RB 54

167 Tabic A: Homicide cases at the JDS in 1820, 1825, 1830, 1835, 1840, 1845, and 1850/decisions concerning the most serious crime of the principal accused/by judicial instance and decisional category/89 cases/93 decisions. Total CA A AA Cl C LC 2 22 14 68 I 93 HC 0 0 2 25 93 66 JDS 76'5 0 0 13 93 4 Total 28 1 2 142 106 279 A =Acquittal CA=Conditional acquittal Cl =; Confessional imprisonment AA=Absolutio ab instantia C =Conviction LC Lower court HC=High court JDS=Judicial Dept, of the Senate Howare the differences to be accounted for? Why did lower courts assume such a lax attitude toward the rules of proof? Did the differing levels of legal education perhaps account for different practices? In the first half of the nineteenth century, a great majority of the lower court judges already had a legal education’^ whereas an academic legal training was the rule among the higher court judges, who had been academically trained ever since the end of the seventeenth century.*^ In the hundred courts of the countryside, laymen as nämndemän, of course, continued to play a role. The main rules in the Lawof 1734 were, however, hardly too complicated even for laymen to master; in fact, they had been designed for laymen from the beginning. Although the local courts may have had problems interpreting the more obscure points of the PS, the main rules concerning the requirement of full proof were clear enough for anyone to understand. It appears, indeed, more logical to explain the differences by the very different decision-making situations of the courts. In the high courts and the JDS, '■* Lower courts had no competence to order confessional imprisonment. In this group, an actual decision of theJDS exists only w'hen the case has reached the highest instance by way of appeal. If it has not, the JDS has only given its statement on the high court’s proposal, and the emperor has then given his decision in order for it to be issued in the name of the high court. The statements of theJDSare recorded in the Archive of the Secretary of State (Valtiosihtcerinviraston arktsto) and have only occasionally been consulted. The figure here (and in the tables of the Appendix), therefore, represents both the actual decisions of theJDS and those of the emperor. On the basis of the statements consulted it is evident the emperor assumed a passive role in these cases and did not deviate fromtheJDS’s statements. In 1750-1800, 68% of the hundred court judges had no legal training; in 1800—1850, the figure had descended to 21 %. Mäntylä 1995 p. 27. According to Thunander, many of the judges at Göta High Court had legal training already at the end of the seventeenth century. Thunander 1993 pp. 32-33. 17 12

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