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A code will lessen the labor of Judges and lawyers in the investigation of legal questions. Instead of searching, as now, through large libraries filled with the judicial records, not only of all the American States, but of England, Scotland, and Ireland, it will be sufficient to examine the articles of the Code relating to the subject. Should illustrations be desired, the cases referred to in the notes will furnish all that may be needful.

Not only will there be a saving of labor but a saving of capital. The outlay required for the furnishing of law libraries will be greatly reduced. We forget how great is this outlay at present. Supposing the number of lawyers in the State of New York to be, as computed, ten thousand, and the average expense of their libraries to be three hundred dollars-— too low, I think—the whole capital invested in lawyers' libraries will reach in this State alone three million dollars. This makes no account of the public libraries. I believe it is safe to estimate the whole capital invested in law libraries in this State to be not less than four millions. Three fourths of this, at least, may be saved, and a burden, grievous to be borne, taken from the shoulders of young men starting in profes

sional life.

Besides the saving of labor and capital, there will ensue this additional advantage from a code, which is, that an opportunity will thus be afforded for settling vexed questions of law. We lawyers know that these vexed questions are many. We know better than all others into what a chaos our law has fallen. I have had the curiosity to examine, or rather have had examined, the forty-seventh volume of New York Reports, to see how many and what cases are cited in the arguments and opinions, and I am informed that there are 3,281 in all, of which 186 are from the Courts of the United States; from those of England, 531; New York, 2,190; Massachusetts, 120; Pennsylvania, 60; Connecticut, 30; New Hampshire, 21; Maryland, 27; Maine, 15; Vermont, 18; Michigan, 12; Wisconsin, 7; Minnesota, 5; Illinois, 3; New Jersey, 9; Iowa, 10; Virginia, 5; North Carolina, 10; South Carolina, 12; Rhode Island, 9; Alabama, 6; Georgia, 3; California, 3; Tennessee, 4; Ohio, 4; miscellaneous, 318.

A comprehensive code, aiming to reconcile contradictions and differences, will eliminate from the law the greater number, if not all, of the vexed questions to which I have referred. And not only may doubtful questions be freed from doubt, but needed reforms may be effected through a code with greater facility than is possible without it. Who would have ever thought of assimilating legal and equitable procedure but through the medium of a code? How, with the greatest ease and certainty, can the law of real and personal property be assimilated? In what way can these modifications, in the relations of husband and wife which modern society demands, be wrought with safety so readily as in the form of a general code of all the law? And, when a code is once formed, those necessary changes, which time and experience may show to be desirable, can be made without the confusion and uncertainty which are inseparable concomitants of our present annual legislation. We know how, in its zeal to make the punishment of abortion more severe, the Legislature virtually repealed existing laws, and so pardoned previous offenses. And we know, also, that a conviction and sentence were lately obtained under a Federal statute which had been repealed before the trial. These untoward events could not have happened if the State and the nation had had a Penal Code; for then, if an amendment or change were made, it would be referred at once to the proper article, and be readily known.

And last, but not least, of all the benefits of a code, is the diffusion among the people of a knowledge of the laws under which they live, and to which they must conform their conduct. Here, more than anywhere else in the world, is it needful that the people should know the law. They are supposed to make it. They, at least, are responsible for it. They, by their agents, administer it and execute it. If in France, and other parts of Continental Europe, where codes prevail, the people are found better acquainted with their laws than our people with ours, it is because they have them in a form accessible to all.

It may interest you to know the working of codification in India, and I will give you the following extracts from the opening address at the session of 1872, of the English Law

Amendment Society, delivered by Mr. Fitzjames Stephen, lately legal adviser of council in India, and successor of Macaulay in that office:

You will naturally ask how this process of codification has succeeded? To this question I can answer that it has succeeded to a degree which no one could have anticipated, and the proofs of this fact are to my mind quite conclusive. One is the avidity with which the whole subject is studied, both by the English and by the native students in the universities.

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The knowledge which every civilian you meet in India has of the Penal Code and the two Procedure Codes is perfectly surprising to an English lawyer. People who in England would have a slight indefinite rule-ofthumb knowledge of criminal law, a knowledge which would guide them to the right book in a library, know the Penal Code by heart, and talk about the minutest details of its provisions with keen interest. I have been repeatedly informed that law is the subject which native students delight in at the universities, and that the influence, as a mere instrument of education of the codifying acts, can hardly be exaggerated. I have read in native newspapers detailed criticisms on the Evidence Act, for instance, which proved that the writer must have studied it as any other literary work of interest might be studied.

