October, 1874.] THE ACCOUNTANT. 3
The main object of The Accountant will be to raise the status of, and generally to benefit, the profession; but it may reasonably be hoped (though in all modesty) that our labours in a field where abuses and extravagances are far from infrequent may result indirectly to the advantage of that portion of the mercantile world which looks to our Bankruptcy Laws for assistance and protection. The publication of reports of cases with which accountants have to deal from all parts of the kingdom will be one of the means adopted to secure this end, which will be further advanced by original articles, and an interchange of opinions and experiences upon professional topics. It is manifest, however, that these means will only be made available by the personal assistance of members of the profession. The columns of The Accountant will be open at all times for the discussion of principles and rules of procedure, and the ventilation of important matters connected with accountancy; and we wish it to be thoroughly understood that the gauge adopted in the admission of literary contributions will be one having regard solely to their general utility and fitness for publication, subject, of course, to considerations of the limited space at our disposal. It is our intention to use all means to make The Accountant in every respect the representative organ of the entire profession, and we hope in carrying out this view to receive the hearty support of all accountants.
We began with a semi-apology, and may therefore consistently conclude, to some extent, in a similar strain. The time has been too short to make complete arrangements for the supply of literary matter, and there are consequently deficiencies, particularly in regard to the reports of cases; but we hope to be judged not by results actually shown in our first number, but by the indications therein given of the course which it is intended to pursue in the conduct of this paper.
_
There is, perhaps, no subject so important to the world of commerce, or more worthy the consideration of the Lord Chancellor in the present recess, than the laws which govern our Bankruptcy Court. It was hoped that the Bankruptcy Act of 1869 would remedy the patent evils existing under the old statutes which it repealed, and that some of the avenues to the perpetration of fraud would be closed against evil-doers. But the reverse is the case. The liquidation and composition clauses of the Act still admit of precisely the same description of malpractices as formerly, with some few additions. Sworn affidavits of creditors apparently provided a safeguard against the operations of “friendly” creditors and the intervention of disreputable advisers; but the wide use of proxies encourages a system as discreditable to our integrity as it is harassing and unjust to the real creditors; and the manner of convening and holding of cases with which accountants have to deal from all meetings is also open to grave condemnation. A forcible illustration of this was recently exposed in a case heard before Mr. Justice Quain at the Central Criminal Court. Hall, an attorney's clerk, by using the name of a solicitor, undertook to release a certain debtor from his liabilities for a money consideration. A petition for liquidation was filed, the necessary formalities completed, and a meeting of creditors duly summoned. The next stage of the proceedings was the receipt by the Registrar of certain resolutions purporting to have been passed at the meeting for the liquidation of the bankrupt’s affairs, which would have been followed in the ordinary course by the appointment of Hall as trustee, and the granting of the bankrupt's discharge. However, it subsequently transpired that not a single creditor attended the meeting, that proofs and proxies were forgeries, as were also the signatures of the Commissioners before whom the affidavits were said to have been sworn, and that Hall himself was the only person present at the so-called meeting. Eighteen months' imprisonment with hard labour rewarded this man's ingenuity; but it is not unreasonable to suppose that other cases of a similar character have escaped detection.
It is more within the province of the legal profession to suggest a remedy for the evil we diffidently point out; but it may be asserted that the presence of a Registrar of the Court, instead of a chairman appointed by the meeting, which admits of a person holding the proxies of a quorum of creditors to elect himself to the office—the presence, we say, of a Registrar of the Court at the meetings of creditors, and a narrower limit to the number of proxies, would do much to deter people from hazarding fictitious proofs, and would render impossible the holding of phantom meetings. A thorough revision of the liquidation and composition clauses is perhaps desirable in order to prevent the possibility of devising and carrying out the forms of fraud resorted to. Though at first sight it may appear an enormous undertaking to amend the
