his life would make me the speaker of the evening and leave him but a fraction of the time. A lawyer, a professor, member of the House of Commons, Solicitor-General, Attorney-General, Lord Chancellor he has run the whole gamut of distinction in the legal world of our sister nation across the sea. And not content with having exhausted the life of a lawyer to the full, when war came, he deserted one of the largest practices in the city of London and enrolled as an active combatant, served for nine months on the front, was decorated and mentioned in dispatches for gallantry in action.

A career so distinguished, ladies and gentlemen, could only lose if I attempted to adorn it by any phrase of my own. I introduce to you, therefore, a gentleman who is no stranger either to the American people or, most of all, to the American lawyer, the Right Honorable the Earl of Birkenhead.

Lord Birkenhead:

I cannot think it but unfortunate that an audience so magnificent should be wasted upon an entirely technical subject. My only answer must be that after all when you came here you all knew, both the men and the women among you, that you were coming to a discussion of lawyers and what, therefore, falls upon your head you have invited by your mere presence here this evening.

Even the scholarly address of my distinguished colleague who preceded me did not altogether escape contact with technical matters, and I fear that on some points at least the few observations I am about to address to you will incur the same censure. I shall, if you will allow me, make in the first place some general observations upon the subject which I have proposed, and then I shall attempt, after I have done so, to make some more particular application of these general topics in relation alike to the constitution of your country and ours.

Lord Birkenhead then delivered his Address.

(See Address, page 224.)

Lord Birkenhead (continuing):

You have listened to me in a very hot and crowded hall with incredible patience while I made these general observations to

you upon the subject of a constitution which is not your own. The kind indulgence which you have shown me is eloquent alike of the civility which you extend to your guests and of your own interest in these great constitutional doctrines, whether the immediate illustration flows from your own or from a kindred nation. While I have said and illustrated the differences, and they are grave and numerous, which exist between your constitution and ours, I know that if one carries the analysis away from that which is formal to that which is fundamental, there are many points of majestic identity. I note that in both constitutions there is a recognition of the primordial right to individual liberty; I note that in both constitutions there is denial to the executive of any of those powers which, under the name of droit administrative remove all the servants of the Executive in France from the control and the jurisdiction of the courts. And I seem to see one common vein running through the tangled constitutional skein which each of us must unravel who is to understand the elements of the constitution of the other. I seem, I say, to see running though that tangled skein one common thread, and it is perhaps the thread at once the most vital and the most noble which may add distinction and value to any constitution: it is that before the law all men are equal.

We had an illustration of that in our own country only a few weeks ago. The leaders, or the supposed leaders, of the Irish Republic party were using the hospitality of England in order to conspire against the authorities, and the government of the Irish Free State. Our legal authorities, acting obediently to the wishes of the Irish Free State, and acting, beyond a doubt, conformably alike with the political and the constitutional interests of our people, handed over these persons to the Irish Free State in the belief that they were protected in so doing by some regulations which had survived the war. These men had actually been handed over to another government which we could not control any more than we could control the government of the Dominion of Canada, and the leader of them, a man who has since, after open trial, been sentenced to two years penal servitude, the leader, before that trial was undertaken and while he was still in the hands of

the Irish Free State government, sued out a writ of habeas corpus in the British courts, and those courts said to our government, "Your assumption of control over these men has been illegal; bring them back." And they were brought back and the strong arm of the British law controlled the strong arm of the British Executive.

In the belief that it is the elements which connect us and not the elements which divide us that are the strongest and the most permanent, I welcome the opportunity of speaking to you today on behalf of the British lawyers. And in a world which has changed as our generation knows it, in a world which still has in front of us further changes incalculable to the longest vision, I descry to a moral certainty that whatever those changes may be, they will disturb, neither in your country nor in mine, the majestic fabric upon which your jurisprudence and your constitution depend, and upon which equally our jurisprudence and our constitution depend. And while they continue intact in substance, in spirit unimpaired, the civilization of the world can never perish, nor the spirit of liberty ever die.

