Prohibitions del Roy

Facts

The dispute arose from conflict between the common law courts and the ecclesiastical courts over prohibitions, orders by which the common law judges restrained the Church courts from dealing with matters thought to lie outside their jurisdiction. The Archbishop of Canterbury complained to the King, and the King said that, as the source of justice, he could take any case out of the hands of the judges and decide it himself. The matter was discussed in a meeting between the King and the judges.

Issue

Whether the King, in his own person, could decide cases that were pending in the courts, or take them away from the judges, on the ground that the judges derive their authority from him.

Held

The judges resolved that the King in his own person cannot adjudicate any case, criminal or civil. Cases must be determined in a court of justice according to the law and custom of England, and the judges act on his behalf in doing so.

Ratio

• The King may not himself decide cases. Justice is administered through the courts by judges who apply the law and custom of the realm, and judgment requires reasoning developed by long study of the law, which the King does not possess.

The judgments

Key reasoning

• Deciding cases under the law of England requires reasoning developed by long study and experience of the law, and the personal good sense of the King, however great, does not suffice.
• The King delegated his judicial power to the judges and the courts, and the proper course is for the cases of the subject to be decided by the judges in courts of record, with the law as the measure of the rights of the King as well as those of the subject.

Where it fits in the module

In the module on the Crown and the prerogative, the case is a starting point for the history of the relationship between Crown and courts, and for the argument that the judges have an independent constitutional role. It is read with the Case of Proclamations (1610) and with Dr Bonham (1610), in which Coke made further claims about the common law. The case raises the question of how far the report reflects what happened and how far it expresses the view of Coke, and the relationship with the later settlement after 1688.

Criticisms

• The report was written by Coke himself and presents his own view of the exchange, so it is not a neutral record of what was said, and historians have questioned how accurate it is.
• The claim that judgment requires reasoning acquired through long study is a claim to professional monopoly, and it does not answer the argument that the judges derive their authority from the Crown.
• The case does not provide a clear legal rule, because it was a resolution of the judges and not a judgment in a dispute between parties, and its status as binding authority is uncertain.