where the most eminent lawyers can always aspire to the office, and can hold it without anxiety for their wants and needs, and a tenure during good behavior, with retirement at seventy on full pay, thus rendering the bench for all time independent by divorcing it from political changes.

Consider now for one moment in conclusion the right of our courts to sanction the practice outlined. I have examined the provisions of our constitution and our statutes. and read with care every one of the many cases decided by the Court of Appeals touching upon the respective functions of Court and jury. This is not the forum for a brief upon this question, but I believe it can be demonstrated that in our organic law and in our statutes there is nothing to deny the right of the trial court to sum up the whole evidence, and, in connection with the prayers, give the jury the benefit of its views upon the credibility of witnesses and the weight of evidence, always leaving the jury free to follow their own discretion in reaching their final verdict.

Turning now to our decisions, we find that in Smith vs. Crichton, 33 Md. 103, our Court of Appeals held that the trial court may, in its sound discretion, instruct the jury. orally, instead of in writing. In Downey vs. Forrester, 35 Md. 117, it was held competent for the trial court to give oral instructions to the jury explanatory of written instructions previously granted. In Hussey vs. Brown, 64 Md. 426, it was held that the Court may give instructions of its own, or explain the effect of those granted at the instance of the parties, provided they are not inconsistent therewith. "Such an interposition of the Court," said Judge Ritchie in that case, "is often salutary and promotive of a clear understanding of the law of the case, especially if its rulings are not clearly understood, or, as sometimes occurs, are contravened or misconstrued in the argument to the jury."

If these decisions embodied the extent to which our Court of Appeals had gone, then, reading them in connection with those cases in other jurisdictions which hold that in the absence of constitutional or statutory restrictions,

the Court under the common law may comment upon the evidence and upon its weight, provided the jury are ultimately left free to determine the facts for themselves, it could fairly be said that not only no constitutional or statutory provision, but no decision of our Court of Appeals, barred the way to the adoption by our courts of the practice herein proposed.

On June 24, 1908, however, in the case of Abraham Morris Rosenkovitz, infant, vs. United Railways and Electric Company, the Court of Appeals of Maryland reversed the judgment of the lower court, not for any error in rulings or instructions, but solely because the lower court, after reading to the jury the prayers which it granted, then proceeded to give the jury a practical explanation of these instructions, by applying them to a very brief summary of the plaintiff's and the defendant's evidence. It cannot be said that this summary which the Court thus gave was not, under the evidence, an entirely correct and impartial résumé of the respective contentions of the parties, and the lower court, moreover, was careful to conclude it by informing the jury that "it is in your province to determine what you believe in regard to this matter."

When, therefore, the Court of Appeals held an oral statement of this kind "calculated to confuse and mislead the minds of the jury," and stated that under our practice the power of giving oral instructions "should be cautiously exercised," and "is not to be approved or commended," it can only be concluded, in view of the facts in the Rosenkovitz case, that our appellate tribunal has now sanctioned by judicial pronouncement the system of instruction which has so long formed part of our practice, and that any departure therefrom will constitute reversible error.

The Rosenkovitz decision is not thus commented upon with any idea that our Maryland practice is in the slightest degree different from what the Court of Appeals there states it to be. The decision is material here only as show

ing that no other practice can now be adopted save by legislative enactment, without a reversal of the Rosenkovitz case.

But if the defects pointed out in our present practice are real, as we all know they are, and not fancied, if that practice has developed for reasons and under conditions which have long since disappeared, if the guiding hand of an upright, intelligent and clear-thinking court will not confuse, but rather help the jury in the discharge of their duty, what magic is there in our ancient practice that we must tie to it for all time to come?

On February 21, 1850, an Act of Georgia was passed, providing that a trial judge should not charge the jury as to what had or had not been shown by the evidence, or express an opinion as to the guilt or innocence of the accused, and that if he did, his language, however accurate, should constitute reversible error. That act was called the Dumb Act, because Chief Justice Bleckley said it struck the judges dumb. Here in Maryland we have no statute to excuse a similar suppression of the Court's intelligence. What then prevents a fair and impartial charge for the jury's aid? The jury is entitled to it, society is bettered by it, justice demands it. What blocks the way?

It has never been attempted. There we find the key to the only reason which can possibly exist why it may not be attempted now. It has not been the custom. It has never been done. Precedent is against it.

Precedent! How often do we find some ancient landmark, born in the mazes of an almost forgotten past, strong, not in the reason, but in the ages behind it, block like a sentinel the quest for justice! The physician looks to the past for his training, his information, the sources of his knowledge, but only that. To heal his patient, he profits by the failures and the experiences of those who have gone before, and upon them he mounts step by step to the great new truths which constitute the work he does. What would we think of the doctor who would refuse to administer anti

toxin as a preventative to diphtheria, because the doctors of a century ago did not use it?

The courts are but physicians-not of physical health and strength, but of moral and legal health and strength, physicians who administer to our business relations and keep them pure and sound and clean, who preserve free and untainted from disease our liberty, our property and our rights. The aim of the physician Law is justice. Should we not welcome whatever serves to bring it nearer to its goal?

The law, and the practice of the law, is a growth. It must expand, it must develop, it must grow wiser. It must not be the last to abandon old tenets. It must not sacrifice right and justice to them. Too often do the courts conform their rulings to what were or might have been the rulings of the dead. Reverence for what we did yesterday must not fetter the reality of what we can do today. China guides her destinies by the worship of the past. She clings to the twilight of the sun that has set. But Japan goes forth to meet the rising dawn.

So let it be with the law. Behind us there lies a fertile field of principles that are good and truths that we need. Let us take them. But around us the field is fertile too. Its fruits are ours. Let us gather what is ripe, that our hearts may beat a little faster, and that the blood may flow a little quicker through our veins, in the knowledge and in the memory that the best that was in us we freely gave to the uplifting of our mistress law, of whom

there can be no less acknowledged
Than that her seat is the bosom of God,
Her voice the harmony of the world."

The President: The paper just read is now open for discussion under the rules. If there be no discussion desired, the next thing in order is the report from the chairman of the Special Committee on the Torrens Land System.

REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON TORRENS LAND SYSTEM.

To the Maryland State Bar Association:

The Committee appointed to consider the advisability of adopting the Torrens System in this State, begs leave to submit the following report:

In its report to the last annual meeting the Committee gave the history and purpose of, and the usual procedure under the Torrens System, and stated that it was not then prepared to submit any specific conclusions or recommendations as to the adoption of the system in this State, and upon its suggestion, it was continued with authority, if in its judgment, an adequate and constitutional law could be framed to draft an act for voluntary registration.

Since then a commission of seven, appointed by the Governor of the State of New York to consider the expediency of the establishment of the Torrens, or of a similar system in that State, has reported-four of them in favor of the constitutionality, and of the adoption, of the system and the enactment of a law they had prepared, the remaining three opposing the system upon both constitutional grounds and upon grounds of general expediency. The report of the majority was approved by the Legislature of that State, and the Act recommended by it was passed and was approved by the Governor.

Your Committee has corresponded, further, with persons in the States in which the system is in operation in order to ascertain the practical workings of the law there, and have had the benefit of the very thorough investigation and admirable report made by the New York Commission.

The System is now in force in the following States, viz.: Illinois, adopted in 1897; California, in 1897; Massachusetts, in 1898; Minnesota, in 1901; Oregon, in 1901; Colorado, in 1903; Washington, in 1907, and New York, in 1908.