The Gazette 1967/71

of a local authority and the local authority pro poses a course pursuant to the powers and duties conferred by statute in the event of such an order, the Chancery judge in wardship proceedings can not substitute his own views as to the best course to be adopted in relation to the care and control of the infant for the views of the local authority, [in re T (AJJ) (an infant); Court of Appeal; 22 June 1970.] WORDS AND PHRASES The registration of a building certified as a place of meeting for religious worship under the Places of Worship Registration Act, 1855, requires the Registrar General to be satisfied after due inquiry that it is such a place. "Religious worship" connotes, among other things, reverence and ven eration for a Supreme Being, humility, praise, thanksgiving and intercession to and for such a Being, so that where a building was used for instruction in the tenets of Scientology which laid stress on man the Registrar General's decision that it was not registrable under the Act was correct. [Regina v Registrar General, ex parte Segerdal and another; Court of Appeal; The Times, 7 July 1970.] the omission from the final version of the require ments of "unanimity" and "the accustomed re quisites" was no accident and that, accordingly, the Sixth Amendment, having omitted "the accus tomed requisites" of the common-law jury, there by omitted the requirement that the jury should consist of twelve. While the decision extends only to deciding that a six-rnan jury satisfies the requirement of the Sixth Amendment, its reason ing casts serious doubt on the constitutional necessity of the unanimity rule. The historical argument that induced the American Supreme Court to deem the twelve- man jury not to be constitutionally jnecessary, and to cast doubt on the necessity of the unanimity rule, would, of course, find no place in the inter pretation of the Irish Constitution, which derives its existence from a vote of the people and not from any parliamentary process. As the law stands 104

being a trespass. His Lordship so found when awarding the husband, Mr. Ernest Joliffe, tailor, of Slough, £400 damages and costs against the inquiry agent, Mr. Cyril Hearne, of Manderville Court, Egham, for trespass and assault. Mr. Jolliffe also sued his wife's solicitors, Willmett & Co., of Carey Street, W.C., but that claim was dismissed with costs against Mr. Jolliffe. [Jolliffe v Willmett & Co. and another; Geoffrey Lane J.; The Times, 21 July 1970.] TRESPASS BY ANIMALS The right to have the fences of neighbouring farmers kept up in order to keep out straying sheep is a right of the nature of an easement known to the law which can come within the words "easements, rights and advantages" in Sec tion 62 of the Law of Property Act, 1925, and so within the general words implied in convey ances. [Crow v Wood; Court of Appeal; 15 June 1970.] WARDSHIP Where a fit person order has been made in respect of an infant by a juvenile court in favour However, the American Supreme Court, not being bound by any rigid doctrine of precedent, did a volte-face in Williams v Florida (22 June 1970). By a majority decision, it over-ruled the previous decisions and held that a conviction by a six-man jury was not in breach of the Sixth Amendment. The rationale of the decision derives primarily from the parliamentary history of the Sixth Amendment. As originally introduced in Congress, it provided that: "the trial of all crimes . . . shall be by an impartial jury of freeholders of the vicinage, with the requisite of unanimity for conviction, of the right of challenge, and other ' accustomed requisites . .." The version that finally emerged from Congress as the Sixth Vmendment ensured an accused "the right to n speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed .. ." The court held that

THE CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT TO TRIAL BY JURY by Hon. Mr. Justi ce Henchy (Part II)