at the bar has taught us something about the practice of the profession, and no doubt will them.

While the conducting of litigation in court is not all of the profession, it is a very important part of it. The Law Schools are established and carried on to teach men how to do that, and the business that comes to a lawyer in his practice. The student enters the law school for this purpose, and expects to be taught along that line of work; and so, if the law school is to do the work it is expected to do by the profession, it "is the best thing we can do for a student to teach him how to go into court and conduct a litigation"-at least teach him something of it, give him all the experience possible in this branch and in every other branch of practice.

Criticism is easy, and in these days seems to be quite generally indulged in; but, for all that, if we will fairly consider the facts, we must conclude, for it is true, that there never was a time in the history of our profession when young men were so thoroughly and so well equipped as they are to day. The Law Schools during the last fifteen years have done splendid work, and the result of their work is shown in the young, successful practitioners of the profession. So apparent is the advance and thoroughness of this work that today no one will contend, or even claim, that the law school is not the best, and by far the best, place, if not the only place, to obtain a legal education.

Too much attention cannot be given to teaching practice in these schools. By practice I do not mean merely the trial of cases in a practice court-that is only a part of it--but practice of the law as it comes to a practitioner in the business of his profession, practice of

the substantive law, taught in the several courses of the Law Colleges. In the third or last year of the course this should be made, not only an important feature, but a requirement.

To this end instructors in the Law Colleges should be something more than school teachers. They should be men who have had practice in the profession, in the law office, and in the courts; men of experience in all the work of the profession, as well as men. of learning, who are able to teach the law and apply it, who are not confined to books alone, but who can draw from the wellsprings of legal lore gathered from an actual and successful practice.

It is the method of teaching the students to practice law adopted by the Detroit College of Law, with which I am connected, that I have been asked to describe.

This particular department of work in the College is called "The School of Practice." The instruction is confined to the men of the third year class, except as men of the other classes are required to act as jurors, parties, and wit

nesses.

The instruction in the school of practice starts with the law office. This necessarily is done in part by lectures, but whenever it is possible we make it actual work. It includes the form of drawing, folding, and properly keeping in the office papers that come to the lawyer to draw and keep for his clients, how to keep the office docket and the many little details of the office, not omitting the conduct and deportment of the lawyer in his office.

An instructor is given charge of a course, teaching conveyancing, the drafting of contracts, wills, deeds, mortgages, and that which naturally falls to such a course. The student is required

to draw these papers and submit them, being aided from time to time in his work by the instructor, and a record of his work carefully kept. A text-book is used in this course. An instructor is given charge of the work of teaching the students how to organize corporations, draw the articles, superintend and direct the holding of the first meeting of stockholders, electing of directors, keeping the records, and drafting the by-laws. This also includes practice in proposing and passing resolutions for the transacting of the business requiring it, the commencing and defending of suits. The work is actually done by the students under the supervision of the instructor, who aids when necessary, and lectures, quizzes, and criticises, at all times keeping a careful record of the qualifications and progress of each stud

ent.

A course of instruction is given on the preparation of briefs and the use of law books, in which the students are taught the proper way of using the decisions and statutes, the circumstances affecting the relative value and weight of the doctrine of a decision, the rules as to the construction of statutes, the best methods to search out what may be wanted from the great mass of legal publications, and how to use the matter effectively in preparing brief or argument.

We do not fail to remember that the first court that the young man will first, without doubt, enter after he is graduated, will be the justice court, and that his success in this court in the very beginning of his career will have much to do with his future. We therefore give him a course in justice court practice, using a text-book, lectures, and actual practice. As soon as the class have advanced in text-book and quizzes

far enough to have learned the theory of commencing actions, they are given statements of facts involving the several kinds of actions, and all are required to commence the proper action, these papers are collected, gone over by an instructor, criticised and marked, and the student shown his errors, if any. When defenses have been gone over and quizzed in the text-book, each student is required to draw the pleadings in the cases given him and so all the papers incident to the cases submitted, as affidavits for continuances, affidavits of merits, motions, the service of process and returns, etc., etc., are required to be drawn and submitted.

