English barristers were retained as much for their influence with councilors 
sitting in judgment as for their forensic talents. 160 
By Committee routine, preliminary problems such as lack of jurisdiction or 
want of proper parties were disposed of before entrance upon the merits. 101 
In the course of hearing objections might be raised to the admissibility of the 
evidence of one of the parties. In such cases counsel withdrew and the Committee 
debated the admissibility of the evidence in question. Then counsel 
were called in and acquainted with the Committee decision as to admissibility, 
whereupon the hearing proceeded. 152 Oral argument was largely devoted to 
discussion of English precedents, 153 except in those cases in which the coutume 
de Normandie, Manx law, Spanish law (Minorca), or East Indian law governed. 
In many cases decision involved the interpretation of colonial statutes 
154 This necessity for conciliar information as to colonial legislation was 
seized upon to counteract the reluctance of some chartered and proprietary 
colonies regularly to transmit their laws to England. 155 But in conciliar prac- 
150 See infra, p. 326. Cf. 6 Doc. and Rec. Rel. 
Prov. N.H., 893 on the weight of the Attorney 
General and the Solicitor General at 
Whitehall. 
151 See Hamilton v. Home (PC 2/90/213- 
15); Mansfield v. Bontein (PC 2/101/18, 33, 
62-64); Gale v. Strachan (PC 2/101/299); 
Altham v. Gray (PC 2/103/116); Peters v. 
Bourke (PC 2/109/187); Paine v. Bontineau 
(PC 2/91/8). 
152 In Pelham v. Stone et al. an objection was 
raised to appellant's counsel reading from the 
proceedings below an exemplification of a 
will under the seal of the Prerogative Court 
of Canterbury. It was claimed that such exemplification 
could not be read as evidence 
to affect realty in Massachusetts. The Committee 
sustained the objection (PC 2/95/24). 
In Stevenson v. Waters (Stevenson) from the 
Isle of Man, respondent objected to depositions 
offered to be read which had been taken 
in Ireland under a July 27, 1749, commission 
from Man. It was contended that the commission 
was irregularly issued pending an 
appeal from the insular judiciaries to the 
Duke of Atholl, that the depositions taken 
thereunder were null and void, and that 
respondents in reliance upon the irregularity 
thereof had neither cross-examined appellant's 
witnesses nor presented their own witnesses 
for examination. The Committee sustained the 
respondent's contentions (PC 2/104/551, 553). 
Later in the same cause appellant objected 
to respondent's reading certain pleadings in 
a Court of Chancery suit in Ireland as introductory 
to certain depositions taken in the 
instant cause for respondents. The appealed 
actions were of ejectment and for dower by 
the pretended widow and heir of appellant's 
brother. It was objected by appellant that the 
Irish suit only concerned personalty where the 
marriage was only a collateral question, so no 
proof could be regularly entered into with 
respect thereof. Upon Committee consideration 
this objection was overruled (PC 2/104/568, 
571). For the Cases of the parties see Columbia 
Univ. Law Lib. See also Francia v. Hope 
(East India, 1756), in which the same procedure 
was employed upon objection to certain 
accounts being read as improperly authenticated 
(PC 2/105/174). 
133 See the notes on the conciliar hearings in 
the papers of Charles Yorke in Add. MSS, 
36,217-20. 
154 See infra, p. 503 et seq. In 1784 it was proposed 
that appeals from Quebec should lie to a 
Board of Council composed of the Lord Chancellor 
and judges of the Courts at Westminster 
(2 Doc. Rel. Const. Hist. Canada, 745). To 
this it was objected that the King in Council 
had taken local laws as a guide to decisions, 
and it was questioned what would become of 
dominion rights when brought before a court 
unable to deviate from British laws and constitution 
(2 ibid., 761). 
155 pq 2/102/460. Cf. 1 Correspondence of 
Governor Horatio Sharpe, 6 Md. Archives, 24; 
2 Correspondence of Governor Horatio Sharpe, 
9 Md. Archives, 519.