A proof of a different kind of the success of the Codes is this: A few years ago an act was passed enabling the Government of India to legislate in a summary way for the wilder parts of India. The Punjaub Government were accordingly asked whether they had any proposal to make as to the special laws for the government of as wild a frontier as any in the world, the districts between the Indus and the mountains. They replied that they could suggest nothing better than the Penal Code and the Code of Criminal Procedure, with one or two slight modifications and additions. It is a new experience to an English lawyer to see how easy these matters are when they are stripped of mystery.

I once had occasion to consult a military officer upon certain matters connected with habitual criminals. He was a man whose life was passed in the saddle, and who hunted down Thugs and Dacoits as if they were game. Upon some remark which I made, he pulled out of his pocket a little Code of Criminal Procedure, bound like a memorandum-book, turned up to the precise section which related to the matter in hand, and pointed out the way in which it worked with perfect precision. It is one of the many odd sights of Calcutta to see native policemen learning by heart the parts of the police act which concern them. The sergeant shouts it out phrase by phrase, and his squad obediently repeat it after him till they know it by heart. The only thing which prevents English people from seeing that law is really one of the most interesting and instructive studies in the world is, that English lawyers have thown it into a shape which can only be described as studiously repulsive.

Having thus set forth, so far as I am able, within the hour which I allotted to myself, the reasons for which I do so, I close by urging you again to carry on to completion that reform and codification of the whole law, common and statute, which the State of New York began. It would be affectation in me to conceal my personal interest, though it is not that which I would put forward, but another and larger interest common to you and me, that of public benefit and State pride. We boast justly that we have inherited from our fathers that English law which proclaims and enforces the rights of men. Let us give ourselves cause to boast also that we have enriched the great inheritance. It was, I am fain to think, a felicitous opportunity which enabled our State to lead the way. She struck the blow that broke in pieces the unnatural, cumbrous, and oppressive procedure, which had hardened through ages. Behold, now, the influence of her name and example! The laws which she has caused to be written have already passed into the statutes of half the States, and form an inseparable part of their institutions. You will find them on the Western prairies, on the slopes of the Rocky Mountains, and on both shores of the southern This is due, in great part, to the prestige of this populous and opulent Commonwealth, whose commerce embraces the continent and stretches to the Indies. You can keep at the head of this movement, if you will; but, if you falter, others will go on, and the Codes which you caused to be prepared, but have not as yet accepted, will come back to you on a refluent wave from the West, and you will then follow where you might and should have continued to lead.

sea.

THE CODES OF NEW YORK AND CODIFICATION IN GENERAL.

Address to the law-students of Buffalo, February 6, 1879.

YOUNG GENTLEMEN: If I were to say all that I think of the profession for which you are preparing yourselves and to which I belong, I should say nothing else in the course of this

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address. It is only flippant and foolish persons who talk disparagingly of lawyers. They who are best acquainted with the history of civilization, or have studied most the science of government, know very well that no truer measure can be found of progress in either than the influence which the legal profession exerts and the respect which it receives. In stormy times, when oppressive laws and tyrannous acts were to be resisted, when political rights were to be defined and defended, or when a state was to be founded, they have been the foremost champions of freedom and progress. In times peaceful and prosperous they have too often relapsed into mere practitioners at the law, without an effort or a wish to make it better, content to keep it as they found it. The conservatism of lawyers has thus almost passed into a proverb. I should prefer to call it by a different name-not conservatism, but inertia. Of their integrity and honor there can be no surer test than their fidelity to their clients. When has that been broken? Leaders of armies have betrayed their country, chiefs of parties have been false to their friends and followers, trustees have despoiled those who have trusted them, but how few lawyers have been found betrayers of their clients! In a long and varied practice I have never found one. I congratulate you, gentlemen, that you are to enter this profession.

It is not, however, the character of the profession which you are about to join that I am to speak of to-night, but certain topics which greatly concern it and which I think will especially interest you on this occasion, the Codes of New York and codification in general. By the Codes of New York I mean not the Code of Procedure, under which we worked from from 1848 to 1877, nor the Code of Civil Procedure under which we have worked, or tried to work, since, but the five Codes, which were prepared by commissioners appointed by the Legislature, pursuant to the Constitution of 1846. What I have to say to you, therefore, will relate to those Codes and to codification.

Reversing the order of subjects as thus stated, I will first ask your attention to the subject of codification. There is a prevalent impression among lawyers in this country against a general codification of the law. It would be difficult for them,

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