The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1871-04-26


six vacancies in the Commune Assembly in
Paris. General Cluseret, taxing ADVANTAGE
of his position, rules with iron hand and
perseoutes with relentless severity those who
he has reason to believe are opposed to him.
If any conclusion can be drawn from this il
is that even among the rebels themselves the
approach of dissolution is perceived, and the
day is coming when the leaders of the Paris
Reds will pass out of sight and leave France
to be reconstructed, we trust, by the govern
ment Of an enlightened republic.
CURIOSITLES OF AMERICAN LEGAL
PRACTICE.
Frsm heJondon Saturday Review.
The proceedings of American courts of
justice have much of the interest which be-
longs to a foreign country, while they are as
easily In .elligible as if they took place in
England. 1t is curious and instructive to
observe how the law and practice of these
courts, derived originally from our own have
been modified by national character or habit,
or by contact with systems of isrispradence
from which our English system las remained
unfortunately isolated. The law of American
courts has been in general improved by this
contact, but their practice has in some
respects deteriOrated We spoke lately of
the extraordinary protraction of criminal pro-
ceeding5-in the State of New York by suc-
cessive appeals. A man having been tried by
was heard and reheard by judges. who had
before them printed report of the evidence
given before the jury, but not, as we un-
derstand, the witnesses themselves. The Privy
Council in England hear Indian appeals on
printed reports of the evidenee Of wit
nesses- in India, and very unsatisfactory such
a method of proceeding is, but nobody
would dream of applying it to a criminal
case in which the witnesses were resident
in England. If the verdict of afrst jury is
not conclusive as to prisoners guilt, it
might be placed in the discretion. of court
to order him to be tried again. by another
jury; but, except on questions of law, no
other sort of appeal would be deemed in Eng
land satisfeotory. This, however, is rather a
grave discussion, and we will turn. from it to
the consideration of some amusing features
of American courts which exemplify diversi-
ties, not Of legal systems, but of human cha
raeter.
The love of startling effect and of tall talk
is much stronger among American advocates
/ and Judges than with our own, and this pro-
pensity is encouraged by the frequent alter
nations Of the same practitioner between
bench and bar. We are all familiar with one
example of American forensic oratory. ''If,
gentlemen, the defendants pigs are to be
permitted to roam at large over the plaintiff
farm, then, gentlemen, ay, then indeed,
have our ancestors fought and bled and died
|
| caricature of the prevailing style is shown by
charge of an American judge which we find
reported in recent number of the New York
| Herald. The ingenious gentlemen who
! furnish reports to that journal from
courts and Congress have fine sense
of the ludicrous, and great capacity for
making the best of good story. Nothing
could be more artistic than the last touch
which one of them put to his description of
| ha al orriv vaI of fha
at New York. After drawing gloomy and
narrowing picture of the sufferings of these
Fenians in British dungeons, and remarking
that they looked uncommonly and sur
prisingly we'll under the circumstances he
proceeds to say that the severity of the incar-
ceration to which they had been AFFECTED was
strongly shown by the fact that they were able
to endure with equanimity the tortures of O
New York reception. But the report
to which we are now referring gives the very
words spoken by Judge, without any at
tempt at establishment by the reporter be-
yond large type heading which states that
Judge Bedford, in his charge to the Grand
Jury at the Court of Gen sral Session for New
York, had opened a campaign against the
'legal shysters." In England, although we
have not the term ''shyster," we have the
animal thereby designated, and he is said tc
be particularly rife at the Old Bailey.
shyster is tout and touting may be prac
tised either by barrister, or by his clerk
or by his past or future clients. 1t is saiC
that barrister at the Old Bailey once made
such an eloquent defense that, although
his client was convicted and sentenced to
long term of imprisonment, the clients graft
tude caused him to tout SO effectually fo
this barrister among gentlemen in difficulties
that the other barristers were obliged Il
memorabilia the Home Secretary to let hin
out of prison, as they found that if he re-
mained there the barrister for whom he touteC
would get all the business of the court. In
general, however, toutiDg can only be prac
tised in England with very great caution; but
in New York the dishonest and unprincipleG
members of the bar" otherwise called shys
ters, are, as Judge Bedford says "a growing
evil" 1t is not the custom in England fol
the bar TO be present while the Judge il
charging the Grand Jury, and therefore il
any English judge ever compared the bar to
a garden of the fairest flowers, where
all are beautiful but some,
meaning of course the Queens counsel
and serieants, are more beautiful than Others
the bar would only receive this charming and
poetic compliment through the medium OF
, next days newspapers. But in New Yorl
both the compliment and the ''scathing re-
buke" of Judge Bedford were, or might be
beard by all practitioners in his court, anC
We may conceive that he actually contem
plated from his desk several rows of learned
heads Uhan ha aaid that she looked unon En-.