THE LEGAL PROFESSION.

Taranaki Daily News, 14 June 1929, Page 8

THE LEGAL PROFESSION.

While the average citizen has no qualification and little desire to comment) upon the internal arrangements of the legal profession, there were certain points in an address given at Wednesday’s conference of Taranaki lawyers to which a layman may refer without temerity. Speaking of means by which the status and efficiency of the profession might be raised, Mr. Harold Johnston, a Wellington practitioner, made the suggestion that Christchurch in the South Island and Wellington and Auckland in the North Island “should be the centres at which the judges would sit, and there the law schools should be situated and the lawyers do their work.” From the point of view of a training ground for the practitioners of the future, there may be something to be said for the proposed centralisation of legal work. Talent has a habit of drifting to the places where it has most scope, and there is little doubt but that the most brilliant' lawyers and advocates would be found at the centres. Their work and personalities would be available for study at first hand by students, and this might prove a very effective assistance in the latter’s training. But there is another aspect, that of the lawyers’ clients. It will require very much more information than that afforded by Air. Johnston to convince a resident in Taranaki that it would be better for him if any appeal he makes to the Supreme Court were to be heard at some centre hundreds of miles away. The first objection would be that it would increase expense considerably, and often make impossible that close consultation between lawyer and client which is of so great importance. Moreover, in the whole of its history New Zealand has steadily opposed centralisation of public affairs. The results of a contrary policy in Australia are not such as to suggest the Dominion has suffered from decentralisation, and though there may be. grounds for suggesting smaller circuits for the judges there seems little to support a demand for the centralising of judicial work in one or two cities. While what may be termed the administrative side of Air. Johnston’s address may be considered open to criticism, those who “have no law” can appreciate the high ideals of service which he maintained must inspire the legal profession if it is to take its rightful place in the community. Not once or twice but many times in the history of the British race has an appeal to the Courts of Justice proved that they are the bulwarks of liberty. Even in later and more democratic days well meant but unconstitutional efforts at reform have been held in check by the right of the law, while in earlier days the curb placed by it upon rapacity and unscrupulousness has passed into history. That all entering such an honourable profession should have the amplest training possible is a truism that needs no argument. How that training can best be given is for the profession to say, but in its zeal for doing go there must be no sacrifice of the ° interests or convenience of the general community.