South Canterbury Times, FRIDAY, OCTOBER 22, 1880.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2371, 22 October 1880, Page 2

South Canterbury Times, FRIDAY, OCTOBER 22, 1880.

Just as we predicted a few weeks ago, there has been a slaughter of the chimney ornaments known as District Judges. Of the quartette whose duty it was to perambulate the Middle Island and stir up the litigation that oscillated between the E.M. Courts and the Supreme ones, only two are left standing— Judge Ward and Judge Broad. The question arises, will their Honors be able to overtake the multifarious duties so suddenly thrust upon them ? Are they not likely to he placed in the dilemma of the two single gentlemen rolled into one, so often referred to on the schoolboy platform ? Will they be able to so condense their business as to meet the requirements of the litigious public and at the same time revolve like wandering stars round the island ? It is true that the business of our District Courts is not very extensive, and that hitherto the practice has been to spin it out to an alarming degree. But their Honors have displayed a faculty for expansion rather than compression. The suits tried before them have so frequently been adjourned, and have grown so complicated under dexterous points of law and confusing arguments, as to become like suits in chancery. Not to travel out of Timaru, we have seen, in the District Court here, simple disputes over property that an inferior magistrate would have disposed of in a few minutes, extended over months. Yet the process was never complained of, and the game went merrily on. As a natural consequence, the District Court lias only been applied to under severe compulsion, and the popularity it has lost lias been a clear gain for the E.M. and Supreme Courts. In the latter Courts legal business is transacted with reasonable expedition although it is sometimes rather costly. But the intermediate Court has been managed

in such a grotesque manner as to be neither usej&l nor ornamental. Its main object apparently has been to exemplify, at the cost of clients, in a manner truly thrilling, the law’s delays. The gradual extinction of the District Court will therefore, we presume, create but little alarm and less regret. But the question arises, and it is a serious one—will the two remaining representatives of the District Courts quartette be able to overtake their duties? The actual business transacted in these Courts is not great, but between their Honors and the Bar it has always been spread out in the most elaborate manner, and as use is second nature it may be a difficult matter to revolutionise an antiquated system. Will their Honors he able, all of a sudden, to transform their long parliaments into short sessions, and got over the now ground? His Honor Judge Ward for instance has been appointed to take charge from November 1, of the District Courts of the Dunedin, Otago Goldfields, and Western Otago districts. Hitherto His Honor has had his time very busily occupied with the Courts of Canterbury, and the addition of Otago is something more than the proverbial straw for the camel’s back. Unless His Honor can devise means by which the business of months can he compressed into as many days, the cause lists must inevitably get into arrears and it is impossible to foresee the issue. In accordance with physical laws there is a limitation to pressure and the probability is that the District Courts may speedily burst up under the weight of accumulating briefs.

It is for flic Ministry to consider whether it may not be wise, with the object of averting the possibility of such ;i catastrophe, to avoid all danger by making a clean sweep of the District Courts altogether. The spectacle of a couple of judges with their wigs, gowns, and other paraphernalia in a continual state of travel,” doing their monthly visits to quite a collection of Courts cannot fail to impair the dignity of justice—a quality which, in New Zealand, we can ill afford to trifle with. Would it not bo belter, even at the risk of a few more deprecatory speeches, such as bis Honor Judge Harvey made the other day, to superannuate their Honors at once and abolish these intermediate Courts ? We are satisfied (hat if District Courts were abolished to-morrow, the colony would not be inconvenienced in the slightest. On the contrary, the business of those who arc brought into contact with courts of justice would be facilitated, and the legal game of lawn tennis, which has lately been played at Ashburton, whose client-shave been bandied about between the 11. M. Court and the District Court, in a most extraordinary manner, would be impossible. To say that District Courts are necessary is a clear perversion of facts. They are certainly not maintained for the bcuelit of the community. In every aspect from which they can be viewed, they are legal cxcrescnces. Not only arc they devoid of usefulness, but they rank among the superfluous things that are hurtful, inasmuch as they prey upon the industry of the people. The continued maintenance of District Courts for no apparent object beyond keeping a few district judges in employment is hardly a thing to be tolerated, and we trust the Government in the interests of economy will follow up the reduction of their Honors by the extinction of these wishy-washy intermediate tribunals.