120 / 228
tants, were re-appointed Auditors for the year to
end 3Oth April, 1948.
The Secretary read the report of the Scrutineers
of the Ballot of the Council for the year to end
26th November, 1948, which stated that the fol
lowing had been returned unopposed as Provincial
Delegates :
Ulster, John Gillespie; Munster, A. J.
Blood-Smyth ; Leinster, Reginald J. Nolan ; Con-
naught, Christopher E. Callan;
and
that
the
following had been elected as the thirty-one ordinary
members of the Council, having received the number
of votes placed after their respective names : H. St.,
J.Blake, 418; Arthur Cox, 411 ; Daniel O'Connell,
389 ; William L. Duggan, 388 ; Patrick F. O'Reilly,
383;
J. Travers Wolfe, 367;
Joseph Tyrrell,
364; William J. Norman, 361; Joseph Baxrett,
359; Thomas A. O'Reilly, 351 ; Patrick R. Boyd;
351; James J. Lynch, 348; William S. Hayes,
345 ; G. A. Overend, 343 ;
J. P. Carrigan, 340 ;
Dermot P. Shaw, 335 ; Lughaidh E. O Deaghaidh,
335 ; Scan O hUadhaigh, 334;
J. B. Hamill, 334
John J. Bolger, 326 ; Henry P. Mayne, 319; Roger
Greene, 316; James R. Quirke, 307; William S.
Huggard, 307;
John S. O'Connor, 303 ;
Peter
O'Connor, 299; John B. J. Dunne, 296 ; Niall S.
Gaffney, 288; John J. Smyth, 284; Francis J.
Gearty, 266 ; Robert A. Macaulay, 263 ; with the
following as
the supplemental list
in case
of
vacancies :
Anthony J. Malone, 234; John P. J.
Gannon, 232 ; Derrick M. Martin, 216.
The President, in moving the adoption of the
Annual Report, said:
LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,
I should first like to welcome you all here to-day.
The half-yearly meetings of the Society are not as
a rule very largely attended by the members of the
Society.
I think this must be evidence that the
members of the Society are satisfied with the
manner in which their interests are looked after
by the Council. Like the shareholders in a well-
managed company, they are interested more in the
results than in how the results are achieved.
It
would, however, be desirable that the members
of the Society should take an active interest in the
everyday management of the Society, and it is
therefore, in my view, regrettable that a larger
number of members do not attend these half-yearly
meetings. The Council are always interested in the
view-point of the individual member. Any repre
sentations or suggestions put forward at these
meetings are always carefully considered by
the
Council, and if they are practicable suggestions,
and in the interests of the profession, effect is
given to them.
Since the last half-yearly meeting of the Society
the following members of the Society have died:
Mr. Archibald Clarke, Mr. Vesey C. Nash, Mr.
Frederick W. D. Moorhead, Mr. Henry E. Donegan,
Mr. Edward Thornton, Mr. Charles Jermyn, Mr.
William Dwyer, Mr. Patrick Donnelly, Mr. J. P.
Lonan Murphy, Mr. Richard L. O'Flaherty, Mr.
Aloysius D. O'Riordan. We deeply regret their
loss, and tender our sympathy to their relatives.
Membership of the Society
You have read in the Annual Report circulated
with the Agenda for this meeting that the members
of the Society for the current year number 1,084.
This is a slight increase over the number for the
previous year. During the past six years there has
been a considerable increase in the number of
members, but I regret to say that there are still
almost 300 members of the solicitors profession
who, while continuing to benefit from the activities
of the Society, do not think it worth their while
to pay the annual subscription of
£i
necessary for
membership. This must strike you all as extra
ordinary, but it is a fact.
I doubt if there is any
other profession in which such a large body of
practitioners
remain
outside
the
professional
organisation. I hope that as a result of the appeals
made from time to time these members will join the
Society, and that we shall shortly have a membership
of one hundred per cent.
Bar Associations
NEXT to membership of the Society, the most
important thing, in my view, is that each solicitor
should be a member of a provincial Bar Association.
The Society regulates the profession as a whole,
and speaks on behalf of the profession when
occasion requires.
It is also charged with the
duty of protecting the interests of the profession
as a whole throughout the country. The Society,
however, is not as closely in touch with the indivi
dual solicitor as is his local Bar Association, which
knows intimately the conditions affecting its par
ticular locality and the general opinion of the
practitioners in that locality. There are a number
of matters with which Bar Associations are better
qualified to deal than the Society, except as a last
resort.
In my opinion, the standard of professional
conduct between solicitors among themselves and
towards their clients, and the efficiency with which
clients' business is transacted is raised and main
tained by the existence of a strong and well-
organised Bar Association. Unfair practices, such
as canvassing for business and undercutting, which
are as much against the interests of the client as of
the profession, can best be eliminated by the action
of the individual members of the profession operat
ing through their local Bar Associations,
In the