THE POLITICS OF THE BAR.
IT will be in the recollection of our readers that when Lord Westbury was appointed Lord Chancellor, Lord Palmer- ston's Government was placed in a position of great embarrass- ment with respect to the choice of a new law officer of the Crown. It had long been a custom, arising from necessity as well as convenience, to select the Attorney and Solicitor- General from the two sides of Westminster Hall, or rather from those members of the Common Law and Chancery Bar who had seats in Parliament. When Sir Richard Bethell resigned the office of Attorney-General, Sir William Atherton, a common-law barrister, known more for his sterling common sense than for general culture or extraordinary legal ability, took his place, and the Solicitor-Generalship became vacant. The Chancery Bar was at that time practically unrepresented on the Liberal side of the House. of Commons. However, • Sir Roundell Palmer, the foremost advocate of the day, and a thorough scholar, came to the relief of the Government, and having been appointed Solicitor-General, he soon afterwards took his seat in Parliament for the pocket borough of Richmond, in Yorkshire.
Four years have passed away, and the Liberal party is in similar danger. During thelast Session of Parliament no Chancery barrister holding Liberal opinions has obtained a seat in the House of Commons, and there is no prospect of the General Election producing any difference in this respect. It would seem as though the cloisters of Lincoln's Inn were as free from Liberalism as the so-called cells at Littlemore. It is an undoubted fact that with two or three exceptions none of the barristers who practise within the Bar in the Court of Chancery have declared themselves supporters of the Liberal Larty. Some alarm was therefore naturally felt when the fall of ord Westbury seemed to involve the elevation to the wool- sack of the present Attorney-General. It was admitted on all hands that although Sir Robert Collier would in that event become nominally the Attorney-General, he would require much assistance in the discharge of the principal duties de- volving upon the law officers of the Crown, and it was felt that the necessary help could not be given by any member of the Bar holding a seat in the House of Commons. It is true that looking outside the walls of Parliament the office of Solicitor-General might have been conferred upon the present Vice-Chancellor of the Court of Chancery in the County Palatine of Lancaster (Mr. William Milbourne James, Q.C.), whose cultivated mind, sound judgment, and earnest Liberalism would have eminently justified the choice, but here a difficulty again arose in consequence of this gentleman not being in Parliament. The acceptance by Lord Cranworth of the Chancellorship has postponed for the present the practical inconvenience of the situation, but -his great age, while it brings with it the valuable experience of a life unusually full of change and honour, warns us that we must not rely on retaining him long in the office which he so eminently adorns. A man wbo thirty years ago held the office of Solicitor- General, and who since that time has presided as a judge for eighteen years in the various capacities of Baron of the Exchequer, Vice-Chancellor, Lord Justice, and Lord Chan- cellor, has almost fulfilled his duties to his country. In the person of Mr. Coleridge the new House of Commons will have an elegant speaker on the Government benches, but an untried Liberal and hardly what Mr. Bright would call a robust politician. He is also a member of the Common Law Bar.
We must therefore expect another change soon, and the question naturally arises, What has become of Whig policy at the Bar? Is the race of Liberal lawyers come to an end? It will be suggested that inasmuch as the Liberal party have been in office, with the exception of about seven years, ever since the Reform agitation, the supply of leading Liberal barristers has naturally not proved equal to the demand. There is much truth in this suggestion. Since 1830 twenty- four distinguished lawyers have held the offices of Attorney and Solicitor-General, and out of this number only six have been chosen from the ranks of the Tory party. Besides this an unusual number of judicial appointments have been filled up. The drain upon the Liberal party practising at the Bar has therefore been great. We think, however, that it would be a mistake to attribute the present dearth of Liberal lawyers entirely to this circumstance. Other causes have contributed to this result. The Bar is essentially a conservative body. Its tra- ditions, its rules of etiquette, and the training of its members, are to a great extent opposed to originality of thought. The habit of weighing both aides of every question naturally produces a certain insensibility to the pursuit of abstract truth. That under-current of sympathy with what interests and affects the masses of the people generally which constitutes the true criterion of the real Liberal, is wanting to a great extent among the members of the Bar. Besides, the political history of the last twenty years has tended to foster the natural con- servatism of which we speak.
The movement which Sir Robert Peel inaugurated, and which justified in some measure Mr. Disraeli's language when he spoke of the life of his great Parliamentary opponent as " a great appropriation clause," appealed with great force to the lawyers. In fact for the last twenty years Liberal Conservatism has been the political creed of the Bar—a creed. in accordance with which a man may boast of having taken a part in all the recent triumphs in the cause of social and religious reform, while, at the same time, he is conscious that he does not possess any of the instincts which promoted these, results—a creed which it would be as difficult to define as to fill up the pages in Mr. Rogers' Blank Bible. Sir Robert Peel himself had Liberal instincts, and so have those of his disciples, to whom we now look as our true leaders for the future. But we think that it must be candidly admitted that one effect of the career and policy of Sir Robert Peel was to weaken political good faith, and to disturb the landmarks which divide the two great parties in the country without producing an honest harmony of thought. For twenty years past educated Liberals have been occupied in forming, and renewing from time to time, a truce with their political opponents—a truce which is as hollow as the feeble union of the Evangelical Alliance, and is productive of indifference, and not of peace. The effect of this view, in accordance with which every Tory is a disguised Whig, and every Whig a real Tory, has been felt throughout the country. It has had peculiar force in the Universities and at the Bar. It is painful to find how little interest the leading juniors at the Bar, who represent the growth of opinion during the period of which we are speaking, take in political questions, and to observe the absence in them as a class of all real earnestness upon the topics of the day—social, political, and religious. While this is the case we need not wonder at the absence of. leading Liberal lawyers in the House of Commons. We would not, however, wish our readers to suppose that this unfortunate state of affaira is chronic in the Inns of Court, or that it is likely to continue. The Bar have noble aspirations, and a genuine enthusiasm outside the walls of Lincoln's Inn and the Temple is not without its influence within. Those who have watched the political horizon have not failed to observe during the last few years a growing honesty of purpose and genuineness of conviction in public, men, which will, we believe, in a short time develop in some very comprehensive schemes of reform in Church and State. It is impossible for one great question to agitate the minds of the people without the contagion spreading. Earnestness in one branch of thought strengthens the character and har- monizes one's instincts. We have recently seen a hearty and
genuine sympathy manifested by the younger members of the Bar upon the question of the abolition of University Tests, and on other subjects connected with the free expression of opinion in matters of religious belief, and we trust and be- lieve that a few years hence we shall not be compelled, as it were, to advertise for genuine Liberal barristers. We are glad to see that at the present General Election the dis- inclination to accept the candidature of young men has been greatly modified.
Returning to the subject with which we started, is it not unreasonable to confine the choice of law officers of the Crown to sitting members of the House of Commons? No offices ought to be more entirely free than these from the clap-trap of the hustings. At the same time, inasmuch as their duties frequently involve grave questions of State policy, we think it is well that the Attorney and Solicitor-General should have seats in the Legislature, and bear the responsibility attached to such a position. If they had ex officio seats as members of the Government of the day, the difficulty which at present exists, and which occasionally drives an inferior man into the front of the profession, would be obviated. This plan would also have another great advantage. It would gradually tend to break down the habit of making judicial appointments from the ranks of mediocre Parliamentary supporters, and thus the highest posts in the profession of the law would be thrown open to the men whose voices are most frequently heard in the Court of Chancery or the Exchequer Chamber, rather than to those who can best confuse a jury or most blindly obey the Ministerial whip.
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