in a great number of different ways. He has a and rocky row to hoe who adopts the legal pr sion to bring him fame and fortune, and i starts out in his own little country town he b stay right there and not listen to the call of I Fortune.

Let the big cities alone if you must be a lav There are fifty times more attorneys now than needed to keep us from being sent over the r Stay at home and be content with the practice rived from your own community,

"It's better to be a big frog in a little puddle than a little frog in a big mud puddle. That is a piece of the Big City's philosoph It is old stuff-has been used before.

But it is true!

Reflections of a lawyer,

Stanford Law Library

The Earning Capacity of Lawyers.

A committee appointed by the Baltimore Bar Association lately brought in the following report:

"This association is face to face with an important situation. We have been informed that seventy per cent. of the members of this bar are not making a livelihood. We do not believe eighty per cent. of the 1,500 or 1,800 members are making $100 a month. Corporations doing our business are working not only to our detriment, but will also ultimately inflict tremendous injury upon the general public. Slowly, but with persistence, the corporations are pushing the lawyers to the wall. They advertise, solicit, and by their corporate influence and wealth monopolize the legal field."

Benno Lewinson, Chairman of the New York County Lawyers' Association, said that there are 16,000 lawyers in New York, seventy per cent. of whom live on the verge of starvation with an income of not more than $3 a day.

In the N. Y. Globe of July 21, 1911, George P. Wilt, who has been in the N. Y. County Court House for twenty-five years, is quoted as saying the following:

"Lawyers are not what they used to be. The second growth of attorneys seems to run largely to fennel and ragweed. Maybe it's because half the young attorneys of to-day don't get enough to eat. They'd best be behind a ribbon counter, and

pull down a nice, steady, dependable $12 Saturday night.

"Of course, there are many good attor who do not come here at all. Some practic most exclusively in the federal courts, or the c nal courts, or elsewhere, and might not pass doors of this building once in a generation. from what I can see, it strikes me that the y lawyer of to-day doesn't average up to the y lawyer of a quarter of a century ago. And not believe that the law pays as well as it did t if an average could be struck among all lawy Some get tremendous fees now, of course—bu greater number by far get no fees at all.

"There isn't as much litigation to-day, in E portion to the size of the city, as there was th Then people who had a cause of action engag an attorney, put a mortgage on the old farm, a galloped gayly to court to fight it out. A lawy only needed one rich client with a short temper be sure of a livelihood. Nowadays people ha better sense. Instead of threshing it out in cou after the good old-fashioned way, and taking a peal and exception and I don't know what, ea man puts his affairs in the hands of a lawyer. A they get together in an office and go over the who trouble, and find where this man erred and the man inched a little. By and by a fair compromis is reached, both sides are satisfied, and time an money have been saved.

"This is becoming the case more and more.

EARNING CAPACITY OF

LAWYERS.

45

know lots of young attorneys who tell me they had rather have a desk at a good salary in the office of some corporation than try to make a precarious living by the practise of law. Business men don't like to waste time in fighting now."

"Purging the Bar" and "Lese Majeste."

(The following letter was sent to a newspaper of wide circulation).

To the Editor of the

New York, July 15, 1908.

In your editorial of July 10th, entitled "Purging the Bar," it is stated that a lawyer was suspended for filing an affidavit that a certain Municipal Court Justice favored a certain lawyer known in the district-court practice as the "Attorney-General," and that the clients of this favored lawyer were shown preference over others, the Appellate Division saying "that it was not right to criticise the motives and integrity of judicial officers, thereby reflecting upon the administration of justice." While there can be no doubt that the Appellate Division acted within legal bounds and that it was discretionary with it to disbar the attorney altogether, still I think that our laws and public opinion in reference to the judiciary are a menace to the institutions of a free country and are entirely undemocratic. The liberties of a free people depend on free criticism, and to uphold the integrity of the various govermental departments it is absolutely necessary that the people shall have the right to express their honest opinion about the servants of the people. Even the chief magistrate of our country may be freely criticised, and no one would say that such criticism would be detrimental to the proper administration of the