Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 14.pdf/542

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The

Green

Published Monthlv at $4.00 per Annum.

Bag

Single Numbers 50 Cents.

Communications in regard to the contents of the Magazine should be addressed to the Editor, Thos. Tileston Baldwin, 1038 Exchange Building, Boston, Mass. The Editor will be glad to receive contributions of articles of moderate length upon subjects of in terest to the profession; also anything in the way of legal antiquities or curiosities, facetice anecdotes, etc. The series of articles entitled " A Century of English Judicature," by Van Vechten Veeder, Esq., which appeared in the last volume of The Green Bag, received so much favorable notice from our readers that we take especial pleasure in announcing, for next year, two important series of articles by the same able writer. The first series of articles, which will begin in the January number, will be called, " A Century of Federal Judicature." It will be a sketch of the justices of the Supreme Court of the United States along the lines of the former sketch of English Judicature. The case bibliography will be somewhat exhaustive. Marshall, Story, Taney, Curtis, Miller, Field, Bradley and Gray will be fully treated. Washington, McLean, Grier, Nelson, Clifford, Swayne, Chase, Strong, Waite and Blatchford, will also receive due at tention. Of the present justices only an exhaus tive list of leading opinions will be given. The other series will be entitled " The Judicial History of Individual Liberty." It was sug gested by Justice Miller's statement in Ex parte Bain, 121 U. S. 12, that in the construction of the language of the Constitution we should place ourselves as nearly as possible in the condition of the framers of that instrument. Referring to Article V. of the Constitution he said that the framers had undoubtedly been for a long time absorbed in considering the arbitrary encroach ments of the crown on the liberty of the subject, and were imbued with the necessity of providing proper safeguards for the future. This series of articles will therefore illustrate the encroach ments which the framers had in mind in formu lating their doctrine of individual liberty, by systematic examination of the English State Trials for treason, conspiracy, sedition, criminal

libel, etc. The subject will be treated in three divisions : from Tudor times to the English Revolution; from the Revolution to the adoption of the United States Constitution; and, as illus trating what the founders succeeded in avoiding, from 1789 to present times. For cheerful reading we commend to all householders with empty coal-bins a recently pub lished pa'mphlet,' by Heman W. Chaplin, Esq., of the Boston bar, which discusses the timely subject of " The Coal Mines and the Public." What, if any, legal remedy is open to the public for ending a situation which is fast becoming unbearable, is a question which not only has a strong theoretical interest for the lawyer, but also comes close home in a practical way to almost every person in the community. The best treatment of the subject which has come to our notice is that contained in the pamphlet above mentioned, a summary of the more important parts of which we give below. The rriaterial facts are first summed up : —" that practically the whole existing and available source of supply of anthracite coal for more than twenty millions of people in the Eastern States is in a territory of five hundred square miles, more or less, in the State of Pennsylvania;" that not only is " at least two-thirds of [this] whole mining property in capacity of output owned or held under lease by one or another of seven railroad corporations," but that "these corporate owners, by arrangements among them selves or their stockholders, are for practical purposes a unit; " that these same railroad cor porations " controlled practically all the coalcarrying business from the mines and did not compete with each other; " that by a combina1 The Coai. Mines and the Public. A Popular Statement of the Legal Aspects of the Coal Problem, and of the Rights of Consumers as the Situation Exists Sept. 17, 1902. By Heman W. Chaplin. Boston: J. B. Millet Company. 1902.