STOWELL, William Scott, Baron (1745-1836), one of the ablest and most accomplished of English judges, especially in international law, was born at Heworth, a village about four miles from Newcastle, on 17th October 1745. His father was a “coalfitter” (or tradesman engaged in the transport of coal); his mother was the daughter of a small tradesman, Atkinson by name; his younger brother John became the famous Lord Chancellor Eldon (q.v.). Scott was educated at the Newcastle grammar school under the able tuition of the Rev. Hugh Moises. In February 1761 he gained a Durham scholarship at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, and was immediately admitted as a student of the university. In 1764 he graduated as bachelor of arts, and became first a probationary fellow and then—as successor to William (afterwards the well-known Sir William) Jones—a tutor of University College. In 1767 he took his M.A. degree. In 1772 he graduated as bachelor of civil law. As Camden reader of ancient history he rivalled the reputation of Blackstone (1774). Although he had joined the Middle Temple in 1762 (June 24), it was not till 1776 that Scott devoted himself to a systematic study of law. In 1779 (June 23) he graduated as doctor of civil law, and, after the customary “year of silence,” commenced practice in the ecclesiastical courts. His professional success was rapid. In 1783 he became registrar of the Court of Faculties, and in 1788 judge of the Consistory Court and advocate-general, in that year too receiving the honour of knighthood; and in 1798 he was made judge of the High Court of Admiralty. Sir William Scott twice contested the representation of Oxford university,—in 1780 without success, but successfully in 1801. He also sat for Downton in 1790. Upon the coronation of George ...IV. (1821) he was raised to the peerage as Baron Stowell. After a life of distinguished judicial service Lord Stowell retired from the bench,—from the Consistory Court in August 1821, and from the High Court of Admiralty in December 1827. His mental faculties became gradually feebler in his old age, and he died on January 28, 1836. Lord Stowell was twice married,—on April 7, 1781, to Anna Maria, eldest daughter and heiress of John Bagnall of Early Court, Berks, and on April 10, 1813, to the dowager marchioness of Sligo. By his first marriage he had four children, of whom two (a son and a daughter) died in infancy, a third (a son) died unmarried in middle life, while the eldest (a daughter) was twice married and survived her father.
Lord Stowell’s judgments are models alike of literary execution and of judicial reasoning. His style is chaste yet not inornate, nervous without abruptness, and perfectly adjusted in every instance to the subject with which he deals. His decisions in the cases of Dalrymple v. Dalrymple (Dr Dodson’s Report) and Evans v. Evans (1 Hagg., 35)—from their combined force and grace, from the steadiness with which every collateral issue is set aside, from their subtle insight into human motives, and from the light which they cast on the philosophy and dark history of marriage law—deserve and will repay attentive perusal. Lord Stowell composed with great care, and some of the MSS. which he revised for Haggard and Phillimore’s Reports were as full of interlineations as a bill of the Lower House corrected by the Lords. Stowell’s mind was judicial rather than forensic,—reasoning, not as for a dialectic victory nor so as to convince the parties on whose suit he was deciding, but only with sufficient clearness, fulness, and force to justify the decision at which he had arrived.
The chief doctrines of international law with the assertion and illustration of which the name of Lord Stowell is identified are these :—the perfect equality and entire independence of all states (Le Louis, 2 Dod., 243)—a logical deduction from the Austinian philosophy and still one of the fundamental principles of English jurisprudence; that the elementary rules of international law bind even semi-barbarous states (Hurtige Hans, 2 Rob., 325); that blockade to be binding must be effectual (The “Betsey,” 1 Rob., 93); that there cannot be a legal where there is no actual blockade; and that contraband of war is to be determined by “probable destination” (The “Jonge Margaretha,” 1 Rob., 189). In the famous Swedish convoy case (The “Maria,” 1 Rob., 350; see too The “Recovery,” 6 C. Rob., 348-9) Lord Stowell, in defiance of the complaints of those greedy merchants who, as Pufendorf, himself by choice a Swedish civilian, tells us, cared not how things went provided they could but satisfy their thirst of gain, asserted that “a prize court is a court not merely of the country in which it sits but of the law of nations.” “The seat of judicial authority,” he added, in words which have become classic, “is indeed locally here, in the belligerent country, but the law itself has no locality.”
The judgments of Lord Stowell were, almost without exception, confirmed on appeal, are to this day the international law of England, and have become presumptive though not conclusive evidence of the international law of America. “1 have taken care,” wrote Justice Story, “that they shall form the basis of the maritime law of the United States, and I have no hesitation in saying that they ought to do so in that of every civilized country in the world.”
See Townsend, Lives of Twelve Eminent Judges, vol. ii.; Quarterly Review, vol. lxxv.; W. E. Surtees, Sketch of Lords Stowell and Eldon·, Creasy, First Platform of International Law·, Decisions, by Dodson and Haggard.
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