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great and vital question has been raised in India. It is...the question whether Englishmen in that part of the empire shall or shall not be placed at the mercy of native judges. ... n dealing with foreign countries we have been singularly sensitive of the danger of subjecting Europeans to Oriental tribunals. In Turkey, in Egypt, on the shore of Africa, in China, in Japan, we have always pursued the same policy—to insist that an Englishman, if he has a cause to try, or if he were indicted or attacked in law by any native, should have someone of his own blood and religion...in the Court by which he was tried. ... What would your feelings be if you were in some distant and thinly-populated land, far from all English succour, and your life or honour were exposed to the decision of some tribunal consisting of a coloured man; what would your feelings of security be? You would know that his thoughts were not your thoughts, that he could not justly estimate the circumstances or feelings in which you acted , and that, perhaps, his view of judicial duties was not such as Englishmen are accustomed to find in the Judges to whom their fortunes are consigned. (en) |