After this course in text-book work and drafting pleadings and papers has been given, statements of fact are submitted, two or three at a time, upon which every student in the class is required to take one side or the other, as he chooses, draw the pleadings, make a brief for the trial, and submit them for inspection. The case is then assigned to be tried by two young men who have taken opposite sides of the That the practice of the justice. court may be more thoroughly understood, one of the class is selected to act as justice, for each case selecting a different man, until all have acted. This appointed justice is required to issue papers and keep the docket, etc.

case.

The trial is had under the supervision of the instructor, all of the work of each student is carefully marked, and the record kept and considered in making up his standing, including the work of the justice.

Every student of the third year class. must go through this work and try as many cases as the time will permit.

The work of the probate court is taken up and proceeded with similarly.

The practice in the circuit or district court is taught first by text-book, which is gone over as was the justice court practice. Brief making and trials continue throughout the year. Justice cases and probate cases are appealed and tried in the circuit court, and new cases that is, cases that the circuit has original or concurrent jurisdiction ofare commenced and tried in the circuit court.

By this system cases of every kind are commenced, briefed, and tried. Following each trial, the instructor gives a short lecture, in which he criticises before the class the trial and suggests improvements. From the circuit court the case is taken to the Supreme Court by writ of error or appeal, as the case may be, bills of exception being made and settled when necessary to review the case. Motions and interlocutory proceedings are had as the case progresses.

Equity cases are also given the students, and proceedings to hearing, hearing and decree had, with the motions and interlocutory proceedings incident to such

cases.

Juries are drawn from the freshman class, witnesses and parties are taken from the second year class, and in this

way all have a taste of the school of practice.

All courts, except the justice courts, are presided over by an instructor of the College; the Supreme Court by three of the faculty.

In this short general description I have not attempted to go into detail, but to give such a description as will give the reader an idea of the plan and the work.

There may be a great difference of opinion as to this work and its efficiency, but I may be pardoned for adding that it has been by observation that in our College it has elicited greater interest and enthusiasm on the part of the students than any other work. And this interest has not been confined to the third year class alone, but second year men are anxious for the time to come when they can take up the work, and in my judgment more substantial and successful instruction results from this work than from any other. Certainly, after noting the success of the endeavor, it would take a great many addresses and a great many resolutions to convince me that this is not the very best way to teach, not only the practice. of the law, but "the substance and soul of the law."

W

HEN the lawyer learns from his client the history of the transaction regarding which his aid is sought, he usually analyzes the statement, reducing it to its lowest terms, and knows in a general way the legal principle the facts involve. To merely recognize a general principle, however, is insufficient in his work as a practicing lawyer. For example, suppose the facts related involve the rule, "General appearance waives defect in process." know of this general rule is not enough. He must know what acts of the parties constitute a general appearance, and must learn how courts have applied the rule to like facts. So, to be fully equipped to serve his client, he must know where and how to find the precedents showing such application.

Το

A general rule or principle of law, like general expressions regarding lay matters, implies nothing certain, nothing specific, and can only be construed generally.

The application of the principle to the facts of the case is generally the only difficulty. The principle itself is fixed and well understood, while a small circumstance attending an act may change the application. So a knowledge of the law is to a great degree a knowledge of precedents. In fact, the main use of authorities or decided cases is the recognition of some principle and its application to the particular facts involved, which the court can follow out in deciding the question before it.

It is cases showing the application of the legal principle, and not the principle itself, which the courts of to-day most demand.

Therefore it is not in search for the principles of law the practicing lawyer

spends so much time, but to find cases showing how the principles have been applied; and in his search for them he must use the facts as a guide, because the application arises out of the fact, and not vice versa.

Legal publications coming under the category of text-books and books of like. nature deal with the law in a general way and are confined largely to abstract statements of principles, and to these the author appends the authorities to which he refers; but it is impossible to tell, without reference to a Digest or the authorities themselves, to what extent or in what particular way the cases cited support the proposition in the text. Textbooks and encyclopædias do not give the facts in each case, and therefore cannot show the particular application of the principle involved.

