The Gazette 1927-30

The Gazette of the Incorporated Law Society of Ireland.

; 1929]

33

libri •••cl !!r: -'- ,Mr. Esmonde A. Power, Solicitor, Castlerea, has been appointed County Registrar for the County of Roscommon, .in room of Mr. William Early, resigned. Mr. 'George 'Lynch, State Solicitor for the County of Leitrim, has, in addition, been appointed State Solicitor for the County of Sligo, in room of Mr. John R. McCarthy, appointed County Registrar for the County of Sligo. APPOINTMENTS. • A Special General Meeting of the Society, summoned by the Council to consider the Legal Practitioners (Qualification) Bill, 1928 (as amended in Special Committee of the Bail), was held on Friday, the 8th February, in the Molesworth Hall, Dublin. The President (Mr. E. H. Burne) in the Chair. There were one hundred and eighteen members present, including representatives of Sessional Bar Associations throughout the , Saorstat deputed to attend and represent their Associations. The Bill proposes to enact that persons seeking admission to the Solicitors' pro fession, who are under the age of fifteen years on the first day of October, 1929, shall not be admitted as Solicitors unless before admission they satisfy the Chief Justice that they possess a competent knowledge of the Irish language, which expression is defined by the Bill to mean " such a degree of oral and written proficiency in the use of the language as is sufficient to enable a legal practitioner properly to conduct the business of his clients in the Irish language." The Bill makes the subject of Irish to be compulsory at the Preliminary, Intermediate and Final Examinations of the Society for those who are under fifteen years of age on the first of October, 1929. Resolutions urging opposition to the further progress of the Bill were read from THE LEGAL PRACTITIONERS (QUALIFICATION) BILL.

the Southern -'L4$ 'As'sdoiafti'on,' /Cork, and from the Sessional Bar Associations of Counties. Tipperary,, Louth, Meath, Kilkenny and Waterford: .••; (,,; ;. . . . ,.,, Resolutions suggesting that amendments to the Bill be sought were read from the Sessional Bar Associations of Counties Carlow, Wexford and Kildare. The following resolution was moved and seconded :— '' That this Special General Meeting of " the Incorporated Law Society of Ireland, " summoned by the Council to consider " the proposals contained in the Legal " Practitioners (Qualification) Bill, 1928, " (as amended in Special Committee), " desires to place on record that the Society " is opposed to the Bill.so far as it affects " the Solicitors' Profession, and instructs " the Council to use every possible effort " to secure its rejection." To this resolution the following amend ment was moved and seconded :— " That the Incorporated Law Society of " Ireland, while recognising the legal status " accorded to Irish as the National " language, with its necessary results in " the life and business of the people, and " while undertaking to apply the principles " enunciated in the Legal Practitioners " (Qualification) Bill, 1928, in the spirit as. " well as in the letter in connection with " the professional education of Solicitors* " apprentices, strongly deprecates the fact " that this Society was not first asked to " apply those principles, the tone of " distrust of this Society evinced in the '' said Bill and the tendency in a degree to " take the training of aspirants to our " profession out of our hands, and demands " that such amendments as shall be in " accordance with the dignity of this pro- " fession may be made in the Bill." The amendment was put and rejected, eight only voting in favour of it. The resolution was put and adopted, with eight dissentients.