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 EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT

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CURRENT LEGAL LITERATURE This department is designed to call attention to the articles in all the leading legal periodicals of the preceding month and to new law books sent us for review

Conducted by WILLIAM C. GRAY, of Fall River, Mass.

Among the legal articles reviewed this month a prominent place may be assigned to Professor Beale's analysis of Contempt of Court, as a clear exposition of a subject which is becoming a political issue, with the usual accompaniments of party and class prejudice. Readers of corporation and constitutional law will find also reviewed some articles of more than passing interest in those specialties. AGENCY. " The Independant Contractor Under the Law of Illinois," by Barry Gilbert, January Illinois Law Review (V. ii, p. 361). AUTOBIOGRAPHY. "A Scottish Judge Ordinar," by J. Dove Wilson, Yale Law Jour nal (V. xvii, p. 170). Professor Wilson's autobiography gives many interesting side lights on the legal profession in Scotland; it will be concluded in the February number. BANKRUPTCY. "The Bankruptcy (Scot land) Bill, 1907." by W. Wallace, Scottish Law Review, (V. 23, p. 344). BIOGRAPHY. " Some Lawyers Who May Be Candidates in the Presidential Campaign of 1908," by Richard Selden Harvey, American Lawyer (V. xvi, p. 11 ). COMBINATIONS. In the December Politi cal Science Quarterly (V. xxii[ p. 11 ) Henry R. Seager calls attention to the fact that, " not withstanding the attention that has been given to trade unions in the United States, their legal powers arc still very imperfectly defined." On the contrary litigation and legislation have evolved a fairly definite series of principles in England by which, employer and employee may know their rights. The Trades Disputes Act of 1906 has effected a revolution in the attitude of the law toward combinations of labor, especially as to their responsibility in damages for the acts of their agents as decided in the famous Taff Vale case. "To the legal mind," says the writer, " there is something anomalous about associations whose existence is guaranteed by law, and yet which are relieved by the law from responsi bility for the acts, injurious to others, that may be performed on their behalf." "But the question is too important to be decided by reference merely to legal precedents and traditions. There is good ground for the widespread feeling among wage-earners that

the rights of property are made too prominent in our legal system, and that at too many points persons with property enjoy advan tages over .those without. We must recognize that the small accumulations of wage-earners are vastly more important to them and to society, dollar for dollar, than the much greater resources of capitalist employers. Just as our common system of making light punishments, either fine or imprisonment, falls with far greater severity on the poor who can not pay fines than on the well-to-do who can, so a plan of penalizing trade unions by making their funds liable in the same way that is recognized as just and proper in the case of business coqwrations may be both unjust and inexpedient. We must consider carefully the effect such a policy will have upon the labor movement before deciding in favor of it; and we must recognize that the protection of the property interests of employers, while an important, is by no means the most important end to be kept in view. The most important end is the protection of the personal rights of both sides and the maintenance of conditions which will advance the general welfare of the community." CONSTITUTIONAL LAW. "Commerce Under our Dual System of Government," by Charles Nagel of St. Louis. An address before the Missouri State liar Association, printed by J. W. Steele & Co., St. Louis, 1907. An argument in favor of the extension of national regulation " because it alone can provide uniformity of rule and action, by establishing an entire system." " There is every reason why a United States citizen should be jealous of the right to protection guaranteed him by the Xational Government and the State Government — each within its proper sphere. I submit that so far from