Seeing as English law has so much of your worthwhile attention today, here is a thread on some of our greatest judges for your interest. Starting with the superb Lord Denning. A judge who occasionally produced some head-scratchers but is still widely revered & very influential.

Denning came from a poor family so very rare for the Bar at the time. A formidable intellect, he taught himself Ancient Greek in about a month to qualify for entry into Oxford. He had a life-long preoccupation with using simple language so everyday people could read judgments.

Amongst Denning’s most important decisions that affect you today are that landlords can’t compel you to fix their properties, & that you must be very careful to check who you sell goods to when doing causal bargains like selling your car.

Lord Hoffmann. Sadly now retired, but in my view the greatest legal mind alive. South African Lord Hoffmann has brought into especially English commercial law some very important equitable reasoning & is especially influential in a complex area known as proprietary estoppel.

Amongst Lord Hoffman’s decisions that affect your everyday life are if you make an informal contract, the court will look at why you made it in case there’s a later dispute & if you work on a farm for a long time because you were promised it, the promise-maker will be held to it.

Lord Coke. Undoubtedly the greatest common law judge as well as English judge of all time. Lord Coke got into a serious skirmish with James I at the time that without Coke would likely have led to the end of the common law. A great judicial totem for common law lawyers still.

Lord Coke is so important that amongst his decisions still affecting you are that Parliament is sovereign & you can only be judged by qualified judges. He is also the father of common law contract & is widely considered a foundational figure for the American Constitution.

Lord, the Baron, Blackburn. Probably the most important black letter common law judge of all. Scottish Lord Blackburn had a fastidious intellect & was known for spending almost all his non-court time reading Greek classicists & and any judgments he could get his hands on.

Amongst Lord Blackburn’s decisions that affect you are that you must take care to check what you are buying before paying for it. He is also the judge most responsible for the agile & quick free-market heart of the common law & why almost any contract you make is enforceable.

I shall return to this thread in due course. Thanks for reading it so far.

Lord, the Baron, Atkin. Probably the most important modern English law judge & almost single-handedly responsible for the entire law of negligence through the landmark case of Donoghue v Stevenson, or the ‘snail in the bottle’ claim.

Australian Lord Atkin was an early proponent of female judges & placed into law the ‘neighbour’ principle to establish liability. His impact on your life today includes your ability to claim for injury at work as well as higher food standards & packaging that allows inspection.

Lord Coleridge. Notable for his most important judgment, R v Dudley & Stevens. A decision that is still a High Court decision but never overturned or expanded on due to its impeccable, if somewhat polemic, reasoning. This case concerned a young cabin boy, Richard Parker.

Parker, Dudley & Stevens were survivors of a shipping disaster. The weak Parker was killed & cannibalised by the defendants. At the time, such survivors were considered heroic for having taken steps to save themselves & both defendants returned to England to great fanfare.

Appalled at the defendants’ boasting, a local policeman, Constable Laverty, managed to persuade his superiors to lay charges & the case eventually made it to the High Court. Lord Coleridge in a thundering judgment still famous condemned both men to death for murder.

In his reasoning, Lord Coleridge revived an ancient common law principle that necessity does not justify murder & that, on the facts, Parker would likely have survived as the defendants were picked up a few days later. Stevens & Dudley received a royal pardon & six months prison.

Rest in Peace, Richard Parker.

Lord Mansfield. Widely considered the father of commercial law, Mansfield was, in truth, a visionary who tightened up court procedure to stop vexatious claims & a strong proponent of limiting the nobility from controlling trade so commercial opportunities were available to all.