A STUDY IN LEGAL ADMINISTRATION AND RECORDS SHARON ...

mandate and jurisdiction of the creating body. Each kind of record, from the
smallest praecipe to the largest index, has its place and its importance.
It is interesting to contemplate the long history of equitable justice. In
England, equity began its development within the common law. The necessity
for fair treatment under the law was recognized and met by clergy-judges. They
included canon law and 'God's laW as part of their means of dispensing fair
justice. However, the usefulness of their broad jurisdidion was confounded by
the intriacies of the writ systern. Equity became diffiailt to obtain as
administrative restrictions obstructed the avenue to it. But the need for equity
persisted.
A new body ernerged. Court of Chancery employed a reinvented writ that
better served the requirements of justice. The chancellor had at his disposal the
injunction and the decree of specific performance. But Chancery was a court of
record. As such, it ernbraced two aspects, the judicial, and the administrative.
Like Common Law before it, Chancery eventually succumbed to rigidity of
precedent on the judicial side, and proliferation of paperwork on the
administrative side. Still the need for equity persisted.
Refoms were needed in order for equitable justice to prevail. In England
the Judicature Acts created a new streamlined Supreme Court of Judicature with
jurisdiction over both law and equity. In Manitoba the Queen's Bench Act
amalgamated Common Law and Equity into a new Court of Queen's Bench.
Separated administrations were drawn together into one, and the restructured