Believing the members of your body are in sympathy with the aims and purposes of the National Bar Association, I have trespassed on your time and courtesy to explain its policy, and to invite your earnest co-operation in carrying it out.

On motion, the recommendations of the National Bar Association were referred to the Committee on Law Reform.

On motion of Mr. Payne, the President elect was authorized and directed to appoint nine delegates to represent this Association at the next meeting of the National Bar Association.

10. LAW REFORM.

Report of committee, by its chairman, David McCulloch:

I am sorry to have to state to the Association this morning, that through some inadvertence or accident the manuscript I had prepared to submit to the Association at this time, has got out of its place, and I am unable to account for it; so I shall have to state as nearly as I can from recollection, what the substance of that paper would be if read before the Association.

The committee on Law Reform, in looking over the proceedings of this Association for some years past, find that all matters of reform that have been suggested or in anyway brought before the public, have received consideration at the hands of the committee or through public addresses that have from time to time been delivered before this Association. They, therefore have not deemed it wise to present any new measures at this time, looking to amendments of the statutes, but to devote themselves more particularly to the question whether or not this Association, through this committee on Law Reform or otherwise, is accomplishing all that it possibly could in this direction.

This committee, according to our Constitution, is an annual committee, a new committee being appointed every year. Its duties, as pointed out, are these: It shall be the duty of this committee to consider and report to the Association such amendments of the laws as in its opinion should be adopted; also to scrutinize proposed changes in the law and when necessary report upon the same; also, to observe the practical working of the judiciary system of the State and recommend, by written or printed report, from time to time, any changes therein which observation or experience may suggest.

It will be observed that the duties of the committee are simply to recommend, to report and recommend. They have no power whatever to give practical effect to their recommendations, or to appear before the legislature and urge the adoption of measures that they recommend or that this association recommends. The committee has stated reports to make from time to time; it receives the thanks of the association and is discharged. The report goes into our printed minutes in very small type, and when in the course of the year those are distributed to the members, they may be read or they may not. But further than this, the reports and recommendations of this committee or of the association, do not meet the public eye or come to the attention of the members of the legislature.

What is lost in this regard may be illustrated by what took place at the first meeting of this association. A demand came up from the people of the State, that our judiciary system should be remodeled. The matter was called to the attention of the public and of the legislature through the public press, and for some weeks before the meeting of this association, it was somewhat thoroughly discussed. When the association met, a committee was appointed to prepare the necessary bills to be presented to the legislature. Those bills were prepared and printed. Some of the members of that committee spent a considerable time with the legislature. The result was the reformation of our judiciary system, whereby

we departed from the old system of having one judge in each circuit, to having three judges and the establishing of the Appellate Court. This was mainly the

work of the association at its first session.

A review of the proceedings of the association since that time will show, that nearly every subject demanding reformation at the hands of the legislature has been discussed either by the committee on Law Reform or by members of the Asssociation who have addressed us from time to time; yet how few of our measures have received legislative recognition, or have become embodied in the laws? Our experience will answer the question.

Another matter that may be mentioned is the fact that, by the Constitution of this State*, the judges of the circuit courts are required to report once in each year to the Supreme Court any amendments to the laws that may suggest themselves. To what extent this duty is performed, I am not able now to say, but presume that all the judges in the State do make their reports from time to time, as occasion presents itself. The question is further urged upon us, do those recommendations reach the ear of the legislature? The Supreme Judges are required to recommend to the Governor each year any amendments to the constitution or to the laws which may suggest themselves as proper; and they are required by the constitution to prepare the bills necessary for carrying those amendments into effect. Now it must be apparent to us all, that this is a duty somewhat incompatible with that of the judicial office. Our judges generally have all the judicial work that they can attend to, and if we were to require of them to review all the statute laws and prepare bills for amendments to all statute laws as suggested, any one can see a very large proportion of their time would be demanded for a service which is of a legislative rather than judicial character.

Then there is another thing: it is a very delicate duty to require the judiciary to sit as censors and revisers, of their own motion, as it were, on the action of a coordinate branch of the government. And hence it is, this circuitous route, that is provided by the constitution to get amendments to laws before the legislature, is practically annulled.

We have also pressed upon us by the National Bar Association, and by the American Bar Association, certain measures of State policy, which it is thought are of considerable importance; for instance, the uniformity-under the adoption by Congress, or by adoption in all the States of this Union-of statutory regulations touching the question of marriage and divorce, commercial paper, bills of lading, acknowledgments of deeds and execution and proof of laws. It is thought that all of these could be brought into harmony throughout the Union, by the adoption of a uniform system by the several legislatures. Whether this can be done, of course, is somewhat problematical, but the demand seems to be made in good faith and good earnest, and our attention is called to giving some heed to these questions.

