uous calling, it was ruled that he had contravened Section 10 of the Solicitors Act of 1860, and his service was vitiated accordingly. The examinations are three in number, preliminary, intermediate and final. The preliminary examination which is a condition precedent to service under articles is intended to demonstrate the possession by the clerk of sufficient general education to qualify him for the study of law. It includes among other subjects English, arithmetic, algebra and elementary geometry, the geography of Europe and the history of England, Latin and any two languages out of the following six, namely: Latin Translation, Greek, French, German, Spanish, Italian. The intermediate examination can be taken by the candidate at any time after the expiration of twelve months' service under his articles, and consists of two parts elementary law in which the selected work has been for years Stephen's Commentaries on the laws of England, and second, trust accounts and book keeping. The final examination comes on the eve of the expiration of the articles of service. The subjects are (1) principles of the law of real and personal property and the practice of conveyancing; (2) the principles of law and procedure in forms usually determined or demonstrated in the Chancery Division of the High Court of Justice; (3) the principles of law and procedure in matters usually determined or demonstrated in the King's Bench Division of the High Court of Justice and in the law and practice of bankruptcy; (4) the law and practice of probate, divorce and admiralty, ecclesiastic and criminal law, and practice and proceedings before the Justices of the Peace. Let us search our consciences and ask whether as practicing members of the American Bar we would be safe under analogous fire. Unlike the barrister, the solicitor is not compelled to maintain a membership in the Law Society, which plays so large a part in his professional life. The law list for the year 1920 contains the names of some 16,000 enrolled solicitors in England and Wales; only 9,000 of these are members of the Society but all of them alike are subject to its disciplinary power. Formerly the jurisdiction to strike solicitors from the roll for professional or personal misdemeanor, was vested in the High Court of Justice, acting upon recommendation of the Society. By recent statute, however, the Society itself is given original jurisdiction to strike off an offending solicitor, whose only remedy thereafter is to appeal to the High Court of Justice. Since the Society acts in such matters only after a formal hearing, it is fair to assume that few appeals will be successful. Thus the barrister and solicitor having entered their callings by different doors, pursue their separate lives to the end. They are not even welcome guests in each others houses. No barrister can invite a solicitor to sit at table with him in the Inns of Court; and while the barrister may visit the sumptuous and comfortable quarters of the Law Society in Chancery Lane, where solicitors congregate, his frequent coming would lay him open. to the suspicion that he was in search of business. One of the reproaches lodged against the 'notorious Jeffreys is that he came into full practice by getting acquaintance with the attorneys in city and "drinking desperately with them." Apparently it is not his habits, but his associations which history condemns. After this discussion of the ranks and orders into which the legal profession in England is divided, it may seem paradoxical to say that another point of contrast with the profession in America is the greater solidarity that prevails in England. In comparison with the close knit organizations sheltered by the Inns of Court and the Law Society, we in America seem so many scattered English grains of sand. It is difficult to make one familiar only with English atmosphere understand that in truth, notwithstanding this Association, there is no such body as the American Bar. There are instead scattered groups consisting of County, City and State Bars, with a Federal Bar here and there composed in part of some members, but united by no tie of common origin or discipline. In England, on the other hand, especially among barristers, there is a sense of solidarity and community of interest to which we do not attain. The companionship of the Inns permeates their entire professional life, and in the days gone by there was added to this the fraternity of the old Circuit messes that made their semi-annual rounds of the assize towns. These pilgrimages Dean Swift has satirized in his jingling verses: "Now the active young attorneys On the horses of their clients" and so on and so on for a hundred lines or more. Those who dwell with affectionate memory upon the golden age of the Circuit Bars, lament the fact that the leaders of today no longer go regularly upon circuit and can be enticed away from the comforts and emoluments of London only by promise of a bumper fee. Perhaps it is rapid transit, perhaps other causes less obvious, but the fact remains that the concentration in London, both of the lawyers and of the legal business of the Kingdom, is a phenomenon quite without parallel on this side of the sea. Of the ten thousand barristers' carried on the Law List, but 363 are entered as of the Provincial Bar, and in 1920 among the 307 King's Counsel but one was registered outside the Capital. Again, one-third in round numbers of the enrolled solicitors are credited to London, and one must remember that among the remaining two-thirds who are entered as country solicitors are included those who serve the great cities of the Midlands and the North, such as Sheffield, Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds