Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 10.djvu/325

Harvard Law Review. Published monthly, during the Academic Year, by Harvard Law Students. SUBSCRIPTION PRICE, $2.50 PER ANNUM 35 CENTS PER NUMBER. Editorial Board. Robert G. Dodge, Editor-in-Chief, James A. Pirce, Treasurer. Edmund K. Arnold, Edward Sandford, Roland Gray, Harry U. Sims, Livingston Ham, Clarence B. Smith, Logan Hay, Lloyd W. Smith, Harold D. Hazeltine, J. Lewis Stackpole, Jr., Robert Homans, Charles S. Thurston, Robert L. Raymond, Jens L Westengard. Philip S. Abbot. — To all who knew Philip Stanley Abbot, the Novem- ber number of Appalachia will be full of interest. The circumstances under which he met his death are vividly described by Professor Fay, who was with him at the time. To this account are appended extracts from a letter written to the author of the article by iVIr. Abbot's father. Professor Palmer contributes an appreciative and sympathetic obituary notice, which is followed by a very effective sonnet. The magazine is published by the Boston Appalachian Mountain Club, and is for sale by W. B. Clarke & Co., of 340 Washington Street. ToRRENS System held UNCONSTrruriONAL in Illinois. — In the case of The People V. Chase^ reported in 29 Chicago Legal News, 93, the Supreme Court of Illinois has declared unconstitutional that feature of the Torrens system of title registration as adopted there, which provides for a registrar of titles whose duty it is to register titles, etc., after he is satisfied that an applicant's title is good. It is assumed for the purposes of the decision that the law gives all persons five years to assert claims in the courts. Never- theless it is held that judicial functions are conferred upon the registrar because his decision is necessarily based on law and fact, and because, with the limitation of actions provided for, it affects rights. The State Constitu- tion vests the judicial power exclusively in the courts therein provided for. This is not a satisfactory decision. It is perfectly clear that no sharp line can be drawn between judicial and other functions. Cooley, Const. Lim., 6th ed., 109. That the duties of an official require him to pass upon law and fact in a way that affects rights does not of itself make these duties judicial rather than ministerial. When a sheriff levies upon the goods of A as belonging to B, a judgment debtor, his decision that they are B's binds A after the statute of limitations has run quite as much as, on the hypothesis of the court, a registrar's decision binds all adverse claimants. The latter is not an adjudication in the constitutional sense,