"A SUGAR-COATED ABHORRENCE."

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 23, 27 January 1912, Page 11

" A SUGAR-COATED ABHORRENCE."

« FROM SOLICITOR TO BARRISTER. '. SPECIAL LEGISLATION. The University Senate's business yes-, I terday included a discussion on certain aspects of the Law Practitioners Act. The matter was Taised by Mr. L. Coheu (Wanganui). He "movea — ' "That the Legislature fie requested to amend ' the' Law Practitioners Act, t 1908, so as to deprive solicitors, who have been practising as such for "five years, or solicitors who have been managing- clerks for five years, of the privilege they now have of' being enrolled as ' barristers without further examination." The mover stressed the care" that had been taken v to add academic distinction to the law degree, and asked why th» section of the Law Practitioners Act, to which the motion referred, should bo allowed to remain there? It was put there to give the status of barrister to several persons — persons who had never earned it and. had never qualified for it. "This id a sample of the sugarcoated abhorrence known as special legislation," added Mr. Cohen, who thought that now the obnoxious clause was functus officio, it should stand no longer. In seconding and supporting the motion, the Hon. 'J. A. Tole 6aid that such a provision lowered the status of the LL.B. degree, and lowered, too, the status of law at the University. The motion was declared carried on th» voices. ' - /S RECOMMENDATION TO JUDGES. It was also' moved by Mr. Cohen — * "That it be a recommendation to the Judges that solicitors applying for admission should be, required to furnish satisfactory 1 evidence that they have had experience in office work." It wa<s most dangerous,, said Mr. 1 Cohen, to permit men to practise- law who had had no training in legal work. "It is a piece of gross audacity," he declared, " for a man who has never been in a law office, but who has merely passed an examinatipn,., to put up hit! brass plate and venture to offer advice ' to , the public and explain legal questions." N The Hon. J. A. Toie seconded it. After a briet debate the motion was carried.