The territorial jurisdictions of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council expanded and contracted in line with the British empire. A full list of jurisdictions from which appeals were sent can be seen by using the drop-down menu for ‘Place’ on the catalogue.
It would be important to keep in mind that the jurisdictions do not, in many cases, correspond with present-day national boundaries. Neither do they always correspond with the administrative boundaries of single colonies. For example, the Supreme Court for China, Japan and Korea at Shanghai covered vastly larger physical territory compared to Jamaica. But in terms of appellate hierarchy, they were exactly at the same level, that is, just one level below the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. This difference in the ‘catchment area’ of the courts that sent appeals reflected the variable density of British interests in different parts of the world.
