LAWYER CANDIDATES.
THERE has been some complaint, that among the candidates for election to the Reformed Parliament there arc a great many law- yers. The aversion to legal members of Parliament is not a new one. There was a Parliament in our history from which they were specially excluded, and on which they revenged themselves by affixing to it the epithet of Indoctum. It is not to be denied that many a barrister seeks admission to the Senate less with a view to forward the interests of the People than his own; but is this true of lawyers only ? Do not all men more or less seek their own interest first, whether they figure at the bar or elsewhere? Besides, it does not always happen that the path of self-love and social cross each other—they new and then run parallel. The public ought to make a proper distinction between what is called a thorough lawyer, in our times of' judicial complexity,— a mere creature of forms and precedents, skilled in the defence of error, and little capable of advocating truth,—and a good lawyer. The former class are always useless, and often mischievous in the Senate : in the latter have ranked the greatest and most efficient Reformers of our times and of all times. The benefits derivable from the labours of such men were ably shown in a speech pro- nounced a few days ago at Hull, by Mr. MATTHEW HILL, the liberal and learned candidate for that town. We give an extract from the speech—
The present Ministry deserved our thanks, for haying abolished, in many cases, the punishment of death ; and we were partly relieved from the stigma of hanging men for offences against property, when, if the life of man were taken at all, it ought only to be for having shed the blood of his fellow man. lie trusted we should live to see this reform perfected. We all felt that the mi- tigation of the criminal code was a glorious event in our history; and to whom did we especially owe that it was mitigated ? whose exertions had been most effectual in that work? They would excuse him the vanity of saying, that it
was v owing to lawyers. One of the first men who wrote against a san- guinary code, was Jeremy Bentham a lawyer ; the first who raised his voice in Parliament against a sanguinary code, was Sir Samuel Romilly, a lawyer ; he was ably supported by Sir James Mackintosh, another lawyer; and out of Parliament no one had done more than another lawyer, Mr. Basil Montague. And who were they that put the seal to this great work? Sir Thomas Denman, Attorney-General, and Henry Brougham, now, thank God, Lord Chancellor of England. "When I think on these names, I ant reminded of still another great and good lawyer—I call to mind that forty years ago, when William Pitt, the renegade Reformer, crept into power and swayed the whole force of Government against men whose only crime was that they sincerely believed and honestly practised the doctrines which he had falsely professed —when Thomas Hardy, just now dead, John Thelwall, and John Home Tooke, were tried for treason, who was it that stood forward and de- fended them ? And I ask not whether, if Mr. Pitt had succeeded in destroying those men—whether we should have had a Reform Bill ; but I ask, whether we should not have been trod into the earth by as grinding a despotism as ever cursed a nation. To whom do we owe that the destroyer was stayed in his progress? The liberties of England at that awful moment hung on the lips of E d ?lc the lawyer ! His eloquence decided our fate: but for him, I firmly believe we should by this time have ranked below the slaves of Don Migliel." When he .thought upon these things, he bore the stigma of being a lawyer with more philosophy than the world might suppose. For though there might be had men among them, and no doubt had been, the names that he had brought to their recollection showed that the order to which he belonged had Produced, and still boasted, men whom he might safely compare with the vei y best of any other class! It was, therefore, a futile objection to him, that he was a lawyer. He did not ask to be chosen because he was a member of that profession; nor, on the other hand, ought he to be rejected on that ground. It was absurd to judge of men by classes—they should be examined one by one. He came before them as Matthew Hill, and on his individual merits or demerits ought they to accept or refuse him.
Mr. HILL might have properly added, that as, by the efforts of the Anti-popular party, lawyers, determined on " conserving " the abuses of our present code, are sure to gain admission to Parlia- ment, it is absolutely necessary, in order to neutralize their efforts, that Liberal lawyers also should gain admission.
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