and Liverpool. Which is cause and which effect might be hard to say, but it is evident either that litigation has drawn the lawyers or, what is less likely, the lawyers have drawn the litigation to a central focus. Setting to one side the petty cases tried in local courts of limited jurisdiction, an overwhelming majority of all the law suits of the Kingdom are tried and decided in the Law Courts on the Strand. For instance, in the last year for which figures are at hand, 2117 cases were set down for trial in the King's Bench Division of the High Court of Justice; only 609 of these were entered on Circuit, and of this number 384 are credited to the cities of Manchester, Birmingham, Liverpool and Leeds. Twelve of the assize towns had no case for trial; eight had but one; thirty-four others an average of but six cases. One commentator has suggested that provincial solicitors labor under the impression that London juries give larger damages than can be obtained in the Provinces, and for this reason rush to enter their cases on the Middlesex County list. In support of this, an instance is cited of a client who was once deprived of costs by Sir Henry Hawkins because his case should have been brought in Dorsetshire, but who consoled himself by the reflection that he had recovered £300, where a country jury would have given him but £50. Having embarked upon statistics, let me digress to add a word on the subject of the relative amount of litigation in England and America. One must remember, in comparing figures, that the population of England and Wales is roughly one-third that of the United States, and this disproportion will naturally reflect itself in the statistical returns. But the difference in population is quite insufficient to account for the disparity which in fact exists. Startling as it may seem, the major litigation of England and Wales is relatively little more than the litigation in our Federal Courts alone; and the vast tide of controversy that flows through our State Tribunals may be credited to us as surplus belligerency. I have no complete statistics with which to prove this assertion, nor would I tire your patience with them if they were at hand, but a few comparisons will be suggestive. During the five years from 1914 to 1918 inclusive, the average number of new cases docketed with the Supreme Court of the United States per term was 576.6; in the House of Lords for the same period it was 81 for the United Kingdom and 51.8 for England and Wales. In the year 1918 there were docketed in the Circuit Court of Appeals of the United States 1320 new cases. For the same period in the English Court of Appeals but 488, which was, however, 83 cases less than the five year average. In the same year the District Courts of the United States docketed 72,237 cases, including 20,385 bankruptcy proceedings; while in the High Court of Justice, including its Chancery, King's Bench, Probate and Admiralty Divisions, 36,171 proceedings were commenced and 1276 bankruptcy petitions were filed. It is true that in this same year the County Courts present an imposing total of 309,096 complaints entered; but 308,650 of these were for sums not exceeding £20 and but 209 for sums over £100. Figures are often misleading and generalizations from incomplete statistics are always dangerous; and yet I believe it may be truly said that the average Englishman, with all of his proverbial insistence upon his personal rights, calls less often upon his courts for relief than does his American cousin. Who shall come forward with an explanation of this fact, if fact it be? Is it a survival of days long gone when justice was not only costly but tardy and uncertain; is it because there exists in England a class of lawyers whose business lies wholly outside the Courts and in whose hands many controversies are settled without judicial aid; or is there a reason deeper still in the age-long habit of this island people to respect the law they have made and live their daily lives within its well-marked circle? Now, in addition to its organization and its unity, I venture, all novelists and story-writers to the contrary notwithstanding, to ascribe to the legal profession in England, as another attribute, a marked spirit of progress. To justify this statement by review of the sweeping changes which have taken place within the last century, notably in the Judicature Acts of 1873, 1874 and 1875, would be easy; but much has happened since the country turned to show that the English lawyer has not lagged behind the times in his liberalizing tendencies. In his own house he has set up the General Council of the Bar to rule on matters of professional etiquette; and has installed a new and comprehensive system for the education of articled clerks as solicitors, both in the Provinces and in London. The disciplinary powers of the Law Society have been reaffirmed and enlarged. Representation has been accorded to the practicing members of the profession on the committee charged with making rules and orders in all branches of the High Court, which is now composed of eight judges of the High Court, two members of the General Council of the Bar, one member of the Council of the Law Society and one other solicitor, presumably a provincial. Justice has been brought nearer to the masses by the enlargement of the common law jurisdiction of the County Courts, and a movement is on foot to distribute the trial of cases, especially in matters of divorce more generally throughout the Kingdom. In the domain of criminal law and procedure, the spirit of advancement has made itself notably felt. One would hardly expect the learned compiler of Smith's Leading Cases to stand |