Ludlow sat as Member of Parliament for
Launceston from 1868 to 1874 and for
Frome from 1874 to 1876. He was also a
Recorder of
Exeter from 1867 to 1876 and became a
Queen's Counsel in 1868. In 1876, he was appointed a Justice of the Common Pleas Division of the
High Court of Justice, a post he held until 1880, and then served as a
Lord Justice of Appeal from 1885 to 1897. Lopes was knighted in 1876 and sworn of the
Privy Council in 1885. In 1897, he was raised to the peerage as
Baron Ludlow, of Heywood in the County of Wiltshire; his country house was
Heywood House, near
Westbury.
Judgments •
Learoyd v Whiteley [1887] UKHL 1, (1887) 12 AC 727 (Lopes concurring with
Cotton LJ and
Lindley LJ in the Court of Appeal) – the House of Lords affirmed the Court of Appeal decision in this
English trusts law case concerning the
duty of care owed by a trustee when exercising the power of investment. •
British South Africa Co v Companhia de Moçambique [1893] AC 602 (Lopes sitting in the Court of Appeal) – the House of Lords overturned Lopes' Court of Appeal decision and by so doing established the
Mozambique rule, a
common law rule in
private international law that renders actions relating to title in foreign land, the right to possession of foreign land, and
trespass to foreign land non-
justiciable in common law jurisdictions. •
The Satanita [1897] AC 59 – Contract law case atypical of the conventional offer & acceptance pattern seen in English law. Lopes decision at appeal affirmed by the
House of Lords. ==Family==