Proctor (formed by a contraction from the Latin procurator) designates an officer commissioned to take care of another person's cause in ecclesiastical courts, in the stead of the party whom he represents. It corresponds to attorney or solicitor in the other courts. In the Church of Rome there are extra-proctors, a class who settle in the name of another a legal business of no litigious character; a more accurate title is mandatory. The title of proctor has been preserved only in some kinds of procurations concerning ecclesiastical affairs. These proctors may act instead of,
1. Bride and bridegroom for the conclusion of the betrothal. For not only the acts which prepare the betrothal (tractatus sponsalitii), and the suit (pactum de ineundis sponsalibus), which, after its acceptation, takes the lawful nature of a betrothal, but the betrothal itself, or the actual contract about the future matrimony, can be performed by the parties either in person or by procturation (sponsalia per procuratorem). Only the proctor must have special powers for the conclusion of a promise of marriage with a determined person (fr. 34, Dig De Rit. Rupt. 23:2).
2. Either party at the marriage act itself (matrimonium per procuratorem). Should the powers given to the mandatary have been recalled before the copulation, the marriage-act would be void. even if the proctor at that time had no knowledge of the revocation. The mandatary must be present in person, and cannot be represented by a substitute (Sext. c. 9. De Procur. i, 19); and the bride and bridegroom thus united must afterwards give their consent in person. These dispositions of canon law are preserved in the Austrian and Bavarian legislation. Protestant matrimonial law rejects marriage by procuration, but admits an exception in favor of royal persons.
3. Godfathers and godmothers, in baptisms or confirmation, may, if sick or otherwise prevented, choose third persons for their representatives at the holy ceremony (procurator patrini). As, according to the decision of the Council of Trent, the person to be baptized must have a godfather and a godmother (unus et unca), each of the parties .can make choice of a substitute, either male or female, but both mandataries cannot belong to the same sex. The real godfather, not his representative, contracts in this case the cognatio spiritualis, and the prohibition of marriage founded on it (Duclar. S. Conyr. Conc. Trid. May 16, 1630, Aug. 23 and Sept. 1, 1721). 4. Absent electors, if they can sufficiently- justify their absence, and are prepared to swear to it (c. 42, § 1, 10, De Elect. i, 6), cannot declare their vote by writing, but may give their mandate to a colleague. Ecclesiastics are prohibited from being proctors in strictly secular affairs. In the English ecclesiastical constitution, proctors are those clergymen who are chosen in each diocese to represent their brethren in convocation.
In the universities the name refers to those officers who, as representatives of the whole body of masters of arts, maintain the discipline of the university. The proctors are chosen out of the several colleges by turn. The pro-proctors are the deputies of the proctors.