The Duchess of Kingston's Case, the Ruling of Lord Mansfield and Duty of Medical Confidentiality in Court

International Journal of Law and Psychiatry 35 (2012) 480–489

10 Pages Posted: 11 Oct 2014

See all articles by Danuta Mendelson

Danuta Mendelson

Deakin University, Geelong, Australia - Deakin Law School

Date Written: October 10, 2012

Abstract

The aim of this article is to demonstrate that the ruling commonly cited as the original precedent for the doctrine that, at common law, medical practitioners’ duty of confidentiality to their patients does not apply to court testimony, did not, in fact, establish any such theory. The ruling by Lord Mansfield was made in the context of cross-examination by the Crown of a medical witness in the course of the trial of the Duchess of Kingston (Duchess of Kingston Case (1776) 20 Howell's State Trials 355; [1775-1802] All ER Rep 623; [1776] 1 Leach 146), and this article will look briefly at: (1) the fascinating life of Elizabeth Chudleigh, the Duchess of Kingston, and the main events that led to her trial for bigamy; (2) the cross-examination of Caesar Hawkins and the different perceptions of the scope of confidentiality held by the 18th century lawyers on the one hand and medical practitioners on the other; (3) Lord Mansfield’s ruling that witnesses cannot withhold from the court facts which the law considers to be in the public domain; (4) the subsequent wide interpretation, usually as judicial obiter dicta, of its final paragraph in the 19th century, including early jurisprudential responses to the principle of medical confidentiality; and (5) the influence of John Henry Wigmore’s opposition to patients’ evidentiary privilege on common law during the twentieth century.

Keywords: duty of confidentiality, Duchess if Kingston, Lord Mansfield

JEL Classification: K19, K13, K41

Suggested Citation

Mendelson, Danuta, The Duchess of Kingston's Case, the Ruling of Lord Mansfield and Duty of Medical Confidentiality in Court (October 10, 2012). International Journal of Law and Psychiatry 35 (2012) 480–489, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2508216

Danuta Mendelson (Contact Author)

Deakin University, Geelong, Australia - Deakin Law School ( email )

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Burwood, Victoria 3125, Victoria 3125
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