JB/119/314/004

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Panopticon Bill. Introductory Observations

stiled Sections, the present division into Sections being expunged.

II. A second particularly is the giving to each Section a Title expressive of its contents.
The innocence at least of this practice will not be disputed: for where the mention of the
title is of no use, nobody need to mention it.

The use of it, though not of the first importance, seems equally indisputable.

1. In this instance as in all others it is a matter of satisfaction at least, and relief to the
apprehensive faculty, that the name used to distinguish a thing by should convey some intimation of its nature.
2. In the present instance it has a more particular use, in the character of a preservative against
miswriting or misprinting. The significative name serves as a check upon the numerical
one. If a Section is wrong-numbered, the addition of the title indicates the mistake.

III. A third particularity, is the giving the in the like manner a short and expressive title to the Bill itself.

In the practice itself there is nothing new: on the contrary, these summary names are in universal
use, on all occasions except that on which the sue of them is of most importance. The
innovation then, such as it is, consists in the removal of a peculiarity, and that of the most preposterous
and inconvenient kind: in enabling people to speak of a Bill after its conversion
into a law, by the same name that every body had been speaking of it by, before that period,
and without which it would indeed have been morally impossible for any body to speak of it.

Indeed as far as there is any thing like novelty in practice it is rather a renovation
than an innovation: for among the earlier Statutes when there was not a hundredth part of
the occasion for it, examples of it are not uncommon.

In the present instance the call for such a name was perpetually recurring as may be seen in the collection of Forms designed for an Appendix to the Act. By this means
whoever may come to have a concern in any of the instruments for which a Form is given,
will be enabled to catch a general idea of the subject-matter and occasion of the business at
the first glance.

IV. The only remaining particularity that occurs to me is the inserting in references made
to existing Statutes, the number of Chapter, as also that of the Section.
How stands this in common practice? With

Note

II. I could have wished it had been shorter: but there is no word in it that could have been
spared. To the substantive Penitentiary Act, it was necessary to add the word Panopticon as
an attributive, to distinguish it from the Penitentiary Act already existing: as also the other
attributive General, to distinguish it from any Acts that may eventually come to be passed, at any
future time, for the erection of particular Penitentiary Houses, for particular districts.

Identifier: | JB/119/314/004"JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 119.
Date_1		Marginal Summary Numbering
Box	119	Main Headings	panopticon
Folio number	314	Info in main headings field	panopticon bill
Image	004	Titles
Category	copy/fair copy sheet	Number of Pages	4
Recto/Verso	recto	Page Numbering	f1 / f2 / f3 / f4
Penner		Watermarks
Marginals		Paper Producer
Corrections		Paper Produced in Year
Notes public		ID Number	39825
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