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JUNE, 1914]
The Gazette of the Incorporated Law Society of Ireland.
21
should pay as a member of this Society ten
shillings a year, and that for that he should
be entitled to all the privileges of membership
of the Society. At present there were ] ,562
registered solicitors in Ireland, and only ab )ut
half that number were members of
this
Society.
Instead of being a society repre
sentative of the entire profession, the Society
was a mere Leinster provincial council, and
was entitled only to the influence of a pro
vincial council. The country was on the eve
of far-reaching developments, and on that
account he asked the Society to take a broad
view of the matter, and to remember that
the general welfare of
the Society was
superior to any individual advantage. There
was nothing in his proposal of which the}'
need be afraid, for Dublin would always be
the centre of the legal business of Ireland.
MR.
JOHN
MOLONEY
(Midleton)
seconded the motion. He held that id was
of the utmost importance to the interests of
the whole profession that every solicitor in
the country should be a member of the
Society.
If all solicitors had been members
of the Society, the Society would not have
made so many futile protests as they had
made in the past.
In the country they had
to put up with unqualified persons acting in
court, the part which solicitors only were
qualified to play and ought to have possession
of. He protested against the Solicitors' pro
fession having to pay an annual fee to the
Government, while all other professions went
free.
MR. JAMES BRADY said that in his
judgment Mr. Rooney was not going the
right way about reforming the membership
of the Society. The solicitor who cavilled at
the payment of fourpence a week—£1 a year
—as a contribution to the Society was not
worthy of membership.
Mr. Rooney, in
reducing the subscription to twopence a week,
seemed to be starting a sort of gun-running
expedition, but it would never be a success
at twopence a week. The country members
had the absolute right to elect ten of the
forty-one members of the Council, and they
had twelve at present, and he thought that
was
enough
for
them.
While
country
solicitors paid only £6 a yeai to the Govern
ment, the city solicitors paid £9, and yet the
country solicitors benefited enormously by
the legislation of recent years. For himself
he would be in favour of increasing the
subscription
to £2
a year.
What
he
should
like
to see was
that, before
a
candidate received his certificate.lhe should
be obliged to become a member of the Society.
He thought that if Mr. Rooney's motion was
carried it would be a breach of the contract
they made with their country friends in 1888.
MR. R. A. MACNAMARA'said he voiced
the opinion of the majority of the Council,
a view that was taken without any hostility
to their country friends, with whom they had
all worked in the greatest harmony.
The
motion was not moved by a country solicitor.
The reason, he presumed, was that country
solicitors would not go back on what was
arranged in 1888.
Up to that year all
members paid £1, then it was decided to make
the subscription for country members 10s.,
and to give to those who paid 10s. the right
to vote for a Provincial Delegate, and the
additional right of voting for ordinary mem
bers of Council, to those who paid one pound.
In 1888 the entire matter was gone into, and
there was then provided a permanent country
representation on the Council of ten members.
There were now in addition two country
members
elected
amongst
the ordinary
members, by which they really possessed
a very large and effective representation.
The whole Council was forty-one, so the
country representatives were now considera
bly more than a fourth.
They were now
asked to allow the country members to vote
for ordinary members of Council for 10s. sub
scription, the country members were even
to get more votes, and the Dubjin man was
not to have a vote for the country delegates.
The country member could vote for the whole
lot by paying 0. For the 10s. a year they
got all cases of dispute settled by the Council ;
costs questions settled, appeals taken
in
proper cases and expenses indemnified, per
sons unlawfully practising proceeded against,
they had the prestige of the Society, the use
of that Hall and Library, and so on. Referring
to the difficulty of country members attending
meetings of the Council, he mentioned that
there had been last year 24 meetings of the
Council and 54 meetings of Committees, and
the cost
>f
coming up to these meetings
would be prohibitive to country representa
tives.
MR. W. T. SHERIDAN thought the claim