MERCHANTS AS JUDGES.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9713, 8 February 1910, Page 4

MERCHANTS AS JUDGES.

The litigation of commerce in most countries clogs the wheels of judicial machinery. In Antwerp, however, they have solved the problem. Their experiment has been in operation for forty years, and is eminently sucessful. Commercial litigation in that J city is handled exclusively by the socalled Tribunal de Commerce, whose judges are chosen from among the leading business men of the city. The Court is split up into a number of auxiliary chambers, which hear cases of special classes. For instance, a grain merchant complaining about some inequality in the grain trade does not go before a Court whose presiding officer is a steel merchant or a dry-goods merchant. He goes into a tribunal at whose head presides a great grain merchant, familiar with every detail of the business. His evidence is bandied quickly, with knowledge, and with a much better grade of justice than it could get in a Court that must learn ttie business from the ground up in the course of a single hearing. Th&re are 17 of these auxiliary Courts, and their history shows almost uniform satisfaction with their methods and work. The Courts almost invariably begin with an* attempt to conciliate the litigants, ana an immense amount of litigation is prevented in this way. Jlf, however, it is necessary to raake a ruling, the result is generally known in four or five days. In the ordinary civil Courts, it would sometimes take as many years before the judges had familiarised themselves with the details of the business sufficiently to render a full verdict. Any merchant who is more than 25 years old, and j has carried on his business in a reI putable manner for five years is eligible for a judgeship. The judges hold office for two years, and are elected by the vote of merchants and traders who enjoy municipal voting privileges, and who pay at least four dollars a year to the Goverhment as a license tax. This whole system is one of the monuments to the ability of the Antwerp Chamber of Commerce.