The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1892-02-18

4 1,o,I would allow me, substitute carloads.
HT Ta tr,,fb His Isl that the unwritten law. in
tb ~, renorts and decided cases, and in
the innnmerable treat1ses which spring
m l;ke GRASS under our feet, has become
at last a chaotic mass, a labyrinth in
which no man can ina MS way, unless
he has got lawyer 70 go along with him
and support him. Now mat is state OF
things Which think is not creditable to
ne &c . GREAT nation. You have brought
;,,stice F. every mans door; YOU must
br;n o,se a knowledge of the law, at all
events of its elementary principles. and
as far as.vou can, a knowledge of its
nrincinles TO every man. Our law is to
bba fopnd in thousands of volumes
and in acts of Parliament without
end in acts of Parliament more or less
nnintellioiBle bv reason of the uncouth.
harharoTs Dhraseology in which they are
fran,ed Il - 1t is time that all that
was removed. It is time that all that
was removed 1t is time that your laws
should be reduced into intelligent phrase
ology: il is time that your laws
should be digested. No one
but LAWYER knows What is law except
| as to the most elementary principles.
| This is not state of things ereditable to
this country; and as great politician
once said, Register, register, register
My advice, and am very glad to have
the opportunity to express it publicly
here. TO the legislator, lawyer and the
layman is Digest, digest, digest-Codify
codify. codify.' / will notlisten to man,
who tells me that the thing is not capa-
BILE of being done. Other nations have
| done IL * x x 1t is not only
France that has done this, for other Con-
tineptal nations have done the same,
Prussia. Austria and Italy have all adj
mirable codes. y x y There are some
people who run away with the strange
notion that the law is made only for
LAWYERS and Judges to interpret They
do not seem to see the fact that the law
is made for the community, and not
merely for the body OF lawyers. X u
Depend upon it, the time will come when
the pressure of public opinion on this
subject will not allow our law to remain
i'll the state of chaotic uncertainty in
| which to certain extent it isl These
are the words of the late Chief Justice of
England. Let us now listen to the views
of the present Chief Justice, Lord Cole
ridge. AT the public reception rendered
to him by the Bar Association of New
York City in 1888, in reply to the address
of welcome, he spoke eloquently and at
| length, but can quote only that portion
of his remarks relating to reform in the
English Judicial system and some sug-
gestions as to the technicalities of the
common law.
'sYou are probably aware" he said,
ssthat we in England have been engaged
for the last ten years, beginning in 1873,
when as attorney-general, was respon-
sible for passing the Judicature, Act
through the House of Commons, in en-
deavoring to cheaper, and simplify and
expedite our procedure upon the lines OF
those salutary statutes which the wis
dom of Parliament enacted about thirty
years ago lin 1924.
'It was high time that something was
done to expedite and amend and simpli-
fly the common law. 80.
sit had become associated inlthe minds
of many men with narrow technicality
and substantial injustice.
'sThat was not the fault of the common
law, but it was the fault, if fault
it were, of the system of pleading, which
looked at practically, was a small part of
the common law, but very powerful men
had contrived to make it appear that it
was almost the whole OF it-that the
science of statement was far more impor-
tant than the substance of the right, and
that rights of litigants themselves were
comparatively uniInportant unless they
illustrated some obscure, interesting and
subtle point of the science of stating
those rights
sit is a comfort to think that those sub
tleties, if there was any merit in them,
have not entirely been banished from the
earth, and | am told that there is a state
in this progressive Union in which they
are, at this moment, as alive as ever, and
| venture upon this subject to make you
practical suggestion.
'sYou have lately procured, may say
most wisely, a great National Park, in
which the beauties and glories of nature
and the strange and eccentric forms
which natural objects sometime assume,
NAV be preserved forever for the instruc-
ton and delight of the citizens of this
great republic. Could it not be arranged,
that with the sanction of the State, some
corner in that one State should be pre-
served, as kind of pleading park, in
which the glories of the negative preg-
nant, dbsque hoe, replication de injuria,
rebutter and sur-rebutter, and all the
other weird and fanciful creations of the
pleaders brain might be preserved for
future ages to crafty the respectful
curiosity of your descendants, and
that our good old English judges, if
| ever tuoy Ie-VlSlJ JIG SllHupSoS VI GliO
moon, might have some place where
their weary souls might still find the
form preferred to the substance, the
statement to the thing stated. cannot
help thinking that that would be mat
ter worthy of the liberality, of the gen
| Jus and conservative instincts of the
great American. public. But it is really,
to speak seriously, great pleasure for
me to find that slowly, and if l may say
so, with wise hesitancy, you are gradual
ly admitting into your system those
changes which we have lately made, as
and when they satisfy the needs, the
temper, and the genius of your people. ;"
The abolition Of terms is an important
feature of the reformed procedure and
indicates how one great cause of delay
in our courts can be avoided. So far as
all matters preliminary to the final hear
ing are concerned, terms are of no more
use in common law action than in suits
in equity and should be abolished, for if
the,same frequency of return days could
exist in one case as in the other, coupled
with the like power of the judges to act
in vacation in all preliminary matters
leading up to the trial, much of the pres
ent ground of complaint of the laws de-
lay would be remedied, especially if pro-