seven of the adults in the county. When the justices were eliminated in the 1360s, and cases came first to justices of the peace and then to the King’s Bench, the records are sparse and sometimes missing altogether; but we know enough from the early years to see that the machinery of the law was mostly used against workers who wanted more money than employers wanted to pay. This is not surprising; if someone’s offence was refusing work there was nothing to discuss. They were judged on the spot and punished until they agreed to do what was wanted. There was no need to go to the kind of court
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