298 
THE VETERINARIAN, MAY 1, 1855. 
Ne quid falsi dicere audeat, ne quid veri non audeat. — 
Cicero. 
THE ANNIVERSARY MEETING OF THE PROFESSION, AND 
ELECTION OF VETERINARY EXAMINERS. 
It will not be denied that the representative system, as 
existing in the institutions of our country, incurs an increase 
of responsibility in proportion as it is based upon an ex- 
tended suffrage, and that it reaches its climax of accounta- 
bility*when the suffrage is universal. Probably, of all the 
varied trusts that are confided to the keeping of a represen- 
tative council, none surpass in importance the selection of 
proper persons for the carrying out of the enactments upon 
which depend “the weal or the woe” of the electors them- 
selves. Were it possible for the importance of this duty to 
be increased, it would be so when the interests of the com- 
munity at large are made to suffer by the inefficiency of an 
executive, supposing such to belong exclusively to a profes- 
sional body. In the charter by which the practice of vete- 
rinary medicine is raised to the dignity of a profession, the 
principle of universal suffrage is not merely recognized, but 
brought into full operation ; and as such, the council is, or, 
at the least, ought to be, the true exponent of the incorpo- 
rated members. Whether it really does embody the senti- 
ments of the profession as one compact whole may be ques- 
tioned, because as yet the number of practitioners who have 
assembled, year by year, to record their votes in the elections, 
has been too few to warrant the belief that, were more pre- 
sent, the same result would be produced. In this, however, 
it is apparent that the governing power is free from blame, 
and that the fault, be it great or little, rests with the electors 
themselves. It is not our intention on this occasion to discuss 
this part, in particular, of the subject, yet we have thought right 
to refer to it, seeing that within a few days of this number 
