Illinois Bar Association court, without unnecessary interrup tion to the course of justice." THE JUDICIAL RECALL
The recall of judges was vigorously advocated by R. M. Wanamaker of Akron, O., judge of the Court of Com mon Pleas, who declared that there is too much regard in the courts for the rich, and too little for the poor. "There is too much usurpation of legislative power by the courts," the said, "too much expense to the litigants, too much delay, and too much uncertainty." James H. Wilkerson, United States Attorney in Chicago, spoke in opposi tion declaring that if the recall was adopted it would be used "in times of excitement and popular unrest, when the people need protection the most from their own unwise conduct." The adoption of the recall, Mr. Wilkerson said, "would in effect be to declare our judicial system a failure." Albert Martin Kales, of the Chicago bar, spoke in favor of the recall of judi cial decisions, asserting that no one had ever advocated the application of the recall to all decisions involving con stitutional questions, because that would include decisions by the federal Supreme Court. Mr. Kales declared that the amendment of a state constitution in respect to the "life, liberty and prop erty clause" amounted through the course it must take to a popular recall. Charles H. Hamill of the Chicago bar, answering Mr. Kales, commented upon the cases cited by Colonel Roosevelt, and said: "When general propositions affecting all men alike are submitted to our vote, we are impelled by a com bination of patriotism and fairness with self-interest to declare in favor of that which makes for righteousness, but, in my judgment, it would be a most dan gerous expedient to remove from the
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control of men trained by tradition and experience to weigh the rights of others and submit to a general vote, perhaps in time of great popular excitement and prejudice, the rights of a small group of men whose interests might, for the time being, seem opposed to the wel fare of the community at large." Chief Justice Orrin N. Carter of the Chicago Supreme Court made a very earnest defense, at the banquet, of the conception of judicial power which pre vails in most American courts of last resort, under which so many statutes have been held unconstitutional because they invaded, in the opinion of the judges, the inherent or natural rights of the individual. Speaking on "The Courts and Unconstitutional Law," he said: "Great social and public questions cannot be settled speedily. It is only on the 'roaring loom of time' that a new form of government can be created. Extreme positions are taken on both sides of all important questions. Truth is rarely reached except as the outcome of clashing opinions. "The chief work of a court should not be to create new conditions by making new laws but rather to adopt and adjust the fundamental principles of law to the ever changing conditions of society. "We need change and reform, but more than social or political reform do we not need individual, personal, moral, and mental reform?" S. S. Gregory, president of the Ameri can Bar Association, who also spoke at the banquet, declared that the country was practically on the verge of a politi cal revolution. "When popular discontent is so preva lent as it is now," he said, "something is amiss with either the Constitution or the
