762 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



body else writes it ; and a verbal promise, indicated by a nod before 

 some authorized magistrate or clergyman, binds two persons of oppo- 

 site sexes to each other in marriage for life. All the vast interests of 

 the kingdom of Great Britain are regulated and controlled by an im- 

 aginary "constitution" — one never written or printed, but which 

 seems, Topsy-like, to have "growed" out of customs adapted to the 

 hour, and which come to the present generation as traditions, and 

 which are accepted and interpreted by the British courts with as much 

 reverence as though everything had been written out, sanctioned by 

 the people, and filed, as with us. Even British "common law" is 

 nothing more than ancient customs accepted as laws, and interpreted 

 as such with as much care and exactness as though they were statute 

 laws sanctioned by Parliament. All this shows that the mass of ver- 

 biage in legal documents has no basis of necessity for its existence 

 when courts administer justice according to certain general principles, 

 and that the excuse for its retention has some other purpose than jus- 

 tice between buyer and seller. 



A large part of our litigation is due to laws which embody contra- 

 dictory or unconstitutional provisions, or are so vaguely expressed that 

 judicial decisions are necessary to their interpretation. In this, too, 

 the " fine work " of the able lawyer is apparent. The inexperienced 

 or non-observing citizen would suppose that a Legislature of lawyers 

 would enact statutes about which there could be no ambiguity and no 

 conflict with higher laws. The lawyer is not slow to express appre- 

 hension about the fitness of plain citizens to enact laws, and of the 

 necessity for a legal supervision of embryo statutes, in order that they 

 •shall not shock conservatism nor create disorder in the body politic. 

 To every Legislature he goes in force, generally making a majority, 

 and sometimes a two-third majority, carried there in triumph by those 

 brilliant qualities w^hich distinguish his profession, popularly known 

 as " cheek," in addition to wire-pulling and that trinity of political 

 virtues aptly described by a Pennsylvania politician as "addition, 

 division, and silence." In the Legislature his work may be described 

 as that which first and foremost guards on all occasions the interests 

 of "number one." When a proposed law is crude, ill-digested, or 

 of doubtful constitutionality, it never alarms him, because it is such 

 that need interpretation by the courts. ' Then, again, his constituency 

 may require his support of certain measures which he privately abhors, 

 and to kill or cripple such measures with crude, incongruous, or un- 

 constitutional amendments is usually regarded by him as statesman- 

 ship of a high order. A body of men chosen without solicitation of 

 their own, and because of intelligence and high moral character, would 

 scorn such work, but the lawyer regards them generally as "cranks" 

 or "impracticables." A good legislator must be something of a plod- 

 der, ready to do a great deal of inconspicuous work. He must watch 

 legislation very closely, particularly the work done in committees, and 



