Do You Use Text-Books Encyclopedias or Annotated or Selected Cases HEN briefing a point how do you get WHEN briefing at the cases decided since the "notes in your set were published? " Many of these "notes" are now one, three, five---even ten years old. WE CAN bring these old books down to about it. date and keep them there. Ask us West Publishing Co. New York St. Paul Chicago The Bar NOVEMBER, 1911 No. 11 = VOL. XVIII AN OPEN FORUM This journal is intended to furnish an open forum to every lawyer for the discussion of any polIcy or proposition of interest to the Profession. It invites a free Interchange of views upon all such topics whether they agree with the views of THE BAR or aot. THE BAR goes to every court house in the state, and is read by, probably, three-fourths of the lawyers of the state, and thus furnishes not only a ready medium of communication between members of the Profession, but of unification of the Profession on all matters of common concern, which is its prime mission. Every clerk of a circuit court is the authorized agent of THE BAR in his county, and has the subscription bills in his possession, and will receive and receipt for all money due on that account, or for new subscriptions, and his receipt will always be a good acquittance for money due THE BAR. THE BAR is furnished at the nominal rate of $1.00 year, which is less than the cost of publication, and we would like to have the name of every lawyer in the state on our subscription list THE VIRGINIA DEBT A War Claim or A Civil Claim-Which? It is an accepted principle of international law that when a government takes over to itself new territory it takes with it all obligations then ataching to the new territory. But this principle of the law of nations is not applicable to the conditions under which the territory of Virginia was divided and the state of West Virginia was erected out of that territory. The mother state, Virginia, abandoned the territory now constituting the state of West Virginia, and left it without a government, without protection, and without provision for the orderly administration of its affairs. Virginia cut loose not only from part of its territory but from the allegiance which it owed to the Federal government, and the territory it thus abandoned fell into the hands of the Federal government as legitimate spoils of war. The Federal government took it under its protection, drove back the disloyal forces of Virginia that were attempting to regain it, recognizing this new territory as standing for the only legitimate part of the original state and formally and fully received it into the union of states under a new name. There was no taking over by the people of West Virginia anything that did not already belong to them. Western Virginia simply maintained its status quo. If there was any taking over it was done by Uncle Sam And Uncle Sam simply took what belonged to him under all the rules of civilized warfare. We know of no rules of war that puts any power under a financial obligation to pay for territory conquered from its enemy, or to pay any obligations that the enemy may have attached to that territory. There are a great many claims stsill pending, and a great many have been liquidated by Uncle Sam, where property was taken or destroyed during the Civil War, as a war measure, and which belonged to individuals, organizations or communi. ties who were loyal to Uncle Sam, but we have yet to know of a claim being made, or paid, or promised when the claimant lost his property as a result of his disloyalty to Uncle Sam, and which fell into Uncle Sam's hands as a part of the spoils of that war. Think of a claim being made against Uncle Sam for property destroyed or abandoned by the enemy during that fight! But the status of the present state of Virginia in making claim for any loss of territory or property to West Virginia is exactly that. What she lost, and what she abandoned, she lost as the enemy of Uncle Sam, and it fell into his hands and he received it as the legitimate spoils of war. It was Uncle Sam's forces which conquered this territory; Uncle Sam's government that made it possible to divide the mother state; and Uncle Sam that received it as part of his national domain independent of the original state. If there is anything to pay probably Uncle Sam ought to be the paymaster. In the court of nations it would doubtless be determined that there is nothing to pay. But the supreme court has based its conclusion for a contrary view solely on the voluntary assumption by the people of this state, as one of the condi tions of becoming an independent state, to pay an equitable pro. portion of the dept of the mother state. The supreme court calls it a contract, but we fail to discover in this unilateral declaration the essential elements of a legal contract. The proposition could only take the form and force of a contract if Virginia had accepted. But Virginia repudiated the whole proceeding and refused even to confer with us on the offer to pay. The only basis for designating the unilateral declaration a "contract" is therefore the acceptance by Uncle Sam of this severed territory as an independent state with that declaration following it. If this is where the supreme court finds the contract, it ought also to find that Uncle Sam ought to pay if there is anything to be paid. And we are all willing. When this issue as to what West Virginia ought to pay Virginia as the result of a military conflict brought about by the conduct of Virginia, in which she lost a part of her territory-when this issue, we say, is tried by the laws of war as it ought and probably will be, instead of the laws governing a civil obligation: when the rights of the victor and the vanquished in that conflict are balanced and determined by the principles which govern a millitary court, instead of a civil obligation in a civil court, this debt question will take on an entirely different character. And who will say that as an issue of the war this feature of the case has had its due weight or consideration in a civil court which entirely ignored the military side of the issue, or what court can deny, when that issue is raised, that it is under the laws of war, rather than under the laws of a civil obligation, that the status of Virginia and West Virginia has been fixed and should be determined? Let the states build good roads, as Maryland is now doing: improve their systems of education; protect the health of their people; pass reasonable measures to protect the workmen in mines and factories; study means to get rid of the pests that destroy the farmers' crops; open banks where the people can intrust their money to the states, or provide for the guaranty of bank deposits; let there be annual meetings of the governors and attorneys general of the states for conference and for securing uniformity of state legislation, where desirable; in short, let the states get busy. The world moves so fast now, that laggards and drones, whether men or states, are left behind and are forgotten. The notion that a government exists only for the purpose of collecting taxes and preventing people from hurting one another is out of date. If the state government will not occupy proper fields of governmentai action in response to popular de |