for, according to Père Daniel (tom. ii. p. 217, 227), the colonel-general of the Swiss troops had the power of nominating subaltern officers to the rank of captains by a certificate, which enabled them to hold that rank without the regular commission. The same author states also that if any captain transferred himself from one regiment to another, whatever might be the date of his commission, he was placed at the bottom of the list in the regiment which he entered, without, however, losing his right of seniority when employed in a detachment composed of troops drawn from several different regiments. BRIBERY, in English law, has a threefold signification: denoting, first, the offence of a judge, magistrate, or any person concerned judicially in the administration of justice, receiving a reward or consideration from parties interested, for the purpose of procuring a partial and favourable decision; secondly, the receipt or payment of money to a public ministerial officer as an inducement to him to act contrary to his duty; and thirdly, the giving or receiving of money to procure votes at parliamentary elections, or elections to public offices of trust. I. In England judicial bribery has from early times been considered a very The introduction of brevet rank into heinous offence. By an ancient statute, the British army, as well as that of the 2 Hen. IV. " All judges, officers, and half-pay allowance to officers on retiring ministers of the king convicted of bribery from regimental duty, probably took place shall forfeit treble the bribe, be punished soon after the Revolution in 1688. But at the king's will, and be discharged from the practice of granting, when officers the king's service for ever." The person from different regiments are united for offering the bride is guilty of a misdeparticular purposes, a nominal rank meanour. Sir Edward Coke says that higher than that which is actually held, "if the party offereth a bribe to the appears to have been of older date; for judge, meaning to corrupt him in the in the Soldier's Grammar, which was cause depending before him, and the written in the time of James I., it is judge taketh it not, yet this is an offence stated that the lieutenants of colonels punishable by law in the party that doth are captains by courtesy, and may sit in offer it." (3 Inst. 147.) In the 24 Edw. a court of war (court-martial) as junior III. (1351) Sir William Thorpe, then captains of the regiments in which they chief justice of England, was found command. (Grose, Military Antiquities, guilty, upon his own confession, of having vol. ii.) It was originally supposed that received bribes from several great men both officers holding commissions by to stay a writ which ought in due course brevet and those on half-pay were subject of law to have issued against them. For to military law; but, in 1748, when the this offence he was condemned to be inclusion of half-pay officers within the hanged, and all his lands and goods forsphere of its control was objected to as an feited to the crown. Blackstone says unnecessary extension of that law, the (Comment. vol. iv. p. 140) that he was clause referring to them in the Mutiny actually executed; but this is a mistake, Act was omitted, and it has never since as the record of the proceeding shows that been inserted. In 1786 it was decided in he was almost immediately pardoned and parliament that brevet officers were sub-restored to all his lands (3 Inst. 146). ject to the Mutiny Act or Articles of War, but that half-pay officers were not. (Lord Woodhouselee, Essay on Military Law, p. 112.) Brevet command was frequently conferred on officers during the late war; but the cause no longer existing, the practice has declined, and at present there are very few officers in the service who hold that species of rank. BREWER. [ALEHOUSES, p. 99; ADULTERATION, p. 36.] It appears also from the Year Book (28 Ass. pl. 2) that he was a few years afterwards reinstated in his office of chief justice. The case, therefore, does not speak so strongly in favour of the purity of the administration of justice in early times as many writers, following Blackstone, have supposed. In truth, the corruption of the judges for centuries after Sir Wm. Thorpe's case occurred was notorious and unquestionable. It is noticed by Edward " VI. in a discourse of his published by | navy, marines, or other person employer Burnet, as a complaint then commonly by or under the direction of the commismade against the lawyers of his time. sioners of the customs, shall make any (Burnet's Hist. of the Reformation, vol. ii. collusive seizure, or deliver up, or agree App. p. 72.) Its prevalence at a still to deliver up, or not to seize any vessel, later period, in the reign of James I., may or goods liable to forfeiture, or shall take be inferred from the caution contained in any bribe for the neglect or non-performLord Chancellor Bacon's address to Ser- ance of his duty, every such offender jeant Hutton upon his becoming a judge, incurs a penalty of 500l., and is rendered "that his hands and the hands of those incapable of serving his Majesty in any about him should be clean and uncorrupt office