The Farmington times. (Farmington, St. Francois County, Mo.) 1905-1926, 1921-12-09
WHAT is THE MATTER
WITH THE LAW?

Every man on the street thinks
there is something wrong with our
courts, and the most eminent lawyers
in the country agree with him. Ev-
erycne of the last three Presidents OF
the United States, all lawyers them
selves, have pleaded for Improvements
in our administration Of justice. Elihu
Root, probably the leading and most
successful practicing lawyer in the
world, has called our judicial proceed.
ure a disgrace. Woodrow Wilson
whose great intellectual honest and
impartiality is recognized by all the
nations of the world, says that our
judicial procedure is many decades be-
hind that of every other civilized gov
eminent in the world.
These troubles have existed for
many years. They will continue to
exist until we do two things: l Learn
the causes Of our troubles and the
remedies for them; 2 make enough eff
fort to apply the remedies when found.
To try to help do this first thing
learn our troubles and their remedies
"A series of articles will be written
that will tell plainly what is the mat
ter with the law and what we can do
about it.
The articles will be prepared by a
committee composed of: Chief Justice
Harry Olson, of the Municipal Court
of Chicago, which handles the largest
amount of business Of any court in the
United States; Judge ]. NJ. johnson
of Kansas City, formerly of the Court
of Appeals; Judge ]. Hugo Grimm of
st. Louis and Ewing Cockrell of War
rensburg, present judges Of the Cir
cult Court; General John NJ. Atkin-
son, formerly Attorney General; and
Herbert Harley, Secretary of the
American Judiciary Society, which
has made the largest and most
thorough study of judicial administra-
ton of any body in this country.
The committee includes practically
an equal number of Democrats and
Republicans, and an equal number of
judges now on the bench and lawyers
in private practice. It includes men,
bers who have served several terms
as prosecuting attorneys, who have
practiced law both for and against
large corporations, who have served as
professors in law schools, who have
been special investigators o. courts
an over the country, and who have
personally studied and visited the
courts of this country, Canada and
European countries. And all articles
come from and are approved by the
whole committee unanimously.
Each article or group Of articles
will analyze definite trouble and
give a definite remedy. And this
remedy will be one that has been ac-
tually applied to the same trouble in
some court elsewhere, and is in sue
cessful operation today in that court
and community.
The articles blame nobody, neither
lawyers nor judges, neither people nor
politicians. They propose no theo-
retical reforms, but simply try to tell
how all of US can help get courts that
do three great things:
l. Give justice surely, quickly, and
eheaply.
2. Take care of people and their
happiness as well as they do of prop
erty and its ownership.
3. Give the poor man as much JUS
tice as the rich one.
Such courts we can get without a
single revolutionary or radical change,
but with the same judges, the same
lawyers, and substantially the same
procedure, we can by simple rear
rangement secure results beneficial to
everybody and harmful to nobody.