Constituency : Exeter 1865-73
John re-took one of the Exeter seats for the Liberals following a by-election defeat in 1864.
John was a great-nephew of the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge. He was educated at Eton and Oxford and became a barrister. From 1853 to 1854 he was secretary to the Royal Commission on the City of London. He was an Anglican but spoke in favour of removing religious tests at Oxford.
John came to prominence during the debates on the Second Reform Bill. He believed household suffrage would not threaten the existing order. Nevertheless he aided Gladstone's attempts to thwart Disraeli , putting forward the fixed-line franchise Instruction which came to bear his name. This attempted to rally Liberals around Gladstone's stance but failed to do the trick. John supported Mill on female suffrage and led an attempt to get a court ruling that the Second Reform Act's provisions must apply to women under the Interpretation Act of 1850 in a case known as Chorlton v Lings.
Nevertheless Gladstone rewarded him when he came to power in 1868. John was immediately appointed Solicitor-General then promoted to Attorney-General in 1871. He was also involved to some extent in the Tichborne case. In 1872 he gave a combative speech to the Social Science Association when he linked the unreformed hereditary House of Lords to the delay in overhauling the legal system on Benthamite lines. He referred to the existing Law Lords as "smallest dwarfs".In 1873 he became Chief Justice of Common Pleas and resigned his seat. The Tories won the by-election.
In 1874 he was elevated to the Lords as Baron Coleridge. In 1880 he became Lord Chief Justice of England. In 1888 as Lord Chief Justice he felt obliged to uphold the principle set by Chorlton v Lings and deny a woman's right to sit on the London County Council. He held onto the office despite declining health until his death in 1894 aged 74.
No comments:
Post a Comment