Untitled

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume X, Issue 3198, 7 May 1889, Page 2

A Turbulent Lawyer.

Whatever may be said about Mr Jellicoe's manner of conducting his case, it cannot be. denied that lie very ofleri succeeds in impiessing the jury wilh bis views of law and fact, It was rather an impotent conclusion for Mr Justice Gillies to say that Mr Jellicoe wua " welcome to the gratiu'cation" of insulting everyone,'"even the Court itself." This is not what a Judge ought to say, He ought to maintain the dignity of his Court, and not to allow insult, If he 'does, he is censurable, Mr Jellicoe evidently thinks that if ho wins his case lie can afford to be told that his conduct is " worthy" of contempt." But is it " worthy of contempt" when he insults the Court] There are some Judges who aro unequal to the tusk of upholding the honorable traditions of a British Court of Justice, They bully the Bar, interrupt and overbear counsel at every stages, anticipate evidenpe, even the. decision, and when they catch a Tartar in' the shape of a Jellicoe, they are so feeble and timid as to bend before him, not even daring to punish insu|t. What does Mr Jellicoe care for the vapid censure of a forcible-feeble.. Judge / His point is to weaken the authority of the BenchJ if he has a shaky case, by creating contempt for its dicta in the minds of the jury. Ab for the opposing counsel, that is a matter of less consequence. To "abuse the oth:r side" comes as facilely to*Mr Jellicoe where he has no cubo as when ho has one, We don't know exactly how to deal with,,Mr Jellicoe on the merits. There svas so much subserviency in the early days oi, .the. colony on the part of the Bar towards the Bench, that one feels balf-inolined to view with 6ome degree of favor -the iudependeuce which manifests itself in the etiquette of a Jellicoe. It is certain that the" conduct to which, this learned gentsemitn is "welcome" in the eyes of the Court, is the reaction from tho toadyism which was at oue time common in the prostration of tho advocates before the Juggernauts of the judiciary. But we cannot afford to express approval of conduct amounting to disrespect to the Court, any more than ..we can of the rough rude manner in which we have Been the Court treat both lawyers and witnesses. English Judges aiR patient and courteous. Counsel are respectful, and while preserving the firmness due to a sense of duty to the client/do not venture to substitute insult lor the higher attributes of the advocate.' This is the ideal of administrative etiquette in a Court of Justice, and ought to bo approached if not realised in a British colony, But it will be seen that there are duties on both sides. If the line is ovorstepped on the part of either, we are likely to have many reproductions of Gillies versus Jellicoe,—Wanganui Yeoman.