OFFICERS OF CONFERENCE OF COMMISSIONERS ON UNIFORM STATE LAWS 1913-1914. CHARLES THADDEUS TERRY, President. New York, N. Y. ROME G. BROWN, Vice-President. CLARENCE N. WOOLLEY, Secretary, TALCOTT H. RUSSELL, Treasurer, FORMER OFFICERS The first Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws was held at Saratoga Springs, New York, in August, 1892; the second at New York, New York, in November, 1892. Since then the Conference has been held annually at the place of and immediately preceding the meeting of the American Bar Association. Presidents. †1896-1900-*LYMAN D. BREWSTER..... .Danbury, Connecticut. 1901-1909-AMASA M. EATON..... Providence, Rhode Island. 1909-1912-WALTER GEORGE SMITH... Philadelphia, Pennsylvania CHARLES THADDEUS TERRY. New York, New York. 1912 Secretaries. 1895-1898-FREDERIC J. STIMSON.... Boston, Massachusetts. 1898-1906-ALBERT E. HENSCHEL. New York, New York. 1906-1912-CHARLES THADDEUS TERRY. New York, New York. CLARENCE N. WOOLLEY.... Providence, Rhode Island. 1912 Assistant Secretaries. .... Danbury, Connecticut. 1896-1898-ALBERT E. HENSCHEL.....New York, New York. 1898-1905-J. Moss IVES...... 1905-1906-GLENDENNING B. GROESBECK, Cincinnati, Ohio. † Prior to 1896 the Conference was presided over by a Chairman. PROCEEDINGS OF THE SECTION OF LEGAL EDUCATION Tuesday, September 2, 1913, 3 P. M. The Section was called to order by the Chairman, Walter George Smith, of Pennsylvania. The Chairman: I need not say to the gentlemen of the Section-and to the ladies who honor us with their presence this afternoon-that with the many attractions this beautiful city offers to us, it is exceedingly gratifying there should be so large a gathering at this meeting. It becomes my duty now, as Chairman of the Section, to open the meeting with the usual annual address. (The address follows these minutes, page 756.) The first business to transact this afternoon will be the appointment of a committee on nominations, and I will appoint as the Nominating Committee: Hollis R. Bailey, of Massachusetts; Henry M. Bates, of Michigan, and Frank Irvine, of New York. Charles M. Hepburn, of Indiana, Secretary of the Section: I have no formal written report to present. There are, however, two matters of business that I would like to bring to the attention of the Section. I have received a number of letters from the manager of the Panama Pacific Exposition. The hope is-how well founded I do not know-that the American Bar Association will see fit to go to California in 1915 for its annual meeting. Assuming that this will be the desire of the American Bar Association, the manager of the Panama Pacific Exposition has written urging that the Section of Legal Education take charge of a movement to secure an international conference on the ideals and methods of legal education. It might be well, and I would recommend, that this Section appoint a committee to act, without any expense so far as the American Bar Association is concerned, in co-operation with the managers of the Panama Pacific Exposition, in the event that the American Bar Association decides to go to California. Another matter to which I would direct the attention of the Section is the growing importance of the state Bar examiners. throughout the United States. We look upon the law schools as doing the chief work in legal education, and no doubt that is so; but there has arisen within the last few years another very important influence in legal education in most, but not in all the states the state boards of Bar examiners. One curious thing about it is that these state boards have never organized themselves on any national basis. Each board is sufficient unto itself. But it would do much for the cause of legal education in its widest field if we could secure in this Section the co-operation of the law schools, the state boards of Bar examiners, and all other forces working for a better legal education and higher standards of admission. I submit that this is proper field for the activities of the Section. It is a piece of work which cannot be done by the law schools themselves, for various reasons. Among these reasons is the fact that the Association of American Law Schools does not include all the law schools and does not include the Bar examiners as such at all. We have in this Section a free field for the discussion of all proper developments in the line of legal education. It would seem, therefore, that some systematic and continuous effort should be made to bring the Bar examiners throughout the United States into touch with the work of the American Bar Association in the Section of Legal Education. With this in view I wrote to the Secretaries of State throughout the Union for the addresses of the various Bar examiners, and I also wrote to the West Publishing Company for their list of state Bar examiners. I have obtained from these two sources the names of state Bar examiners in almost every state in the union. But these lists very often do not agree. Which is the more antiquated I am unable to say whether that received from the Secretaries of State or that received from the West Publishing Company; but it will not, I think, take much more time to prepare a list that is down to date with reference to the names and addresses of all the state Bar examiners. I wish to suggest, therefore, that as part of the report of the meeting of this Section there be published a complete list of the Bar examiners of the various states. I would make that suggestion as part of this report. I also offer as a resolution that it is the sense of this Section that there be published from year to year, in connection with the report of the Section, a list of state Bar examiners, annually revised, giving their addresses in every state of the union. Those two matters of business, Mr. Chairman, complete what I wish to present as my report. The report of the Secretary was received and his recommendations referred to the incoming Executive Committee for consideration and action. The Chairman: The next matter will be the consideration of the report of the Committee on Standard Rules for Admission to the Bar, of which Mr. Lucien II. Alexander is Chairman. Lucien H. Alexander, of Pennsylvania: This committee was appointed for the purpose of drafting a set of what may be termed standard rules for admission to the Bar without any idea of instituting a propaganda for their adoption, but with the idea that there might be promulgated, after careful deliberation, the best sense of this Section upon the subject. The committee after very careful study several years ago, and after securing copies of the rules of admission in all states, were of the opinion, and so reported to this Section, that before actually drafting such a set of rules it would be well first to agree upon the fundamental propositions which ought to go into them, but which in the rules might be stated-some of them-in a mere clause, and if submitted for consideration in that form might result in a principle of great importance being so buried in the draft as not to attract particular attention. We accordingly formulated what seemed to us to be the fundamental propositions, some sixteen or so in number, and submitted them to all the members of the Association, all Appellate Court and Federal Judges, members of Boards of Bar Examiners and Law School professors, and they have been debated here on two different occasions. We again submitted the propositions with quotations of important comments made both in the Section during debate and in letters received from those sufficiently interested to write the committee. All this was embodied in a report submitted last year, and printed in the Association's 1912 volume, pages 813 to 886, inclusive. This year the Section has an extensive program, and one of our sessions is to be held in connection with the Association of American Law Schools, and so the committee, by reason of the limitation of time, are of opinion it would be wiser not to attempt to present to you any details additional to those already before you, but to re-submit the propositions in the form they were laid before you last year. We hope that if time permit such of them as it is deemed important to debate at this meeting may be called up. Two of the fundamental propositions, numbers III and IX, are to be discussed in one of the papers to be read today -the moral character of candidates. We hope that this question will be among those debated. I am therefore instructed by the committee to submit the report of last year, with, the sixteen propositions, for such action as the Section may deem proper, with the suggestion that the committee be continued to report next year in the light of the replies that may be received during the year. We have copies here in print and they will now be distributed. The propositions submitted are set forth in Vol. 37 (1912), of the reports of the American Bar Association, pp. 815-818. A summary of the discussion upon each proposition will be found in the same volume, pp. 818-886. |