Sir William Henry Maule
PC (25 April 1799 – 1858) was an
English
English usually refers to:
* English language
* English people
English may also refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England
** English national ide ...
lawyer,
Member of Parliament
A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...
and
judge.
Life
Maule was born in
Edmonton
Edmonton ( ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Alberta. Edmonton is situated on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Metropolitan Region, which is surrounded by Alberta's central region. The city ancho ...
,
Middlesex
Middlesex (; abbreviation: Middx) is a historic county in southeast England. Its area is almost entirely within the wider urbanised area of London and mostly within the ceremonial county of Greater London, with small sections in neighbour ...
. His father, Henry, was a
physician
A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...
and his mother, Hannah ''née'' Rawson, a
Quaker. He was educated at a private school and then at
Trinity College, Cambridge
Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge or Oxford. ...
, where he was
senior wrangler
The Senior Frog Wrangler is the top mathematics undergraduate at the University of Cambridge in England, a position which has been described as "the greatest intellectual achievement attainable in Britain."
Specifically, it is the person who a ...
and
Smith's prize winner in 1810 and where he became a
fellow
A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context.
In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements.
Within the context of higher education ...
in 1811.
He initially remained in
Cambridge
Cambridge ( ) is a College town, university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cam ...
, where he was a close friend of
Charles Babbage, and worked as a
mathematics tutor, including
Edward Ryan[FitzGerald (2004)] and
Cresswell Cresswell
Sir Cresswell Cresswell, PC (20 August 1794 – 29 July 1863), born Cresswell Easterby, was an English lawyer, judge and Tory politician. As a judge in the newly created divorce court, Cresswell did much to start the emergence of modern family ...
among his students. He was offered the post of professor of mathematics at the
East India College
The East India Company College, or East India College, was an educational establishment situated at Hailey, Hertfordshire, nineteen miles north of London, founded in 1806 to train "writers" (administrators) for the Honourable East India Company ( ...
but, in 1810, Maule had already entered
Lincoln's Inn with the intention of practising
law
Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been vario ...
. He was
called to the bar in 1814 and began practice in
commercial law, especially
marine insurance
Marine insurance covers the physical loss or damage of ships, cargo, terminals, and any transport by which the property is transferred, acquired, or held between the points of origin and the final destination. Cargo insurance is the sub-branch o ...
, at
3 Essex Court. Maule was appointed
King's Council in 1833 and in 1835 became counsel to the
Bank of England, succeeding
Sir James Scarlett.
His retention by the bank did not prevent him from acting for
Nicholas Aylward Vigors who faced an
election petition
An election petition refers to the procedure for challenging the result of a Parliamentary election.
Outcomes
When a petition is lodged against an election return, there are 4 possible outcomes:
# The election is declared void. The result is q ...
over his
County Carlow by-election
A by-election, also known as a special election in the United States and the Philippines, a bye-election in Ireland, a bypoll in India, or a Zimni election (Urdu: ضمنی انتخاب, supplementary election) in Pakistan, is an election used to f ...
victory in February 1837. Maule's success established his reputation in the region and he himself was elected for
Carlow in the
1837 United Kingdom general election
The 1837 United Kingdom general election was triggered by the death of King William IV and produced the first Parliament of the reign of his successor, Queen Victoria. It saw Robert Peel's Conservatives close further on the position of the Wh ...
of August.
Maule's ironic address in 1845 to a convicted bigamist was said to have contributed to the climate of opinion which led to the passage of the 1857 Divorce Act:
Prisoner at the bar, you have been convicted before me of what the law regards as a very grave and serious offence, that of going through the marriage ceremony a second time while your wife was still alive...
You plead in mitigation of your conduct that she was given to dissipation and drunkenness, that she proved herself a curse to your household while she remained mistress of it, and that she had latterly deserted you; but I am not permitted to recognise any such plea...
The law in its wisdom points out a means by which you might rid yourself from further association with a woman who had dishonoured you; but you did not think proper to adopt it. I will tell you what that process is. You ought first to have brought an action against your wife's seducer if you could discover him; that might have cost you money, and you say you are a poor working man, but that is not the fault of the law. You would then be obliged to prove by evidence your wife's criminalty in a court of justice, and thus obtain a verdict with damages against the defendant, who was not unlikely to turn out to be a pauper.
But so jealous is the law (which you ought to be aware is the perfection of reason) of the sanctity of the marriage tie, that in accomplishing all this you would only have fulfilled the lighter portion of your duty. You must then have gone, with your verdict in your hand, and petitioned the House of Lords for a divorce, it would cost you perhaps five or six hundred pounds, and you do not seem to be worth as many pence. But it is the boast of the law that it is impartial, and makes no difference between the rich and the poor. The wealthiest man in the kingdom would have had to pay no less than that sum for the same luxury; so that you would have no reason to complain. You would, of course, have to prove your case over again, and at the end of a year, or possibly two, you might obtain a decree which would enable you legally to do what you have thought proper to do without it.
You have thus wilfully rejected the boon the legislature offered you, and it is my duty to pass upon you such sentence as I think your offence deserves, and that sentence is, that you be imprisoned for one day; and inasmuch as the present assizes is three days old, the result is that you will be immediately discharged.
Maule was
knight
A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a head of state (including the Pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the church or the country, especially in a military capacity. Knighthood finds origins in the Gr ...
ed and appointed a
Baron of the Court of the Exchequer in 1839, transferring to the
Court of Common Pleas
A court of common pleas is a common kind of court structure found in various common law jurisdictions. The form originated with the Court of Common Pleas at Westminster, which was created to permit individuals to press civil grievances against one ...
later that year. He was a practical and knowledgeable judge with a fine judicial sense of humour (witness his pointed opinion in a case of
wife selling, and his refusal to follow any case reported in
Espinasse's Reports, on the ground that the author was "just another ass"). Maule was the only judge to dissent (in part) on the ruling in
''M'Naghten's Case'', which laid down the legal definition of
insanity
Insanity, madness, lunacy, and craziness are behaviors performed by certain abnormal mental or behavioral patterns. Insanity can be manifest as violations of societal norms, including a person or persons becoming a danger to themselves or t ...
.
Maule retired from the bench because of poor health in 1855 but became a
Privy Councillor.
Maule never married, sharing a house with his widowed sister, Emma Maria Leathley, and unmarried niece, Emma Leathley. He died at home in
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
.
References
Bibliography
*Obituaries:
**''Law Magazine'', new ser., 5 (1858), 1–34
**''Solicitors' Journal'', 2 (1857–8), 236
**''Law Times'' (23 Jan 1858), 247–8
----
* FitzGerald, J. D. (2004)
Maule, Sir William Henry (1788–1858), rev. Hugh Mooney, ''
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
The ''Dictionary of National Biography'' (''DNB'') is a standard work of reference on notable figures from British history, published since 1885. The updated ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' (''ODNB'') was published on 23 September ...
'', Oxford University Press, accessed 17 August 2007
*
External links
{{DEFAULTSORT:Maule, William Henry
1788 births
1858 deaths
English lawyers
Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge
UK MPs 1837–1841
Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for County Carlow constituencies (1801–1922)
Senior Wranglers
Justices of the Common Pleas
Barons of the Exchequer
Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom