Author: Clifford, Frederick of the Middle Temple
Title: A History of Private Bill Legislation Vol. I of 2 Only - 1st Edition
Description: Butterworths, 1885. Hardcover. xxviii + 507 + (132p catalogue; advertisements on endpapers. Green cloth lettered gilt. One volume only of the first edition of the standard work. Frederick Clifford (1828-1904), journalist and legal writer, was a Middle Temple barrister. In 1868 he helped to found the Press Association. 'Clifford also pursued a career as a legal writer. He was admitted to the Middle Temple on 3 November 1856, and was called to the bar on 10 June 1859. With Pembroke S. Stephens KC, he published The Practice of the Court of Referees on Private Bills in Parliament> (1870), which became the standard textbook on the subject. It also brought him work at the parliamentary bar. The historical aspect of the practice especially interested him, and he later published The History of Private Bill Legislation> (2 vols., 1885-7). This was a valuable and painstaking account, which revealed the largely public aims of private bill legislation over the course of more than three centuries. It remained the most significant work in its field until O. C. William's Historical Development of Private Bill Procedure> (1948).' The book is clean and tight without significant marks or signatures; foretitle browned; last two pages of catalogue creased. Few minor marks to boards and little wear of corners and spine ends; 5mm bump/nick to top edge of front board. Still very collectable copy of the first volume of the 1st edition. the second volume followed the first two years later in 1887. See scans. . Very Good

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