Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 17.pdf/612

 LORD HALSBURY

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AN OCTOGENARIAN LORD HIGH CHANCELLOR BY R. D. McGiBBox, K. C. HARDINGE STANLEY GIFFARD, Earl of Halsbury, Lord High Chan cellor of England, entered upon his eightyfirst year on September the third, 1905Although the longevity of English lawyers and judges is proverbial, it has seldom hap pened that a judicial officer is found at the age of fourscore discharging his duties with admittedly unimpaired physical and mental powers. The chancellors of England, have, as a rule, been a long-lived race. Camden died at 81, Bathurst at 86, Eldon at 87, Camp bell at 82, and Brougham and Lyndhurst at 90. Lord Campbell, in his diary, after mentioning the ages of a number of Lord Chancellors, says with some complacency and pride, that since the time of St. Swithin, who flourished about the middle of the ninth century, he, Lord Campbell, had been the only person who had held the Great Seal and exercised the functions of chan cellor after having entered his eightieth year. The achievement of Lord Halsbury is, therefore, quite exceptional. Lord Halsbury has held the chancellor ship for brief periods in two previous ad ministrations, and is now in his eighteenth year of office but his record is yet far be hind that of Lord Eldon, who held the seals for over twenty-four years. At the recent banquet of the Hardwicke Society held in London, July 6, 1905, the perennial vitality and fitness of Lord Halsbury were the predominant theme of the oratory of the evening. However suspicious one may be of com pliments and praises bestowed under the in fluence of what the French call la chaleur communicative des banquets, there can be no doubt of the genuineness of the admiration and respect — one might almost say the affection — entertained towards the chan cellor by the Bench and Bar of England.

His official duties are multifarious and exacting. Inter alia he sits judicially in the House of Lords and in the Judicial Com mittee of the Privy Council; he is a member of the Cabinet; he presides over the delib erations of the House of Peers, in whose de bates he must frequently take part, he makes appointments to both high court and county judgeships; he nominates mag istrates; selects sheriffs; appoints clergy to crown livings; generally supervises the ad ministration of justice; promulgates count less rules of procedure and order; has the care of lunatics and wards in chancery, and attends to a hundred and one minor duties, all taking time and attention. In addition, the ceremonies of the court would be incomplete without the chancel lor, and Lord Halsbury is continually found delivering spirited and breezy speeches at public dinners and meetings of all kinds. He presided at the farewell banquet to Mr. Choate in Middle Temple Hall, on which occasion his remarks were both sympathetic and witty, and his most recent exploit was a charming speech in the French language at the luncheon given by the members of Parliament to the admiral and officers of the northern squadron of the French Re public in celebration of the entente cordiale. One of the judges at the Hardwicke din ner is authority for the statement, that, not long ago, Lord Halsbury astounded an as sembly of Anglican bishops by proclaiming without apparent contrition, that he is in the habit of playing golf on the Sabbath day. Chancellor Thurlow, by the way, when staying at a country house at which a bishop was a fellow-guest, was asked by the latter if he would come and hear him preach on Sunday. "No," said Thurlow, "I am obliged to listen to your damned nonsense in the House of Lords, but there I can answer you,