whatever, either civil or military from gifts and from serving of turns, be and the person also giving or offering the they great or small ones." (Bacon's bribe, or making such collusive agree Works, vol. ii. p. 632, edit. 1765.) In ment with the officer, incurs the like Lord Bacon's own confession of the penalty. By the 6 Geo. IV. c. 80, § 145, charges of bribery made against him in similar penalties are inflicted upon officers the House of Lords, he alludes, by way of of the excise who take bribes, as well as palliation, to the offence of judicial cor- upon those who give or offer the bribe. ruption as being vitium temporis. (Howell's State Trials, vol. ii. p. 1104.) Since the Revolution, in 1688, judicial bribery has been altogether unknown in England, and no case is reported in any lawbook since that date in which this offence has been imputed to a judge in courts of superior or inferior jurisdiction. II. Bribery in a public ministerial officer is a misdemeanour at common law in the person who takes and also in him who offers the bribe. A clerk to the agent for French prisoners of war at Porchester Castle, who had taken money for procuring the exchange of certain prisoners out of their turn, was indicted for bribery and severely punished by the Court of King's Bench. (1 East's Reports, 183.) A person offered the first lord of the treasury a sum of money for a public appointment in the colonies, and the Court of King's Bench, in Lord Mansfield's time, granted a criminal information against him. (4 Burrows's Rep. 2500.) Bribery with reference to particular classes of public officers has become punishable by several acts of parliament. Thus by the stat. 6 Geo. IV. c. 106, § 29, if any person shall give, or offer, or promise any bribe to any officer or other person employed in the customs, to induce him in any way to neglect his duty (whether the offer be accepted or not), he incurs a penalty of 500l. So also by 6 Geo. IV. c. 108, § 35, if any officer of the customs, or any officer of the army, III. As to bribery for votes at elections to public offices. 1. Bribery at parliamentary elections is said to have been always an offence at common law, and it is punishable by indictment or information. There are however no traces of any prosecutions for bribery of this kind, until particular penalties were imposed upon the offence by acts of parliament. The act 7 & 8 Will. III. c. 4, called the Treating Act, declares that no candidate shall, after the teste (date) of the writs, or after the ordering of the writs, or after any vacancy, give any money or entertainment to his electors, or promise to give any in order to his being elected, under pain of being incapable to serve for that place in parliament. The 2 Geo. II. c. 24, which is explained and enlarged by 9 Geo. II. c. 28, and 16 Geo. III. c. 11, imposed penalties both on the giver and receiver of a bribe. But the operative statute upon this subject at the present time is 49 Geo. III. c. 118, which provides that if any person shall give or cause to be given, directly or indirectly, or shall promise or agree to give any sum of money gift, or reward, to any person upon any engagement that such person to whom such gift or promise shall be made, shall by himself, or by any other person at his solicitation, procure or endeavour to procure the return of any person to serve in parliament for any place, every such person so giving or promising (if not returned) shall for every such gift or pro mise forfeit the sum of 1000l.; and every | have been paid or given under the name such person returned, and so having given of head money or any other name whatsoor promised to give, and knowing of and ever, and whether such payment shall consenting to such gifts or promises upon have been in compliance with any usage any such engagement, shall be disabled or not, shall be deemed bribery. § 22. and incapacitated to serve in that parlia- The act 7 & 8 Will. III. c. 4, having ment for such place; and any person or been found insufficient to prevent treating: persons who shall receive or accept of be it enacted &c. that any candidate or any such sum of money, gift, or reward, person elected, who shall by himself, or or any such promise upon any such en- by or with any person, or in any manner, gagement, shall forfeit the amount of directly or indirectly, give or provide, or such sum of money, gift, or reward, over cause or knowingly allow to be given or and above the sum of 500l.; which provided, wholly or partly at his expense, sum of 5001. may be recovered by any or pay wholly or in part any expenses party sueing for the same in the inferior incurred for any meat, drink, entertainCourts of Record in Great Britain or ment, or provision to or for any person Ireland. This act provides for every at any time, either before, during, or after legal expense bonâ fide incurred at or such election, for the purpose of corruptly concerning an election. It also imposes influencing such person, or any other penalties on persons giving, procuring, or person, to give or to refrain from giving promising to give or procure any office, his vote in any such election, or for the place, or employment, to any