Our Provost in Trouble

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OBSTRUCTING THE PAVEMENT
From the Glasgow Herald 25/06/1859 [Thanks to Penny Tray for the original article]

Yesterday at the Central Police Court (Glasgow), John Barr, shipbuilder, Ardrossan, and James Barr, contractor, Yoker, were accused of having obstructed the pavement at St. Enoch Square, by standing and loitering thereon. The gentlemen had been standing opposite a hatter’s window, when a constable came up and asked them to move to the centre of the square, as people were not allowed to stand on the pavement. The gentlemen questioned the police power in this respect, and accompanied the constable to the office.
Bailie Brown found the charge proved, and fined each of the defendants the sum of 40s.


OUR PROVOST IN TROUBLE.
From the Ardrossan & Saltcoats Herald 02/07/1859

On Friday week, at the Central Police Court, John Barr, shipbuilder, Ardrossan, and James Barr, contractor, Yoker, were accused of having obstructed the pavement at St. Enoch Square, by standing and loitering thereon. The gentlemen had been standing opposite a hatter's window when a constable came up and asked them to move to the centre of the square, as people were not allowed to stand on the pavement. The gentlemen questioned the police power in this respect, and accompanied the constable to the office. Bailie Brown found the charged proved and fined each of the defendants in the sum of 40s.—Glasgow Herald.

[The appearance of the above paragraph created not a little talk here on Saturday last; which was increased when it became known that comments upon the circumstance of "a provost" being before the Police Court were in others of the Glasgow Dailies. The dailies were inclined to make merry with the matter--treating it as a good joke. But a number of the weeklies, more just, examined the finding, and concluded that the provost had been hardly dealt with. This is the view taken by the Glasgow Examiner, and we find it endorsed by the Glasgow Mercantile Advertiser.

"We were astonished to observe that two gentlemen from the country were fined each two pounds sterling the other day by the magistrate, in the Police Court, for speaking to each other in the street, at St. Enoch Square. A police officer, it appears had ordered them into the centre of the square, and they very properly (in our opinion) questioned his authority to do so, and preferred going to the Police Court. Mr John Barr, one of gentlemen referred to, is Provost of Ardrossan and he appeared with his brother on Thursday, as noticed in another column, before Bailie Brown, who seemed to think that this was a fine chance for a Glasgow bailie to show his superiority over a country Provost. The Bailie accordingly fined him in two pounds sterling for "loitering" on the pavement, when a fine of five shillings would have more than sufficed to promote the strictest observance of order, if even that was necessary. Municipal authorities have surely entered on a new era, and we should not be surprised at what may be done next. We suppose that Mr Brown, or some one else in office, may take it in his head to call us to account for making these remarks. Although we have a great respect for the Bailie, knowing him to be a gentleman of most estimable character, we do not think we step out of our province when we caution him against allowing his natural disposition to lead him, as it occasionally does, into eccentricities; and against being guided by the advice of Mr Monro. the Assessor, who no doubt wants money, and saw his chance here for the infliction of a fine out of all proportion to the transgression, if transgression it may be called.
"ln a free country like this, we are quite accustomed to speak to each other on the street. and very much unaccustomed to be fined for it. If the Provost of Ardrossan actually transgressed the letter of the law as laid down in the Police Act, he certainly did not interfere with the spirit of it; nor has he set any example which Bailie Brown has not done a thousand times over. If speaking to a friend on the street is to cost a man two pounds, we should like to know who is to be exempted from the penalties it is in the power of the Magistrate to impose. We do not write thus because the alleged aggressor happens to be the Provost of Ardrossan, but because a crying act of injustice has been committed which would scarcely be tolerated in any civilised country in the world. If the laws are to be administered after this fashion, our liberties are at an end, and we have entered upon a reign of municipal despotism."

[A fair consideration of the whole circumstances of the case will lead every impartial reader to agree with the strictures of our contemporary. The Provost has been harshly dealt with; for what is more common than to pause and make the usual friendly enquiries when friend meets friends? and it is little wonder that annoyance was felt when ordered to "move on". But if this is the law in Glasgow, it is equally the law here; and although we think it is a straining of the law to order parties who may have accidentally met with an acquaintance to move on, or adjourn to a vacant space, it could with great propriety, and with out harshness to any one, be partly enforced in Ardrossan. Complaints against the loungers at the head of Glasgow Street are of frequent occurrence. They not only stop the thoroughfare, but they are indifferent to the blush which they call up on the females who pass, by their indecent and indiscreet remarks. It is an annoyance that both town-people and strangers have been anxious to get rid of by soliciting attention to it through our columns; and we now allude to it in the hope that the frequenters of corners of streets will see the propriety of leaving the foot-paths clear for walkers, of whom at this season of the year there are a considerable number. Young men, possessed of good sense, on reflection will see how unmanly the habit is of making remarks upon females, and will, we are sure, desist from the practice, when they know how disagreeable it is; those not so gifted will not talk the less because they have been requested to do so.—
Ed. A. & S H.]