PUBLISHED BY GOULD, BANKS & CO., AND BY WM. & A. GOULD & CO., 1846. Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year one thousand eight hundred and forty-five, by GOULD, BANKS & CO. In the Clerk's office of the District Court of the Southern District of New-York. WILLIAM OSBORN, PRINTER 88 WILLIAM-STREET. PREFACE. THE title of the officer by whom the decisions reported in this volume were made, is so little indicative of the nature of his duties, that it is deemed proper briefly to explain the origin and functions of the office. In the judiciary system organized under the Constitution adopted by the people in 1822, the ordinary powers of the court of chancery, subject to an appeal to the Chancellor, were conferred on the eight Circuit Judges, whose principal duty was the trial of Supreme Court causes at Nisi Prius and holding the courts of Oyer and Terminer. This system was continued by the Revised Statutes, except that the circuit judges were to be denominated Vice Chancellors, in respect of their equity jurisdiction, and the latter was more fully and clearly defined. In all the circuits, except the first and the eighth, this system is still in force. In the first circuit, (the City of New-York, &c.,) the increase of business, as well in the court of chancery, as in the civil and criminal branches of the common law courts, had in effect, overwhelmed the Circuit Judge, before the year 1830, when the Revised Statutes went into operation. This led to the passage of the act of January 28th, 1831, by which the office of vice chancellor of the first circuit was created, and that officer was clothed with all the powers which were previously conferred on the circuit judge as vice chancellor. Relief was thus afforded for a time, but the rapid accumulation of suits in equity in our great commercial metropolis, soon rendered further legislation necessary. By the rules and orders of the court of chancery adopted in 1830, causes in readiness for a hearing, are arranged upon the calendar in four classes, and are heard in that order. The first class, consists of bills taken as confessed; the second, of demurrers and pleas; the third, of causes on bill and answer; and the fourth class consists of causes in which a replication has been filed. For two years prior to 1839, the vice chancellor of the first circuit, owing to the pressure of interlocutory business, and causes in the prior classes, had been unable to make any impression on the mass of fourth class causes on his calendar. |