North Carolina

In studying the development of a people nothing is more helpful than a correct understanding of their system of judicature, for here we not only learn their methods of administering justice, but, at the same time, we get an insight into their conception of justice itself. There is no question of government more vital to

Such in general were the courts in North Carolina at the end of the proprietary government, and such they continued for several years thereafter. The change of the Colonial government from proprietary to royal had very little effect upon the courts. Only such changes were made from time to time as circumstances demanded. It now

The three courts above mentioned constituted the chief agencies for the administration of justice, but there were three other courts of secondary importance. These courts, it would seem, were instituted not so much because of any actual need of them, as because similar courts existed in the mother country, but because of the additional fact