ABSTRACT
After the passing of the 1845 Act, there were three possible channels for further reform. The legal profession had been fully established for centuries. Medicine was engaged in throwing off the shackles of a long association with barbering and charlatanism, and did not achieve full status until the passing of the Medical Registration Act of 1858, which set up a register of doctors who had passed prescribed examinations. In theory, the Committee thought that it was better to lessen the legal procedures of certification and to make early treatment possible. In 1877, the public preoccupation with the danger of illegal detention came to a head again. The leader of the movement for tightening up the legal procedure was the Lord Chancellor, Lord Selborne, a man of outstanding personality and ability who, at seventy-two, had a subtle intellect unimpaired by age.