person upon purpose of corruptly rewarding such peran express contract to procure a seat in son, or any other person, for having given the House of Commons; the penalty on or refrained from giving his vote at any the person returned is loss of his seat, and such election, shall be incapable of being on the receiver of the office forfeiture of elected or sitting for the particular county, it, incapacity, and the payment of 500/.; &c. during the Parliament for which but if the person who so gives, procures, such election shall be holden. or promises any place is an officer of the crown, a penalty of 1000/. is imposed on him. Actions on the case under this statute must be brought in two years. The act of 5 & 6 Vict. c. 102, is an act for the better discovery of bribery and treating at the elections of members of parliament, and is commonly known as Lord John Russell's Act. The 20th and 22nd sections of this act are as follow:$ 20. And whereas a practice has prevailed in certain boroughs and places, of making payments to or "on behalf of candidates to the voters in such manner that doubts have been entertained whether such payments are to be deemed bribery," be it declared, that the payment or gift of any sum of money, or other valuable consideration whatsoever, to any voter before, during, or after ny election, or to any person on his behalf, or to any person related to him by kindred or affinity, and which shall be so paid or given on account of such voter having voted or refrained from voting, or being about to vote or refrain from voting, at the said election, whether the same shall Cases of bribery in the election of members of Parliament are most commonly brought to notice by the special reports made by Election Committees. [ELECTIONS.] 2. Bribery at municipal elections was also an offence at common law, and a criminal information was granted by the Court of King's Bench against a man for promising money to a member of the corporation of Tiverton to induce him to vote for a particular person at the election of a mayor. (Plympton's Case, 2 Lord Raymond's Reports, 1367.) The 54th clause of the act for the regulation of Municipal Corporations in England and Wales (5 & 6 Will. IV. c. 76) provides "that if any person who shall have, or claim to have, any right to vote in any election of mayor, or of a councillor, auditor, or assessor of any borough, shall ask or take any money or other reward, or agree or contract for any money or other reward whatsoever, to give or forbear to give his vote in any such election, or if any person shall by any gift or reward, or by any promise, agreement, or security for any gift or reward, corrupt or procure, or offer to corrupt or procure any person to give or forbear to give his vote in any such election, such person so offending in any of the cases aforesaid, shall for every such offence forfeit the sum of 50l., and for ever be disabled to vote in any municipal or parliamentary election whatever in any part of the United Kingdom, and also shall for ever be disabled to hold any office or franchise to which he then shall or at any time afterwards may be entitled as a burgess of such borough, as if such person was naturally dead." bitus should be incapable of being can The Elections of Roman magistrates occurred annually, and this circumstance gave the Romans great opportunity of becoming expert in all the means of securing votes. The word Ambitio (from which our word Ambition comes) signified literally a going about. As applied to elections, it signified any improper mode of trying to gain votes. The Tribunes of the Plebs at an early period attempted The usual mode of trying to gain votes, to check the solicitation of votes, by pro- to which the word ambitus applied, was posing and carrying a law which forbade by gifts of money. The candidate used a man to add any white to his dress with to go round and call on the voters, shake a view to an election. (Livy, iv. 25.) them by the hand, and make them civil This, observes Livy, which would now speeches. The voting by ballot in the be viewed as a small matter, raised at Comitia was established B.c. 139, and, that time a great contest between the according to the Roman system, the vote Patres and the Plebs (the Patricians and of each of the centuries and of each Plebeians). "To add white to the dress" of the thirty-four tribes was counted signified to whiten the dress by artificial as one vote. Whether then the election means as it is said, or perhaps to put on a was at the Comitia Centuriata or the Cowhite dress. From this circumstance, mitia Tributa, the object was to secure persons who were seeking the magistracy the votes of the centuries and of the were called Candidati, that is, persons tribes. Agents were employed to manage dressed in a white (candida) dress; and all this: interpretes, to make the barthis is the remote origin of our word Can- gain; sequestres, to hold the money till didate. Another law (Lex Paetelia) against the election was over; and divisores, to canvassing on the market-days, and pay it out. The Lex Licinia (B.C. 55) going round to the country places where was entitled a law against Sodalitia; but numbers