The President:

You have chosen, Lord Birkenhead, for your address, the most interesting of all constitutional topics, the comparative merits of the American and British constitutions. You have presented. it with illumination and an interest which has both pleased and enthralled us, and you have put this audience, sir, very greatly in your debt.

From your remarks this clear lesson shines, that whatever the long future may hold in your country or in ours, whatever time may tell of your experiments, or our own, the surest light that will shine upon your pathway or upon ours will be the experience of our sister nation.

There is one other item of business which will take but a moment. It is necessary that we elect a new General Council of the Association. The Secretary will read the names proposed and a vote will be taken upon the election or non-election of that list.

The Secretary then read the names of the new General Council proposed by the respective state delegations.

(See list of General Council, page 178.)

The nominees as read by the Secretary were thereupon elected.

The Association adjourned until 10 o'clock Thursday morning.

The President:

FOURTH SESSION.

Thursday, August 30, 1923, 10 A. M.

The meeting will be in order and we will first listen to the Secretary's announcement.

The Secretary read a telegram from Attorney-General Harry M. Daugherty as follows:

I regret my inability to attend the sessions of the American Bar Association. It would be a great pleasure to me personally to be present and of much benefit to the Department of Justice and the Government, considering the help I have always derived from the Association in the discharge of my duties as Attorney-General. Kindly convey my best wishes and grateful appreciation to the members in attendance.

Thomas J. O'Donnell, of Colorado, offered the following resolution, which was received and referred without debate to the Executive Committee:

Resolved, That a special committee of, five women members of the American Bar Association be appointed by the President to inquire into and to report at the next meeting of the Association concerning the attempt now being made to secure the submission to the states of an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, to be known as the 20th Amendment in substance as follows:

and

"Men and women shall have equal rights throughout the United States, and every place subject to its jurisdiction."

(a) Whether there exists any sufficient reason to justify an amendment to the Constitution on the subject;

(b) Whether the subject is one properly coming within the domain of a federal constitutional provision;

And if these questions be resolved in the negative to recommend what steps, if any, the American Bar Association should take to combat the propaganda being maintained in favor of the amendment.

Clarence I. Spellman, of Missouri, offered the following resolution which, without debate, was referred to the Committee on Professional Ethics and Grievances:

Be it resolved, By the American Bar Association in regular convention assembled, that we voice our disapproval of the practice of attorneys

acting as dummy or conduit through the medium of which property is unlawfully conveyed by will or otherwise in violation of express provision of a statute.

The President:

The regular order of business this morning is the receipt of reports from sections and committees.

Section of Criminal Law:

Floyd E. Thompson, of Illinois, submitted the following report:

To the Officers and Members of the American Bar Association:

The Section of Criminal Law has endeavored by its program this year to bring before the members of this Association the necessity for taking up and carefully studying the present needs for change in the methods of law enforcement throughout the country.

The most important feature of our study is that of the prevention of crime; a fair trial for everyone charged with crime; a speedy trial which will secure justice both for the state and the defendant; the abolition of technicalities in the trial of cases, and the proper punishment for every crime committed.

Of course some of these matters are extremely difficult to bring about, but with the co-operation of judges and attorneys generally we believe the day will come when everyone will unite in this program of law and order and will realize that every act of Congress and every law upon the statute books of the various commonwealths is to be obeyed whether we like them or not.

The only way to eliminate an obnoxious law is to have it repealed and a satisfactory one enacted in its stead. But in this instance the majority must rule, and while our present Constitution with its amendments and its enabling acts remain in their present form, it is our duty as good lawyers and good American citizens to uphold the Constitution, the laws of nation and states, and to support those who are endeavoring to enforce them.

Our Section is working along this line and thus contributing its part to the great work that the American Bar Association is doing for the public.

August 30, 1923.

Respectfully submitted,

FLOYD E. THOMPSON, Chairman.

On motion, duly seconded, the report was adopted.

The President:

I will ask former President Severance to take the chair. (Mr. Severance thereupon took the chair.)