If the lawyer needs to refresh his memory regarding a principle of law, however, then he should resort to these publications as a valuable aid; but, if he desires to know how the principle has been applied to particular facts, he should resort to Digests, which, if properly constructed, give in concrete form the essential facts and show the application or holding of the court in each case.

It does not suffice the lawyer in his particular case to learn: "The right to defend one's self continues as long as an unjust attack." This principle existed long before courts expressed it. What he wants to learn regarding his case in hand is Have such acts of parties as he is prepared to show been construed by any courts to be "an unjust attack"? Are there any precedents? And to learn. this with certainty he must resort to Digests, which give the facts.

The next annual meeting of the American Bar Association will be held at Portland, Me., on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, August 26th, 27th, and 28th, 1907. The International Law Association is considering holding its meeting in America this year, and it is probable that this body will convene at Portland, Me., on August 29th, 30th and 31st. The Association of American Law Schools will also meet this year in Portland, Me., at the same time as will the American Bar Association. The officers of the Association of American Law Schools for the ensuing year are William P. Rogers, Dean of the Cincinnati University Law School, President; William R. Vance, Dean of the George Washington University Law School, Secretary. The Executive Committee consists of Henry Wade Rogers, Dean of the Yale Law School, John H. Wigmore, Dean of the Northwestern University Law School, and James B. Brooks, Dean of the Syracuse University Law School.

The increase of popular control over national conduct, which marks the political development of our time, makes it constantly more important that the great body of the people in each country should have a just conception of their international rights and duties.

Governments do not make war nowadays unless assured of general and hearty support among their people; and it sometimes happens that governments are driven into war against their will by the pressure of strong popular feeling. It is not uncommon to see two governments striving in the most conciliatory and patient way to settle some matter of difference peaceably, while a large part of the people in both countries maintain an uncompromising and belligerent attitude, insisting upon the extreme and uttermost view of their own rights in a way which, if it were to control national action, would render peaceable settlement impossible.

One of the chief obstacles to the peaceable adjustment of international controversies is the fact that the negotiator or arbitrator who yields any part of the extreme claims of his own country and concedes the reasonableness of any argument of the other side is quite likely to be violently condemned by great numbers of his own countrymen who have never taken the pains to make themselves familiar with the merits of the controversy or have considered only the arguments on their own side. Sixty-four years

have passed since the northeastern boundary between the United States and Canada was settled by the Webster-Ashburton treaty of 1842; yet to this day there are many people on our side of the line who condemn Mr. Webster for sacrificing our rights, and many people on the Canadian side of the line who blame Lord Ashburton for sacrificing their rights, in that treaty. Both sets of objectors cannot be right. It seems a fair inference that neither of them is right; yet both Mr. Webster and Lord Ashburton had to endure reproach and obloquy as the price of agreeing upon a settlement which has been worth to the peace and prosperity of each country a thousand times as much as the value of all the territory that was in dispute.

In the great business of settling international controversies without war, whether it be by negotiation or arbitration, essential conditions are reasonableness and good temper, and a willingness to recognize facts and to weigh arguments which make against one's own country as well as those which make for one's own country; and it is very important that in every country the people whom negotiators represent and to whom arbitrators must return shall be able to consider the controversy and judge the action of their representatives in this instructed and reasonable way.

One means to bring about this desirable condition is to increase the general public knowledge of international rights and duties and to promote a popular habit of reading and thinking about international affairs. The more clearly the people of a country understand their own international rights the less likely they are to take extreme and extravagant views of their rights and the less likely they are to be ready to fight for something to which they are not really entitled. The more clearly and universally the people of a country realize the international obligations and duties of their country, the less likely they will be to resent the just demands of other countries that those obligations and duties be observed. The more familiar the people of a country are with the rules and customs of self-restraint and courtesy between nations which long experience has shown to be indispensable for preserving the peace of the world, the greater will be the tendency to refrain from publicly discussing controversies with other countries in such a way as to hinder peaceful settlement by wounding sensibilities or arousing anger and prejudice on the other side.

In every civil community it is necessary