LITMIR.BIZ

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there to abide his own examination of the legality of his detention. These two provisions, by which the precipitate and perhaps intemperate proceedings of subordinate judicatures were subjected to the revision of a dignified and dispassionate tribunal, might seem to afford sufficient security for personal liberty and property. [57] In addition to these official functions, the Justice of Aragon was constituted a permanent counsellor of the sovereign, and, as such, was required to accompany him where-ever he might reside. He was to advise the king on all constitutional questions of a doubtful complexion; and finally, on a new accession to the throne, it was his province to administer the coronation oath; this he performed with his head covered, and sitting, while the monarch, kneeling before him bare-headed, solemnly promised to maintain the liberties of the kingdom. A ceremony eminently symbolical of that superiority of law over prerogative, which was so constantly asserted in Aragon. [58]

      It was the avowed purpose of the institution of the Justicia to interpose such an authority between the crown and the people, as might suffice for the entire protection of the latter. This is the express import of one of the laws of Soprarbe, which, whatever he thought of their authenticity, are undeniably of very high antiquity. [59] This part of his duties is particularly insisted on by the most eminent juridical writers of the nation. Whatever estimate, therefore, may be formed of the real extent of his powers, as compared with those of similar functionaries in other states of Europe, there can be no doubt that this ostensible object of their creation, thus openly asserted, must have had a great tendency to enforce their practical operation. Accordingly we find repeated examples, in the history of Aragon, of successful interposition on the part of the Justice for the protection of individuals persecuted by the crown, and in defiance of every attempt at intimidation. [60] The kings of Aragon, chafed by this opposition, procured the resignation or deposition, on more than one occasion, of the obnoxious magistrate. [61] But, as such an exercise of prerogative must have been altogether subversive of an independent discharge of the duties of this office, it was provided by a statute of Alfonso the Fifth, in 1442, that the Justice should continue in office during life, removable only, on sufficient cause, by the king and the cortes united. [62]

      Several provisions were enacted, in order to secure the nation more effectually against the abuse of the high trust reposed in this officer. He was to be taken from the equestrian order, which, as intermediate between the high nobility and the people, was less likely to be influenced by undue partiality to either. He could not be selected from the ricos hombres, since this class was exempted from corporal punishment, while the Justice was made responsible to the cortes for the faithful discharge of his duties, under penalty of death. [63] As this supervision of the whole legislature was found unwieldy in practice, it was superseded, after various modifications by a commission of members elected from each one of the four estates, empowered to sit every year in Saragossa, with authority to investigate the charges preferred against the Justice, and to pronounce sentence upon him. [64]

      The Aragonese writers are prodigal of their encomiums on the pre-eminence and dignity of this functionary, whose office might seem, indeed, but a doubtful expedient for balancing the authority of the sovereign; depending for its success less on any legal powers confided to it, than on the efficient and constant support of public opinion. Fortunately the Justice of Aragon uniformly received such support, and was thus enabled to carry the original design of the institution into effect, to check the usurpations of the crown, as well as to control the license of the nobility and the people. A series of learned and independent magistrates, by the weight of their own character, gave additional dignity to the office. The people, familiarized with the benignant operation of the law, referred to peaceful arbitration those great political questions, which, in other countries at this period, must have been settled by a sanguinary revolution. [65] While, in the rest of Europe, the law seemed only the web to ensnare the weak, the Aragonese historians could exult in the reflection, that the fearless administration of justice in their land "protected the weak equally with the strong, the foreigner with the native." Well might their legislature assert, that the value of their liberties more than counterbalanced "the poverty of the nation, and the sterility of their soil." [66]

      The governments of Valencia and Catalonia, which, as has been already remarked, were administered independently of each other after their consolidation into one monarchy, bore a very near resemblance to that of Aragon. [67] No institution, however, corresponding in its functions with that of the Justicia, seems to have obtained in either. [68] Valencia, which had derived a large portion of its primitive population, after the conquest, from Aragon, preserved the most intimate relations with the parent kingdom, and was constantly at its side during the tempestuous season of the Union. The Catalans were peculiarly jealous of their exclusive privileges, and their civil institutions wore a more democratical aspect than those of any other of the confederated states; circumstances, which led to important results that fall within the compass of our narrative. [69]

      The city of Barcelona, which originally gave its name to the county of which it was the capital, was distinguished from a very early period by ample municipal privileges. [70] After the union with Aragon in the twelfth century, the monarchs of the latter kingdom extended towards it the same liberal legislation; so that, by the thirteenth, Barcelona had reached a degree of commercial prosperity rivalling that of any of the Italian republics. She divided with them the lucrative commerce with Alexandria; and her port, thronged with foreigners from every nation, became a principal emporium in the Mediterranean for the spices, drugs, perfumes, and other rich commodities of the east, whence they were diffused over the interior of Spain and the European continent. [71] Her consuls, and her commercial factories, were established in every considerable port in the Mediterranean and in the north of Europe. [72] The natural products of her soil, and her various domestic fabrics, supplied her with abundant articles of export. Fine wool was imported by her in considerable quantities from England in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and returned there manufactured into cloth; an exchange of commodities the reverse of that existing between the two nations at the present day. [73] Barcelona claims the merit of having established the first bank of exchange and deposit in Europe, in 1401; it was devoted to the accommodation of foreigners as well as of her own citizens. She claims the glory, too, of having compiled the most ancient written code, among the moderns, of maritime law now extant, digested from the usages of commercial nations, and which formed the basis of the mercantile jurisprudence of Europe during the Middle Ages. [74]

      The wealth which flowed in upon Barcelona, as the result of her activity and enterprise, was evinced by her numerous public works, her docks, arsenal, warehouses, exchange, hospitals, and other constructions of general utility. Strangers, who visited Spain in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, expatiate on the magnificence of this city, its commodious private edifices, the cleanliness of its streets and public squares (a virtue by no means usual in that day), and on the amenity of its gardens and cultivated environs. [75]

      But the peculiar glory of Barcelona was the freedom of her municipal institutions. Her government consisted of a senate or council of one hundred, and a body of regidores or counsellors, as they were styled, varying at times from four to six in number; the former intrusted with the legislative, the latter with the executive functions of administration. A large proportion of these bodies were selected from the merchants, tradesmen, and mechanics of the city. They were invested, not merely with municipal authority, but with many of the rights of sovereignty. They entered into commercial treaties with foreign powers; superintended the defence of the city in time of war; provided for the security of trade; granted letters of reprisal against any nation who might violate it; and raised and appropriated the public moneys for the construction of useful works, or the encouragement of such commercial adventures as were too hazardous or expensive for individual enterprise. [76]

      The counsellors, who presided over the municipality, were complimented with certain honorary privileges, not even accorded to the nobility. They were addressed by the title of magníficos; were seated, with their heads covered, in the presence of royalty; were preceded by mace-bearers, or lictors, in their progress through the country; and deputies from their body to the court were admitted on the footing, and received the honors, of foreign ambassadors. [77] These, it will be recollected, were plebeians—merchants and mechanics. Trade never was esteemed a degradation in Catalonia, as it came to be in Castile. [78] The professors of the different arts, as they were called, organized into

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