The Gazette 1908-9

The Gazette of the Incorporated Law Society of Ireland.

[JUNK, 1908

14

but no doubt at a later stage, when attention is directed to this matter, steps will be taken to effect this extension. By section 17 of the Solicitors (Ireland) Act, 1898, to which I have referred, exemptions from the solicitors' pre– liminary examination are enacted in the case of students passing certain examinations in the Universities named in that section, including the Royal University of Ireland. This section provides that the exemption may be extended by regulations made under the Solicitors Act to persons who pass the examination in any other University specified in the regulations. In the same way section 8 (F) of the same Act enables the Society to make regulations exempt– ing students who have obtained the degree of Bachelor of Laws at any University in the United Kingdom. Doubtless at a later date application will be made to the Incorporated Law Society to extend these exemptions from the preliminary and intermediate examinations to students and graduates of the new Univer– sities ; and I think I am not putting the matter too high when I say that the Incorporated Law Society of Ireland as an educational body will be largely concerned and interested in the success of the new Universities in Dublin and Belfast; and it will undoubtedly be the duty of the Society to encourage as far as possible those seeking to join the solicitors' profession to pass through these Universities, and obtain their Arts and Legal degrees. There is no doubt that we, as a profession anxious to main– tain a high standard in the members to join our ranks, are very much interested in seeing that all the students who attend our classes, and who are preparing for our profession, should be well educated. This seems to me an opportunity for asserting our claim for re– presentation on the Senates of the Universities, which should not be overlooked, the more especially as the Faculty of Law in the new Dublin University will have to be newly created. All of you may not be aware that the Incorporated Law Society of England have two representatives of the Society on the Senate of the University of London, one representa– tive of the Society on the Court of the University of Liverpool, two representatives of the Society upon the Court of Governors of the University College of North Wales, and two representatives on the Board of Governors of Hartley College, Southampton. I have ventured to prepare a resolution, which, with the permission of this meeting, I would pro– pose should be passed to-day, and I trust passed unanimously. If it is, I think we all

MR. FRY : When I sit down, I don't think you will consider I have sprang anything on anybody. MR. FRY : The newspapers have recently published a provisional list of the names of Dublin Senators proposed in connexion with the University intended to be established in this city; but an examination of this list shows that although it includes no less than eleven members of the medical profession, the only representatives of the legal profession are two of the Judges of the High Court, who, being also Benchers of the King's Inns, will be representative of the interests of law students seeking call to the Bar in Ireland. The list, however, does not contain the name of a single solicitor who is a member of the Incorporated Law Society. If we turn to the Belfast list of Senators, what do we find ? It also contains the names of two Judges ; but, with the single exception of the President of the Chamber of Commerce, in his ex-officio capacity, and one other, a temporary member as a benefactor, no solicitor is proposed to hold office, and it is a mere accident that a member of our pro– fession should happen to be President of the Chamber of Commerce that we find our pro– fession thus noticed. I need not remind you that the functions of this Incorporated Law Society are, to a large extent, educational. In it is vested by statute the entire direction of the education of those seeking to join the solicitors' profession in Ireland. It is provided by section 7 of the Solicitors (Ireland) Act, 1898, that it shall be lawful for the Society to provide classes, lectures, and other teachings to persons apprenticed to solicitors, and for this purpose to appoint professors and lec– turers ; and by section 8 the Society is bound to hold at least three times in every year a preliminary examination, an intermediate exa– mination, and a final examination ; and the Act provides that the Society shall have the entire management and control of all such examina– tions, and shall have power to make regulations with respect to several other educational matters. Further, I would remind you that sections 12 and 14 of the same Act shorten the usual term of apprenticeship in the cases of persons who take the degrees of Bachelor of Arts or Bachelor of Laws in certain named universities, including, you will remember, the Royal University of Ireland, which the Bill now before Parliament proposes to extinguish. I gather from a perusal of the Irish Universities Bill that it does not propose to extend these privileges to graduates of the new universities ;