59 / 216
June,
1941]
The Gazette of the Incorporated Law Society of Ireland
same month we lost Mr. James W. Hanrahan,
who had been for fifty-seven years Clerk of
the Crown and Peace for County Fermanagh
and was admitted a Solicitor so far back as
1873.
In February we lost Mr. Robert H.
Carson, Chief Crown Solicitor for Northern
Ireland;
he had been Sessional Crown
Solicitor for Co. Tyrone from the year 1905
to 1922 and Crown and Sessional Solicitor
from 1922 to 1929, and from 1929 he was
Chief Crown Solicitor for Northern Ireland.
In the same month we lost Mr. Hunt Walsh
Leech, who was admitted so far back as 1869.
Other respected members of our profession
have also passed away.
The number of members of the Society at
present is 842, an increase, I am glad to say,
as against
the number of members
last
November, when an increase on the previous
year from 794 to 835 was reported. We are
glad to note that the Society is holding its
own particularly so in this centenary year
of the Society. The Society, I need hardly
point out to you, knows no boundary save
Fair Head in Antrim and Mizen Head in
Cork, and has no politics.
As you are all aware, on the 17th June
next, the Society will have attained the
one hundredth anniversary of its existence.
It has been referred to a Committee to report
as to how most suitably the event can be
celebrated by .the Council.
I am free to tell
you that the Committee has met and gone
into
this question most carefully;
their
report will in due course come before the
Council, and, if confirmed, the purport of it
will be circulated.
As regards the present position and pros–
pects of our profession, I wish I could speak
more hopefully.
\Vith a serious curtailment
of litigation due to the petrol shortage, the
curtailment of Land Purchase and the war
conditions now prevailing, I am afraid that
the position is not a hopeful one, and parents
and guardians of intending apprentices have
to face the fact that the apprentices are
heading for an overcrowded profession.
It
has been stated that the examinations for
the Final have been made more stringent
than formerly, and criticism of the Exam–
iners' methods have been made.
These
criticisms are best answered by the fact
that at the Final Examination held since
our last Half-yearly General Meeting thirty-
nine new Solicitors .have been
let
loose.
This number constituted 70 per cent, of
those who sat for the examination.
It is to
be regretted that for three years in succession
ending in 1940, the Findlater Scholarship
could not be awarded, the required standard
not having been reached, and I am sorry to
say that the position of 1941 will not be
any better.
There is one other matter I would wish
to refer to. When the Courts of Justice
Act was passed it was understood that the
appointment of District Justices would be
divided
fifty-fifty between Counsel
and
Solicitors.
For some years past that has
not been followed, but I am glad to say that
the last appointment was that of a Solicitor.
We can only hope that a gentleman's agree–
ment of 1924 will be observed for the future.
The Solicitors' Bill, 1940, has been before
the Council on several occasions. The draft
of the Bill has been circulated to the different
Sessional Bar Associations throughout Eire,
and the views of their members have been
obtained and received careful consideration,
and we hope in the near future to be in a
position to liold a General Meeting of the
Society to consider the Bill.
OBITUARY.
MR. WILLIAM
J. BRADLEY,
Solicitor,
Bangor, died on 9th May, 1941, at Ards
District Hospital.
Mr. Bradley served his apprenticeship with
the
late Mr. George Alien, Belfast, was
admitted
in Trinity Sittings,
1909, and
practised in Bangor.
MR. WILLIAM J. M. COULTER, Solicitor,
died at his residence, 22 Highfield Road,
Rathgar, Dublin, on 31st May, 1941.
Mr. Coulter served his apprenticeship to
the late Mr. Henry J. McCormick, Dublin,
was admitted in Michaelmas Sittings, 1911,
and practised at 30 Upper Merrion Street,
under the style of Norris, Goddard and
Davidson.
LEGAL APPOINTMENT.
Mr.
Frederick
J. Mangan
has
been
appointed an Assistant Justice of the Dis–
trict Court.
Mr. Mangan was admitted a solicitor in
1933, engaged in private practice in Dublin,
and was later appointed an Examiner of
Title in the Land Commission.
ALL Communications connected with THE GAZETTE
(other than advertisements) should be addressed to
the Secretary of the Society, Solicitors' Buildings,
Four Courts, Dublin. N.W.8.