I was watching Boston Legal tonight, and one of the judges was walking around away from the bench. Down where the recorder sits and such.
I thought that somehow wasn’t allowed. Is it?
Peace,
mangeorge
The judge can do whatever he or she wants. In a smaller courtroom a lawyer may be showing an exhibit to the jury and the judge might not be in a good position to see it, so he might get up to get a better view. I’ve seen a judge, after a particularly hectic morning call, get up during a motion hearing while a witness was testifying and stand off toward the side of the courtroom rubbing his eyes. Maybe he had a hangover.
The judge owns the courtroom and can do whatever she wants, including walking around the courtroom. And, particularly when the jury isn’t there, the judge is more free to wander. I’ve had a judge come down off the bench and come over to where I was sitting to look at a necklace I was wearing, and another time a judge came down to look at pictures on a lawyer’s laptop (he heard us laughing from chambers so came out to look at Halloween pictures of a lawyer’s kids).
In front of a jury, they tend to be more circumscribed, but I’ve seen judges come down and talk to the clerk, to the bailiff, to the court reporter. I’ve also (once) seen a judge come down and sit next to the witness in the witness box to go over a document with the witness.
Incidentally, the empty area in the middle of the courtroom, between the jury box, the clerk’s desk, the lawyer’s tables and the judge’s bench is called the well. And while lawyers are not permitted to “traverse the well” without permission, as mentioned above, the judge can do whatever she wants.
[objection! (hijack)]
So, why is it called “the bench”? Is it because judges of the past literally sat on a bench? Or is it more along the lines of sports teams who are “benched” in a dugout or a particular area.
[/objection! (/hijack)]
Tripler
Seriously, I’m curious.
Far as I know, it was an actual bench, although the use of the word to mean a court is at least hundreds of years old – the main civil court in England from the 17 or 18th centuries was the Court of King’s (or Queen’s) Bench. (Which still exists, although in different form.)
The Bar, meaning the society of lawyers, referred to an actual bar between the public and the well at the old Court of King’s Bench, which you could only cross if you were an appropriately qualified barrister.
–Cliffy
Yes - the bench at the King’s High Table in Westminster Hall. Originally, the King participated in dispensing justice himself, aided by his judges, all sitting at the bench, but eventually only the judges sat.
During some renovations of Westminster Hall a few years ago, they found the remnants of the King’s High Table, but not the bench.
I don’t think it’s quite accurate to say that the King’s Bench was the main civil court. There was also the Court of Common Pleas which had an extensive civil jurisdiction. For example, that was where the celebrated trial of Bardell v. Pickwick took place. I would agree that it was in decline by that point, but it was still functioning.
And there was also the Exchequer Court, with a civil jurisdiction acquired via legal fictions, and the the Court of Chancery, which was a purely civil court.
Those courts are still around. At least the Chancery Division is, part of the High Court in the Royal Courts of Justice (The “RCJ” or Robbing Citizens Judiciously).
There appear to be some parallels between the bench in a court and the altar in a church. One being that the importance of the participants diminishes with distance from the bench/altar.
Is there any prohibition against non-judge people messing around the bench? For example, sitting in the chair?
IIRC, A Roman Catholic church is just a buiding when “The Host” is not present.
Here in Pennsylvania our general trial courts are called Court of Common Pleas of _______ County. American states preserve all sorts of terms long since considered archaic in the Commonwealth.
Back to the OP was that judge also wearing his robe open, like a coat? I remember a judge on BL (or maybe the Practice) from California who was very informal.
Wow! Thanks for the info, y’all! That was an especially cool link Northern Piper. Kind of funny how something so important sort of slips through history’s fingers.
Tripler
Learn sumthin’ new every day, I tell ya. . .
That’s the guy alright. It was on Boston Legal. He kept over-ruling the prosecutor and semi-rolling his eyes.
Blatant hijack:
Curly, right? I’m trying to remember where I’ve heard your nickname before.
Nope. All of the old royal superior courts were abolished by the Judicature Act, 1873, which came into force into 1875.
They were replaced by a new, single superior court, the Supreme Court of Judicature. As an administrative matter, that Court has divisions for the allocation of business, which carry forward some of the names of the old courts (notably King’s/Queen’s Bench and Chancery). However, those administrative divisions are not the same as the old royal superior courts, each with its own judges, body of law, and bar.
Yeah, I know. But my understanding is that by the turn of the 18th century, at least, K.B. was considered the most important court, even if its jurisdiction vis a vis Common Pleas wasn’t yet formalized. I expect Canadian legal education goes into this in more detail than U.S., though.
–Cliffy
Generally true of American courts as well – I’ve sat in judges’ chairs myself. That said, I think they’ll have a problem with you sneaking into the U.S. Supreme Court building and sitting in the Chief’s chair even if court isn’t in session.
–Cliffy
You’re welcome! I’m not sure, though, if this was an example of slipping through fingers, or a conscious attempt to eliminate. The web-page suggests that the table and bench were destroyed or removed during the Commonwealth period, because they were an obvious example of royal authority. During that same period, the King’s Bench was re-named the Upper Bench by the Commonwealth men.
Well, yes and no. If you mean social importance, no, I don’t agree with the comment.
Functional importance, sort of. The courtroom is a workplace, after all. The Bench, the jury box, the dock, the clerk’s table, and the counsel table are all part of that workplace. If you don’t have a role in the ongoing activity, then you’ve got no right to be there, any more than a member of the public is allowed to wander around a shop floor in a factory.
But even by that analysis, the comment overlooks the functional importance of the public to the court’s proceedings. The public is, in fact, essential to the operation of the court. Under the open court principle, the public has a right to attend court, and as a general rule, the court cannot operate unless the court-room is open to the public. If the public is improperly excluded from the court, any proceedings taken may be null and void. So in that sense, the public is one of the most important parts of the court’s operation, even if they’re not involved in the actual proceedings of the court.
Not when the court isn’t in session. The chair and the bench aren’t objects of veneration or anything, but for security reasons, courtrooms are normally locked when the court is not in session.
I don’t think this is right. Churches are consecrated and do not lose their consecrated status if there’s no Host present.
However, it is the presence of the judge that turns a building into a court. I’ve participated in courts held in community halls, Legion halls, and so on. The judges of the Provincial Court here go out on circuit into the smaller communities, in rural areas and the North, to take justice to the people. When the clerk declares the court open in the name of Her Majesty and the judge comes in, you’re suddenly in a court-room, not the Legion’s bingo hall.
My poor vocabulary again.
By “importance”, I mean something close to the functional importance. Significance, maybe, although both mean the same. In both church and court the public has no active effect on the proceedings, nor are they the focus of what’s going on. The sermon comes close, but even then priest is a conduit between the public and their god, who is the focus. The first thing the priest does at the beginning of mass is to say something which makes the place sacred, or maybe more sacred.
A priest can go to a bingo hall (or any place), pull the bread out his ditty bag and bless (consecrate) it, and that place becomes a church. I think.
It’s been about fifty years since I’ve exposed myself to anything church, so I may well be full of “it”.
True, although some judges by dint of long and well-understood practice have an open policy and don’t require explicit permission to approach the witness… at least in Virginia’s state courts. In contrast, the Eastern District of Virginia (federal courts) were very strict about attorneys’ staying behind the podium unless permisson was granted.