THE LAW MERCHANT.'

Auckland Star, Volume LV, Issue 211, 5 September 1924, Page 9

THE LAW MERCHANT.'

ADDRESS BY MR. A. H. JOHNSTONE.

A most interesting and educational address on "The Law Merchant" was delivered by Mr. A. 11. Johnstone, the well-known barrister and solicitor, to members of the Chambers of Commerce at their monthly luncheon. Mr. A. A. Martin (president) was in the chair.

Mr. Johnstone said that he was-prob-ably justified in assuming that amongst an audience consisting mainly of men who followed commercial pursuits there would be few, if any, who were not familiar with the principal mercantile documents and general legal incidents annexed to them. Bills of exchange, cheques, promissory notes, bills of lading, and insurance documents passed daily through their hands, and were dealt with so satisfactorily that comparatively few transactions relating to them ever came before the law courts. Lt would not be his purpose to speak concerning the mercantile law as they now found it. The speaker then indicated where .the law had its origin, and how it came to be part of the English law.

What was now spoken of as the law merchant was merely a collection of usages each of which existed amongst persons engaged in mercantile transactions, not only in one particular country, but throughout the civilised woria, and each of which had acquired such notoriety in the mercantile world that courts would take judicial notice of them. One remarkable characteristic of the law merchant, said Mr. Johnstone, was that in its inception it was interi national in character. It did not grow up in England as a part of the common law, and, indeed, formed no part of the law of England strictly so called until the beginning of the seventeenth century.'

Mr. Johnstone then referred to the origin of many of the mercantile usages, the ancient laws of the seas, how much of the commerce of the Middle Ages was carried on at great fairs; the hearing of mercantile cases by the Admiralty Court, and the great change that took place from the middle to the end of the eighteenth century owing to the work and influence of Lord Mansfield, Chief Justice of England. The speaker concluded by stating that in their daily work commercial men might make the law, but it would not be the more or less haphazard class of law made by Parliamentary legislation.. It would be law arising out of the practical necessities of business which first tested, tried, and perfected by merchants themselves in the course of their transactions, and having obtained widespread notoriety, would in due course be recognised by the Courts. Mr. Johnstone was warmly thanked for his address.