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The Green Bag

books at his side, and then smiled avariciously at the judge as he began his address. The first ten minutes were spent in telling the judge how he had ruled that the stenographic notes taken at a pre vious trial by a court reporter who was employed by the plaintiff were privi leged and could not be read in evidence for the purpose of impeaching the plain tiff on the subsequent trial of the same case. This point he iterated and reiter ated until finally the judge interrupted him as follows: showing "Yes, made Mr. by,you, I held the stenographic that on the notes of the reporter employed by the plaintiff at the first and second trials of this case were privileged, and could not be read in evidence as you requested for the purpose of impeaching the plaintiff's testimony at this third trial." "Yes, sir, that is it exactly," replied the attorney, gloating over the admission and rubbing his hands in gleeful exul tation as he glanced at the table full of law books at his side and continued: "I have here a great number of cases, and I shall show your honor that you have made a very grave error and that every one of these cases, yes, sir, every one of them, bears me out in my con tention that the reporter's notes are not confidential and should have been admitted." "I shall be glad to be enlightened," calmly replied the judge, somewhat irritated by the attorney's attitude. Then the attorney began to read and quote from his cases, beginning at one corner of the table, and continuing row after row until he had consulted each volume. Each case the judge quickly dismissed with, "That was an official reporter," "That reporter was not em ployed by the party sought to be im peached," "That holds merely that

the stenographic notes may be intro duced, which I hold is bad law," or "That holds that the notes themselves are not admissible, and are merely private memoranda, not made for the purpose of binding any one." "What I want you to show me," continued the judge, "is a case which holds that you, the defendant, can call the plaintiff's private stenographer and have him read his notes, taken at a previous trial of the same case, for the purpose of impeaching the plaintiff, without first showing that those notes are not confidential. I held that unless you showed those notes were not privi leged, those notes were just as much privileged, under their objection, as were or are those of the attorney's private stenographer in his office." "But, your honor," smiled the attor ney, "this testimony was given in open court. I have taken a great interest in this case, and have searched all the state and federal reports, and there is not a single case in the whole United States — no, not even in all England or Ireland, where the other side's re porter was called for the purpose of impeachment. But I have here cases where it holds that I can call the oppo site attorney and have him testify as to what took place in open court. Why then can't I call the reporter for the other side also? Proceedings in open court are not confidential or privileged, and anybody can testify to them." "Yes, I agree with your latter statement," said the judge. "But if this has never been done before, do you think we should start anything so per nicious as this would be likely to be come in the hands of an unscrupulous attorney?" The attorney then, gathering fresh hope from this concession, launched furiously into the testimony of the case,