Subject_1 MEMBER of PARLIAMENT. Subject_2 DIVISION III.
The Qualification of Freeholders possessing Lands liable in Public Burden for L. 400 Scots.
Subject_3 SECT. V.
How a division of Valuation may be set aside. - Every Party interested in a division ought to be made a Party to it. - Erroneous division.
Earl of Home v. Stephen Broomfield
Date: 24 July 1760 Case No. No 76.
In an application to the commissioners of supply, for dividing the valuation of lands which are charged in cumulo in the cess-books, found unnecessary to make the superior a party.
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Stephen Broomfield was proprietor of certain lands holding of the Earl of Home, and of other lands holding of the Crown, all lying in the shire of Berwick.
Broomfield applied to the Commissioners of Supply, setting forth, that all his lands were charged in the cess-books in cumulo; and craving, That the cess of the respective lands should be divided in proportion to the real rent. The Commissioners took a proof, and pronounced a decreet of division.
The Earl of Home contended, That by this decreet, the lands holding of him were valued too low; and brought a reduction of it upon this, amongst other grounds, That it was null, in respect the Earl, the superior, was not made a party to the process of division before the Commissioners of Supply; and he insisted, That as freehold qualifications are now esteemed a valuable property, and as the tendency of the process of division was to restrict the valuation of the lands of which he was superior, he had a manifest interest in the question, and ought to have been made a party.
Answered for Stephen Broomfield, No law requires, that superiors be called in divisions of valuation. The acts of convention, and acts of Parliament, which authorise Commissioners of Supply to make such divisions, mention no such thing; and the universal practice proves, that it is not necessary. The Crown is superior of all the lands in Scotland; and yet the officers of state are never called in divisions of valuation. If then it were necessary to call the superior, all divisions hitherto made would be void.
“The Lords repelled the reasons reduction.”
Reporter, Auchinleck.For the Earl of Home, Lockhart.Alt. Ferguson.Clerk, Kirkpatrick.
Fol. Dic. v. 3. p. 409. Fac. Col. No 240. p. 439.