of people were collected, was critics have not been agreed as to what passed B.C. 359, which Livy (vii. 15) calls the term properly means. Wunder (Proa law about Ambitus, the name by which legomena to his edition of Cicero's oration canvassing and solicitation of votes was for Cn. Plancius) says that the offence designated. The object of this law was to against which this Licinian law was check the canvassing of Novi homines, directed, differed from Ambitus, which men not of the class of nobles, who were consisted in giving money or treating the aspiring to the honours of the State. people, or in any way buying their votes. After a long interval (B.C. 181) the Lex The offence of Sodalitia consisted, as he Cornelia Baebia enacted that those who says, in using force; certain persons, were convicted of the offence called Am-called sodales (associates, agents), were 66 bribed by the candidates to compel the rest to give their votes to the briber; and that this might be the more easily managed, the members of each tribe were marked out into divisions, and the whole body of voters was divided into parcels, so that each sodalis or agent had a certain portion of a tribe or of the whole body of voters assigned to him, and it was his business to get the votes of his portion of the voters in any way that he could for the candidate who hired him. "Accordingly," Wunder concludes, in those elections (comitia) in which candidates employed sodales (agents), the multitude were not so much induced to give their votes by money as by force." This is a strange way of explaining an election: the agents were paid, and the voters got nothing. If the learned German had read the late Report on the Sudbury election, he would find it was just the other way there. The absurdity of supposing that the voters were compelled to vote, and that by one man in his particular division, is sufficiently striking. The learned commentator then proceeds to quote passages from Cicero's oration for his friend Cn. Plancius, who was tried under the Licinian law, to prove his point; but his quotations prove just as much as his assertions. It is evident that the law was directed against one of those arrangements which had been invented to facilitate bribery. Agents were appointed to look after particular sets of voters: the value of the division of labour was recognised in this method of securing votes. It is evident from an expression in Cicero's oration (c. 18), that the marking out of the voters into classes or bodies, the putting money in the hands of a person who had to pay it if the candidate was returned, the promising of the money, and the final payment, were all parts of one well-organised system of bribery. One may conclude that the voters in a tribe got nothing unless their briber was returned. They now voted by ballot, but this did not prevent bribery: it only rendered the payment contingent. The means of knowing who had voted right and who had not, we can only conjecture; but if the agents kept a good account of all the proceedings, they might not have much difficulty in ascertaining if their several squads had done their duty and kept their promise. It is quite consistent with all this that a man might be tried for the offence of bribery under the Licinian law only. There were, as it has been shown, various laws against bribery; and this was directed against that particular part of the system which was the most efficacious in corrupting the voters. It is stated that the penalties of the Licinian law were ten years' exile, the same as under the Lex Tullia. Pompeius Magnus, when he was sole consul, B.C. 52, proposed and carried a law for shortening proceedings in trials for Ambitus. When C. Julius Caesar was Dictator, he nominated one-half of the candidates for magistracies, except for the consulship, and signified his pleasure to the tribes by a circular. (Suetonius, Caesar, c. 41.) Under Augustus the forms of elections were still maintained: under his successor Tiberius the elections were transferred from the Popular assembly to the Senate. Finally, the Emperors nominated to all public offices, many of which, such as the consulship, were now merely honorary. Besides the speech of Cicero for Cn. Plancius, there is another for L. Murena, who was tried under the laws against Ambitus. The Romans could never stop bribery by legislation. The penalties, so far as we know, were only directed against those who gave a bribe, unless the Licinian law, the provisions of which are imperfectly known, may have gone further, and included Sodales (agents). But we are not aware that there is any proof of this. Bribery at elections for members of a legislative body, and of one invested with such power as the English House of Commons, is universally considered to be a political evil. It is considered a demoralizing practice with respect to those who sell their votes; and, if that be so, there seems no reason why it should not be demoralizing to those who buy them, though it is not always true that he who hires and he who is hired are equally demoralized by the baseness of the deed for which money is paid. The practice is also injurious to the constitution of the |