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The Green Bag

Charles C. Mumford and Chester W. Barrows. 'Procedure

Under new rules enforced from Jan. 1, attorneys for plaintiffs before the United States Supreme Court must file their briefs three weeks before their case is called for oral argument. Defendants' attorneys must file their briefs one week before the arguments are made. In all cases, the Clerk of the Court is instructed to receive no briefs where counsel have not served copies on op posing counsel. The latter provision is designed to put an end to counsel appearing before the court unprepared to answer arguments on the opposing side. The Federal Judicial Code went into effect Jan. 1, when the seventy-seven federal circuit courts throughout the country were all abolished, all their busi ness being transferred to the federal dis trict courts. The twenty-nine Circuit Judges will now be chiefly engaged in the work of theCircuit Courts of Appeals, though permitted to sit in the federal court of first instance. Another result of the new act is an increase in the sal aries of the Chief Justice of the United States from $13,000 to $15,000 and of the Associate Justices of the Supreme Court from $12,500 to $14,500. "To reform our procedure," said Lieutenant-Governor McDermott of Kentucky before the Kentucky Circuit Judges' Association at its annual ban quet Dec. 28, "we must not merely re sort to tinkering with our code. A com plete and radical revision is necessary to put us abreast of England and Germany. Our code ought not to do into details; it ought to be more flexible as to mere practice and to leave more discretion to the trial judge." Other

speakers were Judge B. J. Bethurum, who deprecated mob-violence and lynch ing, Judge McKenzie Moss, Judge Charles L. Kerr, Judge Fleming Gordon, and Judge W. E. Settle. The superior court judges of Georgia, meeting at Atlanta, Dec. 19, were unani mous in the declaration that some judi cial reformation should be brought about to improve the administration of justice in Georgia. The judges met in response to a legislative resolve asking for the submission of their views. Judge Felton, the chairman, deprecated the evils of delay and technicality. A vote was passed that a committee be appointed to consider suggestions which may be made to them by the bench, the bar or the public and to formulate these sug gestions in the form of a report to be submitted to the convention at another meeting to be held on April 29. Divorce

Divorce bills which were recommended to the Missouri legislature at its session last winter, but were not made into law, partly owing to the burning of the State Capitol, were taken up and again ap proved by Judicial Conference of Mis souri Dec. 29. The bills are not only for making divorce more difficult to obtain, but also are to prevent courts from being imposed upon and deceived in the granting of decrees which ought not to be granted. The following officers were elected: President, Presiding Jus tice George D. Reynolds (re-elected); first vice-president, Judge James Elli son; second vice-president, Judge Argus Cox; secretary, Judge Alonzo D. Burnes, of Platte City (re-elected). A "divorce proctor" has been ap pointed in Missouri, whose duty it is