The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1912-01-31

eeiving. Codding fights liquor instead
patience and has calm depths that
pass all understanding. No one ever
| accused a Virginia judge of the old
school of any of these things.
F. Dumont Smith was also there
Without him the gathering would
have lacked the final polish Mr.
Smith used to run the Kansas senate.
/ He runs the Kansas Magazine now.
In matters of dress and lite8ature he
is a master. In courts of law he is as
subtle as a Hindoo sorcerer. He thinks
more of bulldogs and friends and
| books than he does of public favor.
SO he has never been elected governor
of his state.
Chief Justice Still Young.
Chief Justice Johnston sat in the
back of the room in a group of young
lawyers. The chief justice is the friend
of the young man. There is a reason.
The justice has gray hair Time has
touched his face with indelible fin
gers. But in his heart is a miracle
of youth and warmth, and no one who
speaks from the vantage point of his
friendship would ever name him at
over thirty years of age.
Judge L. S Ferry of Topeka came to
hear the Stone speech. Judge Ferry
looks like one of the writer's of the
magma charter. He speaks softly in
the court room. but so does a dunn
DUN bullet. The judge has read
en- Ough law books to ballast a seago-
ing sloop. If all the printed lines of
his briefs were placed end to end,
they would stretch as far as Tom Nc
Meals Kansas tomato vines, which is
to say three times around the globe.
Judge Dana, who is also a judge of
a sandwich, listened closely to the
speeches during the afternoon. Judge
Dana was elected some years ago to
the Shawnee district court for life
sentence He deserved it. He is one
of the judges who tries to cover with
bruSque speech his natural inclination
to be merciful. It's a good combina-
ton.
There were hundred other lawyers
there, each with his little popularity
that has a meaning all it's own Some
of them play golf and others raise
muskmelons. They have all been
through the mill, that is the old tim
ers, and the young ones are going
years for oratory and six more for
technicality. Armed with these they
may enter the door of mystery while
other men stand outside and pay to be
told what lies behind the door, The
sounding brass and tinkling Gym bal
of the laws forms cannot be played
by hands that have not passed a foot
ball down the line at college and
cooked food and made beds in the lit
tie office for five years, and thumbed
big books to shreds, and dabbled the
ink from an hundred wells and tied
the tape of briefs that were not brief.
The layman may jostle a lawyer on
the street or in the restaurant or
street car or the marts of trade, but
in the courtroom the layman ShrivelS
up like an autumn leaf and looks on
the lawyer from afar The layman
knoweth not and fears much. The
lawyer knoweth all things and fear
eth not the unknown language, the
maze of mystery, the tangle of forms,
the terror of red tape. the battling air.
the Notifications of sheepskin, and all
the menace and ceremonial of the well
conducted court.
one hundred and fifty lawyers in one
room at enc time. 1t was quite a. thing
to have seen and would have been en-
joyed more but for the fear and spec
ulation inspired by their assembled
presence
Mr. Hutehins' Address.
But about the meeting of the bar
association. President Hutchins, in his
address, sa-~-.
"The initiative and referendum, con-
tains the elements of weakness that
have always rendered ineffective all at
teInptS at government on an extended
scale. through the fundamentally Of
pure democracy, the elements that the
founders of our institutions realized
and sought to avoid by the establish
1nent of a representative system. The
prime requisite to success in the work
ing out of the problems of self-govern-
ment is the calm and temperate and in
telligent consideration of such problems
that may be secured from proper rep
resentatives of the people, but that
could rarely be secured from the sub
OF the problems to the people
THE remedy for lack of respect for
the law as declared by the courts is
certainly not to be found in any change
that will result in SubOrdinating the
authority of the courts. If judicial de-
cision is to be dominated in any de-
gree by the uncertain and frequently
irrpulsive and illogical conclusion of r
popular majority, the great steadying
and conserving influence of the Judic-
iary that has meant so much thus lar
10 the American commonwealth Will be
gone forever. There are certain partic-
ulars in which courts may well be re-
formed. But such reformS-as are need
ed should and Will come through the
action of the legal profession and can
never be brought about by turning the
courts over to the popular will. What
the country needs is a proper educa-
ticnaI campaign to show the people the
importance of preserving the const1tu-
tionaI system of our country and main
tanning dndiminished the power Of o
really Independent judiciary. The lead
inc and directing influence of such
must be the American bench
and bar
The bar banquet tonight at the Elks'
cluh will be a brilliant and pleasant
affair.
1870 uR~A@@