Now the question presents itself, where is the body in this State that can accomplish the work necessary to be done, in order to give practical effect to the suggestions that are made by the different Bar Associations, or by the judges of our courts of record? Have we the necessary machinery at work to do so? The answer might be, the legislature are the proper persons to attend to that; but we all know that with the multiplicity of political questions and financial questions that are continually before that body, how little opportunity and how little practical knowledge the majority of the members of the legislature have upon these questions, and, where they have their own constituencies to look after, and their interests to subserve, it is hardly to be expected that a very general review of statute law can be looked for at the hands of the legislature, without some central body to suggest, control and govern the preparation of the necessary bills to be considered by the legislature.

Now in order to remedy this, some suggestions have been made. It has first been suggested that the term of service of the Committee on Law Reform of this Association be extended to two years, and that during the first year-say the present year, when no legislature is in session-the duties of that committee should be, to receive suggestions, to mature measures, and to prepare bills to be submitted

*Art. VI, Sec. 31.

to this body at its next session, in readiness for recommendation to the legislature, and that during the second year the services of the committee should be directed more particularly to supervision of the passage of those measures through the legislature, by acquainting members with their several provisions, and advising with the governor, if necessary, as to he propriety of the approval of the bills. A second suggestion has been, that the committee itself be enlarged to the number of nine, the appointees to be well distributed through the State, and that their term of service be extended to three years, one-third of the members going out every year, in this way to keep up a continuously established committee, who will not lose sight of measures already resolved upon and not yet fully secured.

Now in answer to all this, it is said that the duties thus suggested would be more than ought to be required of an ordinary practicing attorney without compensation, and the suggestion comes to the committee with a great deal of force, and they are not fully prepared to answer it; and while the committee is tolerably unanimous upon the necessity of having some central body of this kind to prepare measures for the legislature, yet they are not prepared to say that that duty ought to be imposed upon members of the profession without some compensation therefor. And hence we leave the matter just in that condition.

Another suggestion has been made, that if the committe had the means of employing a Secretary, who should for the time being be located at the State capital through sessions of the legislature, and whose business it would be to mature and superintend this class of legislation, much might be accomplished in that way. The committee, however, are not prepared to recommend the adoption of either of these measures, but simply suggest them for the consideration of the Association. This leads us to another thought: whether our statute law is not in that condition wherein it would justify the appointment of a commission by law, with sufficient salary to command the best of talent, and whose term of service should be shorter or longer, according to the necessities of the case, to compare our statutes one with another, and eliminate, so far as possible, conflicting provisions. Now we all know, those of us who have followed the decisions of our courts of last resort, what a vast amount of time and labor is expended in the effort to reconcile apparently conflicting statutes. If we could have a commission of revision who would take the entire body of our statute law and thoroughly consider and digest it, comparing statute with statute, the statutes of our own State with the statutes of other States, and the decisions of our Supreme Court upon the validity of statutes and the construction of the constitution, and in this way eliminate all superfluous matter and bring the whole body of our statute law into one harmonious whole, it might well justify the expenditure of the time and money necessary to accomplish an object so desirable.

Another thought that has suggested itself to the committee is this: It is now twenty years, or nearly so, since our present constitution was adopted. Those of us who are in active practice scarcely realize the fact that we are settled down to a permanent working condition under that constitution, and the laws enacted in pursuance thereof. And yet we hear already the sound of a rustling in the public mind in favor of a convention to revise and amend, and probably to adopt, a new constitution. Whether such a measure is demanded or not we cannot tell, but a reference to history might show that we ought to be prepared to answer the question. From 1818, the time of the adoption of the first constitution, until the adoption of the second one in 1848, was only a period of thirty years. It looks like a very long period, to look back to it and to read the history of our State and the decisions made under that constitution; but thirty years, which are only the average, we may say, of one lawyer's practice, was all the time that elapsed from the adoption of the first to the adoption of the second constitution. Then succeeded a period of only fourteen years before the calling of another convention, and the people were again called upon to vote upon a new constitution, which, on that occasion, was defeated by the popular vote. Yet in only twenty-two years from the adoption of the constitution of 1848, the constitution of 1870 was adopted-the third constitution of the State. And now already a period of twenty years has elapsed, and we hear it suggested that the constitution of Illinois, as it exists at the present time, is not adequate to meet exigencies, and a call is already coming up for a new constitution. Now we, as members of this Association, and members

of a profession who are expected, and rightly expected, to always take a leading part in such measures as these, ought to be prepared to answer intelligently whether or not a constitution is actually demanded at this time.

