wales Category:English judges Category:Judges of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales Campbell, Lives of the Chief Justices of England, in four volumes, 3rd ed. London, John Murray 1874
Andover, Hampshire
Andover is a town in the English county of Hampshire. The town is on the River Anton, a major source of the Test, 18 miles west of the town of Basingstoke, both major rail stops, it is 15 miles NNW of the city of Winchester, 25 miles north of the city of Southampton and 65 miles WSW of London. Andover is twinned with the towns of Redon in France, Goch in Germany, Andover, Massachusetts in the United States, its name is recorded in Old English in 955 as Andeferas, is thought to be of Celtic origin: compare Welsh onn dwfr = "ash water". Andover's first mention in history is in 950 when King Edred is recorded as having built a royal hunting lodge there. In 962 King Edgar called a meeting of the Saxon'parliament' at his hunting lodge near Andover. Of more importance was the baptism, in 994 of a Viking king named Olaf; the identity of that man was either Olof Skötkonung. The baptism was part of a deal with King Ethelred II of England whereby he stopped ravaging England and returned home. Olav Tryggvason became king of Norway in 995 and tried to convert his country to Christianity before his death in the Battle of Svolder in 1000.
Olof Skötkonung was king of Sweden and became its first Christian king and began c. 995 to mint Sweden's first coins with the help of English expertise. At the time of the Domesday Book Andover had 107 adult male inhabitants and had a total population of about 500, it was a large settlement. Andover had six watermills which ground grain to flour; the town's relative isolation implies a market for flour. In 1175 King Richard I sold Andover a charter granting certain townspeople rights and forming a merchant guild which took over the governmental rights, see ancient borough; the members elected two officials, who ran the town. In 1201 King John gave the merchants the right to collect royal taxes in Andover themselves. In 1256 Henry III gave the townspeople the right to hold a court and try criminals for offences committed in Andover. Andover sent MPs to the parliaments of 1295 and 1302–1307; the town was ravaged by two serious fires, one in 1141 and another in 1435. Andover remained a small market town.
Processing wool appears to have been the main industry and street names in the area of the town known as "Sheep Fair" commemorate this. A weekly market, an annual fair were held; as well as the Church of St Mary the town had a priory and a hospital run by monks, dedicated to St John the Baptist, a lepers hostel to St Mary Magdalene. In 1538 during the Reformation Henry VIII closed the hospital. In 1571 a free school for the boys of Andover was established in the grounds of St Mary's Church; this in time became Andover Grammar School, in the 1970s it became John Hanson Community School. The school has occupied various sites in the town over the course of its history and is located in Floral Way. In 1599 the town received a new charter from Elizabeth I; the merchants guild was made a corporation and the number of annual fairs was increased from one to three. Like other towns Andover suffered from outbreaks of plague. There were outbreaks in 1603-5, 1625–6 and 1636. During the 18th century, being on the main Exeter – Salisbury – London road, the place became a refuelling or overnight stop for stagecoaches and other passing trade.
More than 30 coaches passed through the town each day. In 1789 a canal to Southampton was opened, though this was never a commercial success and closed in 1859. In 1836 the Borough established a small police force: for the most part a gaoler. Andover was linked to Basingstoke and thus to London on its new railway to Salisbury when Andover junction station was opened on 3 July 1854. A railway from the 1860s ran to Southampton, built on the bed of the canal, for about 100 years, until 1964; the land, together with the adjacent gasworks and P. M. Coombes woodyards, was sold to the TSB Trust Company who built their headquarters there; the population grew from 3,304 in 1801 to 5,501 in 1871. During the 19th century the town acquired all the usual additions, a theatre in 1803, gas street lighting in 1838, a fire station and cottage hospital in 1877, a swimming pool opened in 1885 and a recreation ground opened in 1887. A water company was formed in 1875 to provide piped water to the town and a system of sewers and drains was built in 1899–1902.
The public library opened in 1897. Despite this burgeoning of the amenities of the town in 1845 a notorious scandal involving the hardships endured by the inmates of the workhouse led indirectly to reform of the Poor Law Act, principally involving segregation of a now-obligatory infirmary for local people from the workhouse for the able-bodied, but better governance; the town was one of the boroughs reformed by the Municipal Reform Act 1835. In 1846, the town came to public attention; the Andover workhouse scandal brought to light evidence of beatings, sexual abuse and general mistreatment of workhouse inmates by the overseers. The woollen industry had declined but new industries took its place. Taskers Waterloo Ironworks opened at Anna Valley in flourished. Many examples of the machinery produced by Taskers can be seen at the Milestones Museum in Basingstoke; the town's largest employer is the Ministry of Defence. RAF Andover was opened on Andover Airfield, to the south of the town, during the First World War and became the site of the RAF Staff College.
In 1926, the Andover War Memorial Hospital was opened by Field Marshall Allanby. The hospital provides inpatient re
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