LEGAL EDUCATION IN NEW YORK.

IHE history of legal education in the state of New York
exhibits peculiar and interesting conditions of growth and
development. " Until recently," said a well-known writer
(in 1878), " instruction in the law in the United States has
been given for the most part in the offices of practicing lawyers." The
Hon. David J. Brewer, of the United States Supreme Court, noted in a
paper read before the American Bar Association in 1895 that " it was
many years after the settlement of the colony (of Massachusetts) before
anything like a distinct class of attorneys-at-law was known. And,"
he continued, quoting from Washburn's " Judicial History of Massa¬
chusetts," " it is doubtful if there were any regularly educated attor¬
neys who practiced in the courts of the
colony during its existence."

In a very early history of New York,
written in 1756, the author, William Smith,
afterwards chief-justice of Lower Canada,
calls attention to the fact that the door of
admission into practice of the Supreme
Court of the State of New York is too
open, and he says " the usual preparations
are a college or university education, and three years' apprentice¬
ship ; or, without the former, seven years' service under an attor¬
ney. In either of these cases the chief-justice [who, by the way,
it may be stated, was at that time James De Lancey] recommends the
candidate to the Governour, who thereupon grants a license to practice
under his hand and seal at arms. This being produced to the court,
the usual State oaths and subscriptions are taken together with an
oath for his upright demeanor, and he is then qualified to practice in
every Court of the Province. Into the County Courts, attornies are
introduced with still less ceremony, for our Governours have formerly
licensed all persons how indifferently so-ever recommended, and the
profession has been shamefully disgraced by the admission of men not
only of the meanest abilities, but of the lowest employments."

Thus early do we find recorded, and much earlier doubtless there
existed, a dissatisfaction in regard to the preparation of members of
the bar for the work they were to engage in.

There is no reason to believe that prior to the Revolution any
particular scheme of legal education existed in the Colony of New
York.
 

CROWN ON COLUMBIA COLLEGE