This, Mr. President and gentlemen, is about the substance of the paper I had prepared to read in a more formal way, and if it should come to light, I shall furnish it cheerfully to the Association, the contents of which I have now stated orally.

11. CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION OF THE SUPREME COURT. Upon motion of Mr. Raymond, the President was authorized and directed to appoint ten delegates to represent this Association at the Centennial Celebration of the Organization of the Supreme Court, to be held in the city of New York on February 4, 1890.

12. AMENDMENTS TO CONSTITUTION.

Mr. Payne moved the following amendment of Article XVIII, by adding thereto the provision, that

"Any member of this Association may withdraw therefrom, by written application to the Secretary for that purpose, and the payment of all annual dues accrued, and including the dues for the year in which such application is made."

Adopted.

Mr. Wheeler moved an amendment to Article IX, by striking out the first sentence reading "The Committee on Law Reform shall consist of five members," and inserting instead thereof the following:

"The Committee on Law Reform shall consist of nine members, to be appointed at this meeting, three of whom shall serve for one, three for two, and three for three years; and that at each annual meeting hereafter, three members shall be appointed in place of those retiring, who shall serve for three years."

Adopted.

Mr. Richberg moved that Article XVI, be amended to read as follows:

"There shall be an Annual Meeting of the Association, held at such time and place as the Executive Committee shall fix, in January of each year, and such adjourned meetings as the Association, by a vote of three-fourths of all present, may determine; and at any such adjourned meeting any business of the Association may be transacted, except the election of officers.

"Special meetings may be called at any time by the Executive Committee. At such special meetings no business shall be transacted, except such as shall be specified in the notice thereof. At every meeting of the Association, the presence of twenty-five members shall be necessary to constitute a quorum. At least one month's notice shall be given of the time fixed for the Annual Meeting."

Adopted.

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13. RELIEF OF UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT.

The special committee, appointed at the last meeting, through Messrs. J. K. Edsall and S. S. Gregory, made report:

Your committee appointed to consider measures for the relief of the Supreme Court of the United States, under a resolution passed at the last meeting of the Association, beg leave to report, that in the opinion of your committee a Federal Appellate Court should be established, to which appeals can be prosecuted from the Circuit and District Courts, and from which, under proper restrictions, appeals should be allowed to the Supreme Court of the United States.

The members of the committee believe that this system is, on the whole, the most practicable and efficient that can be suggested. They do not undertake to recommend in detail how such courts should be constituted, nor to define the exact limit of their jurisdiction. They are of opinion that our experience in this State has been of a character to induce the members of this Association generally to concur in this proposition. At the time that our Appellate Courts were established, the docket of the Supreme Court of this State was much overcrowded, and its members very considerably over-worked. Since its adoption, this condition has been relieved, and the practical workings of the system are believed to have been highly satisfactory to the profession, and to the people of the State at large.

There is, in England, a similar intermediate court, called the Court of Appeal, to which appeals go from the courts having general jurisdiction, and from which appeals and writs of error are prosecuted in the House of Lords.

Your committee, therefore, recommend this as the most expedient and adequate remedy for the delay in the administration of justice, incident to the crowded condition of the Supreme Court Docket, and suggest that this Association accordingly, by resolution, express its approval thereof.

And thereupon the following, offered by Mr. Raymond, was adopted:

Resolved, That the President and Secretary of this Association, are hereby instructed to at once forward, on behalf of this Association, to the Senate and House of Representatives, in Congress assembled, a memorial, urging the speedy enactment of some measure for the relief of the Supreme Court of the United States.

14. LOCATION OF THE SUPREME COURT.

At the request of the President of the Association, the Honorable John Dean Caton, of Chicago, the Honorable. Benjamin R. Sheldon, of Rockford, the Honorable John M. Scott, of Bloomington, and the Honorable Lyman Trumbull, of Chicago, and who had for many years occupied seats upon the bench of the Supreme Court, were requested to express their views respecting the location and holding of the Supreme Court of the State, at one place only.

Pending the reading of the papers, the present Chief Justice and Associate Justices of the Supreme Court, accepted the invitation of the Association, and were present at the reading of the following communications from the distinguished ex-justices named.