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IRISH LAWYERS IN AUSTRALIA

THE following paragraphs,

taken

from a

letter

received by the Society from a solicitor in Sydney,

may be of interest:

" I am in communication with Messrs. Vincent

and Beatty about a property in Dublin and in

a letter I recently wrote I suggested that if they

knew of any young members of the profession

who were

thinking of trying

their fortunes

outside Ireland or England, they might consider

coming out here to Australia.

" We read in our papers that great numbers

of young people are finding life too hard or too

restricted for them in Europe and who are going

to newer lands.

Irishmen have always done

very well in the law in Australia, and in the early

days of New South Wales and Victoria they

were very prominent, especially

in Victoria.

The first four Chief Justices of Victoria, Stawell,

Higginbotham, Irvine and Madden were Irish–

men.

Irvine was a nephew of John Mitchel,

but in politics resembled Lord Halsbury more

than his famous relative.

Sir James Martin,

great in politics and in advocacy a Chief Justice

of New South Wales came from Co. Cork as

did Stawell and Madden.

These Irishmen all

enriched our life in every respect.

" It is true, of course, that these fertile streams

almost died out in the last forty years, but Mr.

C. V. Rooney, a Senior Crown Prosecutor, is

an Irishman and Mr. J. A. Meagher a solicitor

with a very large practice in the Courts was

at one time very prominent in Dublin.

" The Irishman's gift for advocacy, for argu–

ment, for making a case, finds full scope in

our courts and in our way of life, and Irishmen

of all classes, mainly on account of their fighting

records in our regiments in both World W^ars,

are very popular in Australia.

" I hasten to add that I am "not an immigration

officer, but I would be glad to refer any inquirer

to the proper authorities."

A notable omission from the names mentioned

by the Society's correspondent is

that of The

Rt. Hon. Sir Frank Gavan Duffy who was called

to

the

Bar

in Australia

and

subsequently

became Chief Justice of the Commonwealth. He

was a brother of Mr. Justice Gavan Duffy, President

of the High Court.

LENGTHY AFFIDAVITS

GAVAN DUFFY, P., in the High Court recently

referred to the practice of filing lengthy affidavits

in support of petitions. The case before him was

a petition under the Solicitors Act, and an affidavit

tad been filed repeating paragraph by paragraph

the terms of the petition. His Lordship observed

that the only authority for this practice appeared

to be derived from a case over a century old;

he was not, he said, aware of the attitude of the

Taxing Masters to the costs of such affidavits,

but the practice appeared to him an undesirable

one. There was no reason why an affidavit con–

taining no more than one or two paragraphs,

stating that the deponent had read the Petition

and that the matters therein stated were in all

respects true, should not be sufficient.

APPLICATION FOR DIRECTION

ON PLAINTIFF'S CASE

IN the GAZETTE for March, 1944, there was reference

to recent English cases laying down the practice

in the matter of an application to the judge by the

defendant for a direction in his favour on the

ground that the evidence for the plaintiff had not

made out a prima facie case for the relief sought.

The English practice is that the defendant on such

an application should be asked to elect either to

stand on his application and not to call any evidence,

or to go into evidence, and the judge will not rule

on the application for a direction until this election

is made.

Since these cases were reported there

seems to have been some doubt as to whether they

would be followed here. These doubts may have

been resolved by the opinion of the Supreme Court

in the case of Bradley

v.

Coras lompair Eireann,

as yet unreported.

It is understood that Maguire,

C.]. then President of the High Court stated

on the hearing before him that he would follow

the practice of the English Courts, and that Counsel

would be put to his election, on an application

for a direction on the ground of " no case," between

foregoing the right to call evidence and having

his application for a direction refused. This practice

is understood to have been disapproved of by the

Supreme Court (Murnaghan, O'Byrne and Black,

JJ. ;

Geoghegan, J., dissenting) and the opinion

was expressed that it would be undesirable to

depart from

the existing practice of the Irish

Courts on such applications.

The case was sent

back for retrial.

CALENDAR AND LAW

DIRECTORY, 1947

OWING to difficulties in the printing trade it is

unlikely that the Calendar will be available for

distribution until March.

The Council regret

this unavoidable delay and every effort is being

made to expedite publication.

Any member who

wishes to obtain a copy and who has not yet sent

in an order, is advised to do so immediately.

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