First a Safegard and a Stay for Sheriffs, Bayliffs, Serjeants at...
"Their Well Doings Justified, and Their Evill Actings Abolished" Leach, William [fl.1631-1365]. First a Safegard and a Stay for Sheriffs, Bayliffs, Serjeants at Mace, And Such Officers. Or Their Well Doings Justified, And Their Evill Actings Abolished. Secondly, With a Preservative Against Fraudent Executors and Administrators. Thirdly, And for Honest Executors and Administrators from Paying More out of Their Own Estates, Than Shall Come to Their Hands from Testators or Intestates. Fourthly, And for Preservation of Shiping from Wilful Destruction by Deceitfull Persons to Defraud Purchasors and Creditors or Ships. In Order to the Saving to the People of this Nation Every Year Hereafter, A Great Part of the Three Millions of Money by Exacting and Monopolizing, Officers Formerly Yearly from Them Unlawfully Exacted, And Formerly Proposed to be Saved for Them, And for the Abatement of the Extreme and Unnecessary Charges in the Proceedings of the Law. London: Printed by E. Cotes, 1652. 23, [1] pp. Interleaved. Quarto (6-3/4" x 5"). Stab-stitched pamphlet bound in later paper-covered boards with contrasting spine, author, title and date to spine. Boards bowed, light soiling to rear board, light rubbing to extremities, faint offsetting to endpapers, later armorial bookplate (Fairfax of Cameron) to front pastedown. Moderate toning to interior, chips to corners and bottom-edges neatly mended with cellotape, loss to catch-word on p. 17, catching text in a few places without loss to legibility, trimming just catching headline on a few pages, light foxing to a few leaves, light soiling and brief early annotations, some struck-through, and underlining to title page. Rare. $1,500. * Only edition, one of two 1652 issues. Leach, an attorney, pamphleteer and passionate reformer, published sixteen pamphlets with proposals "which together outlined a programme for the reform of the entire English legal system" (ODNB). His primary concerns were corruption embedded in the justice system and costly nuisance cases. A Safegard and a Stay for Sheriffs deals with these concerns from the perspective of local officials, executors and administrators. It also includes a brief section on maritime law. Counting both issues, OCLC and the ESTC locate 4 copies worldwide, 2 in North America (Yale Law School, California State Library).
Price: $1,500.00
Book number 75225