The justice system in English history has been through tumultuous ups and downs, from corrupt officials to unfair legal systems, seemingly always with a heavily biased societal view. In How Justices of the Peace Ruled England, Michael Ward details just how justices of the peace managed to retain such a position of power whilst maintaining a legal system that was clearly farcical and unfair at its very core. With details on how the monarchy effected the running of the country and how broad political tensions left the commoners of England at the mercy of those above them, Ward paints a vivid and fascinating picture of the English justice system all the way back to the Middle Ages.

Author Biography

The author graduated in law with a bachelor of law degree in 1963 at the University of Adelaide, and was admitted to the bar in South Australia in the same year. He worked in law firms in mostly civil work until appointed a stipendiary magistrate in South Australia in 1970, then the youngest such appointment. He moved to the Northern Territory of Australia as a stipendiary magistrate for three years before returning to SA in 1975. He worked as a barrister from 1980 to 1986 before taking up an appointment as a stipendiary magistrate in Canberra. He remained there for thirteen years and then practised as a barrister in SA for three years, then back to the NT as a stipendiary until 2005. He worked back in SA as an auxiliary magistrate for the next seven years until retirement in 2012. He was the inaugural secretary of the South Australian Magistrates Association, then its president. He became the inaugural secretary of the Australian Capital Territory Magistrates Association, and the editor of the Australian Association of Magistrates' journal. He is the author of the several legal texts. Always interested in sport, he played Australian rules football, lacrosse, cricket, basketball, and tennis.