Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 01.pdf/194

 Published Monthly, at $3.00 per annum.

Single numbers, 35 cents.

Communications in regard to the contents of the Magazine should be addressed to the Editor. Horace W. Fuller, 15^ Beacon Street, Boston, Mass. The Editor will be glad to receive contributions of articles of moderate length upon subjects of interest to the profession; also anything in the way of legal antiquities or curiosities, facetia, anecdotes, etc.

THE GREEN BAG.

THE "Law Journal" (London) disputes the correctness of the statement made in our January number, as to the antiquity of the green bag as the badge of a lawyer. It says : " The passage from Wycherley's ' Plain Dealer,' cited by the editor of the ' Green Bag,' does not go far enough to show, as he supposes, that barristers carried green bags or that they were the badge of a lawyer. Widow Blackacre, the lady litigant in person of the days of Charles II., carried a green bag, and Jerry Blackacre, a raw squire under age, bred to the law, was laden with green bags, following her; but neither of them was a lawyer. When the widow roundly rated the counsel en gaged on the other side, and called him ' greenbag carrier,' she meant to give him the name of the humblest attendant in the courts." We must confess that we were at first rather taken aback by this statement of our esteemed contemporary; but upon further examination into the subject, we feel that there is certainly very good authority to sup port our statement as to the antiquity of the green bag as the badge of a 'lawyer. In his " Book on Lawyers " Mr. Jeaffreson says : " On the stages of the Caroline theatres the lawyer is found with a green bag in his hand; the same is the case in the literature of Queen Anne's reign; and until a comparatively recent date [the italics are ours] green bags were generally carried in Westminster Hall and in provincial courts by the great body of legal practitioners." Again he says : " So also in the time of Queen Anne, to say that a man intended to carry a green bag was the same as saying that he meant to adopt the law as a profession. ... It must, however, be borne in mind that in Queen Anne's time green bags, like white bands, were as generally adopted by

solicitors and attorneys as by members of the bar. . . Some years have elapsed since green bags, altogether disappeared from our courts of law. Evidence sets aside the suggestion that the color of the lawyer's bag was changed from green to red because the proceedings at Queen Caroline's trial rendered green bags odious to the public and even dangerous to their bearers."

The foregoing statements certainly seem to con firm our position in this matter. Hoes the " Law Journal" pretend to have more information upon the subject than Mr. Jeaffreson? One of the two must be wrong. Which is it?

While the " Green Bag " has received a most cordial greeting from its legal contemporaries in this country, it is pleasant to find that on the other side of " the great pond " it has been welcomed with kindly and appreciative words. " Pump Court " says : " This admirable magazine [The Green Bag] is replete with matter of interest to the profession; and, as we have always maintained, what interests lawyers must interest everybody. We say ' interest ' advisedly, and we mean what we say. The day for ponderous journals copiously larded with clippings from the ' Gazette ' is gone hopelessly, if indeed they ever had any day really; cheap law reports have killed what little life they ever had. The contents of the first number are sufficiently varied to suit all tastes of the profession."

The " Law Times " (London) also thus signifies its approval : " Legal journalism is manifestly in progress of development, more particularly m the United States. We have received from Boston, Mass., the first number of an exceedingly wellprinted and well-edited publication under the title of ' The Green Bag.' It contains some admirable engravings, and both prose and verse," etc. The verdict of the " Scottish Law Review " is as follows : " A magazine for lawyers with no law in it is something of a novelty, yet such the 'Green Bag' professes to be. Its publisher states: ' Its