The morning journal-courier., 1908-08-22
A FIGHT ron REAL JUSTICE.

The day Is fast approaching when this country will witness credtable reforms in It's court methods, There are many reasons why sober and thoughtful citizens should support Mir Taft for the presidency of the United States, but none more potent than his intention, repeatedly avowed, that he will do his utmost to bring about an organization of the courts which will grant justice that s not only sure but speedy and economical, MT Tafts experience and training in the legal profession has been such as to make him realize what court reforms are needed, and his individuality is such as to warrant feeling of conn- dence that he will follow his convic- tIons In the matter without fear or fa- vor.
 But MT, Taft is not the only innu ence contemporaneous at work for needed court reforms. At the meet ing of the American Bar association to be held at Seattle next week. will be presented, and, in all likelihood d national code of professional ethics. Not only are the "Canons of Ethics, as they are called, in the highest de- gree commendable, but the high pos ition of the American Bar association Is such as to insure their adoption as practical among American judges and lawyers everywhere.
 The eanons are the result of con clusions reached by a committee of the association appointed to investi- gate the causes and remedies of de- lays and unnecessary expenses in llti- gation. The committee has come to the conclusion that slow and expens- i've methods are synonymous with in- justice. Where court methods have been expensive and slow, as in the case of Harry Thaw for instance or a hundred other trials, civivl and crim- inal, the results have been unsatis- factory. The more money party to suit has had, the oftener has 1t re- i suited that the dlspensation of jus tice has degenerated into an intricate game, in which there have been legal rules of unquestionable worth ir 1 themselves but so manipulated that cases have been won and lost, not up on their own merits or demerits, bu' rather upon the success or failure oi i the lawyers conducting them to live 1 up to or make use of the strict letter of these rules.
 Too often has 1t been the custom of our barristers to repeatedly ask the judge to make intricate rulings upon the various phases of trial, delicate questions of the admissability of evidence, 1t may be, or other matters upon the spur of the moment. If the rulings have been favorable to them so much the better; if they were not the lawyers would invariably take  exception and have 1t entered upor l the record, Upon the basis of these exceptions, appeals to higher courts ] would be made, if the final decision! were unfavorable, and upon the basis | of these exceptions, rather than upor 1 the true merits of the cases, would tho higher court judges in turn make l their decisions.
 The bar association proposes to pu an end to this sort of thing, which i' ] nothing more or less than q submerg ence of justice. It proposes that fir the future all courts of appeal shal l decide both civil and criminal liti gation brought before them by basins i their conclusions solely upon the mer its of the cases at hand taken in thei entirety, as based upon the court rec ords. IL is a step towards the ligh and it demands the approval of ever! lawyer and citizen. In the past veal thy men under indictments, those ac cused of murder for instance, have s'
 been able to delay their trials, by de
 manding special rulings upon specia
 points from courts of appeal, as t' constantly postpone their punishment
 It has been big evil, For that req
 son it's abolition is the more iHeces sary.