The Martin Case.

Gisborne Times, Volume V, Issue 18, 23 January 1901, Page 4

The Martin Case.

(Wellington Free Lance.)

Here was a man who, on the threshold of middle-age, and in the first flush of his matured powers, had attained to one of the most distinguished positions in the State. Ho had just realised the ambition of a strenuous and laborious life by receiving permanent appointment to the Supreme Court bench. Up to this point Mr Martin’s career has been brilliant, his reputation stainless, his private character unchallenged. No public man in New Zealand ever made a more rapid rise to lofty position, and so readily and convincingly proved his fitness for it. He was Crown Prosecutor at Christchurch when, through the instrumentality of tho Hon. W. P. Reeves, he was appointed Stipendiary Magistrate at Wellington. An abler or more humane magistrate never sat upon the New Zealand bench. When Mr Warburton was made Auditor-General, Mr Martin was chosen to succeed him as Public Trustee, and in this responsible position he exhibited not only great administrative talent, but also that unflinching independence which ever marked him. ' Rather more than a year ago he was raised to the dignity of President of the Arbitration Court. The work of the Arbitration Court was in considerable arrear at the time, but Mr Justice Martin attacked the accumulation of cases with characteristic vigour, and, not only rapidly disposed of them, but won-golden opinions from all sorts of people by the skill and address and the transparent fairness with which he unravelled the tangled skein of complex industrial problems, and planned an adjustment which all parties could accept as a modus vivendi. Finally, just before Christmas last, Mr Martin received permanent appointment as Judge of the Supreme Court. In nine years he had passed tnrough all the grades we have enumerated. . . . We are sorry for Mr Martin, but we are afraid the suggestion of sudden illness won’t go far with sensible people to explain or palliate his conduct. We are sorrier still for Mr Martin's family, who are the innocent sufferers by his misconduct.