"Thank you for your willingness to move the adoption of our report and recommendations at the meeting of the American Bar Association. May I ask you in so doing to call attention to the reports of the committee on ethics and of the committee on the unlawful practice of the law, of the Commercial Law League of America, printed in the June number of the Bulletin of the Commercial Law League, referring to their standardization of an information card as to an attorney's qualifications? Also as to the indirect solicitation of business by lawyers affiliated with collection agencies and the solicitation of claims against bankrupt estates, and, under unlawful practice of the law, the paragraph as to improper division of fees. I think these reports are significant."

The report of the committee makes the following recommendations:

I. That the Executive Committee be authorized to invite the various bar associations of the country, both state and local, to send copies of their annual reports to this Association, either to the Secretary or to the Chairman of this committee, in order that the Association may have available data as to activity.

(a) In discipline cases;

(b) In preventing unlawful practice of the law;

(c) The local activity of Bench and Bar in regard to the Canons of Ethics.

II. That the Executive Committee invite the bar associations of the states where the Canons of this Association have not yet been adopted to take definite action this coming year.

III. That this Committee on Grievances and Professional Ethics be reconstituted so as to be more central and with a membership not widely separated so that stated meetings can be conveniently held.

I move the approval of the report and the adoption of its recommendations.

The motion was carried.

Committee on Commerce, Trade and Commercial Law:

Francis B. James, of the District of Columbia:

The activities of the committee for the past year are fully set forth in our report. The committee has summarized its recommendations on pages 1 and 2, and the recommendations are six

in number. The report is in print, and it has been widely distributed, and therefore I will not stop to read it.

I move the adoption of the report.

The motion was carried.

(For Report, see July Journal, page 427.)

Committee on International Law:

Secretary Kemp:

Mr. C. N. Gregory, Chairman of this committee, wrote to your Secretary that he would be unable to be present at this meeting. The report is in print, and copies of it are on the table for distribution.

The President:

Without objection, we will consider the report as passed and approved.

(For Report, see July Journal, page 451.)

Committee on Insurance Law:

Arthur I. Vorys, of Ohio:

The bill that was prepared by the Committee on Insurance Law was approved by the American Bar Association and recommended for passage by Congress. It was proposed as a so-called model law for the regulation of insurance, and the committee was instructed to press the passage of the bill.

The committee saw fit not to urge the bill upon the 65th Congress, but the bill was submitted to the committees of the House and of the Senate of the 66th Congress, and, after a conference, the bill was introduced in the Senate by the Chairman of the Committee on the District of Columbia, and in the House by the Chairman of the District of Columbia Committee. Afterwards the Senate Committee convened and discussed the bill, but on account of war legislation and matters of more vital interest the consideration of the bill was postponed. We have every reason to believe that the Senate Committee will take it up, and act upon it this year.

The report of our committee recommends, and I put this now in the form of a motion, that the committee be instructed to urge the passage of the bill before the next session of Congress.

The motion was carried.

(For Report, see July Journal, page 449.)

Committee on Memorials:

The audience arose and remainded standing during the reading of the report by the Secretary.

(See Report at end of minutes, page 304.)

Committee on Jurisprudence and Law Reform:
Thomas J. O'Donnell, of Colorado:

Everett P. Wheeler of New York is not here, a fact I am sure we all regret. At a meeting of the committee, held in New York in April, Mr. Wheeler announced that he could not be here, and I was deputed to make the report.

The report of the committee takes up, first, the removal of causes from the state courts to the federal courts. There has been much confusion as to what is meant by the proper district" and a great contrariety of decision. Mr. Boston, in a paper read last year before the Conference of Bar Association Delegates, pointed out this contrariety, which he had previously shown in an article published in the Central Law Journal. As a result, the committee has prepared this bill, which is so short that I will read it. It amends Section 28 of the Judicial Code by adding at the end thereof the following paragraph:

"In all cases of removal where the defendant is not a resident of the state, district, or division of the district in which it is brought, the District Court of the United States for the proper district shall be the one having jurisdiction in the district or division thereof where suit is brought in the state court."

The committee also recommend a bill authorizing the courts of the United States to enter declaratory judgments. The subject of declaratory judgments being perhaps new to many members of the Association, I may say that the purpose is to enable parties between whom a controversy has arisen to submit the same to the court before any breach of the contract between them has

occurred. The case is not uncommon where the parties differ, as to their respective rights, and a controversy on that subject has arisen between them, but there has as yet been no breach, so that, under the existing system, no cause of action has arisen. When the common law and chancery courts were consolidated into one High Court of Judicature, rules were adopted which enabled full declaratory relief to be given. Rule 5 of Order 25 reads:

"No action or proceeding shall be open to objection on the ground that a merely declaratory judgment or order is sought thereby, and the court may make binding declarations of right, whether any consequential relief is or could be claimed or not."

The committee has, therefore, recommended for adoption, the passage of an Act of Congress amending the Judicial Code, as you will see by reference to our report, which is here in print.

Your committee has considered representations by various members of the Bar in reference to the practice in the Supreme Court whereby formal motions, in which no argument is permitted, must be presented by counsel in person. Your committee is of the opinion that the present practice entails unnecessary expense, inconvenience and delay to those members of the Bar of the Supreme Court of the United States who do not reside in Washington, and it recommends that a respectful request be addressed to the court that the rules be changed so that such motions may be presented by the clerk of the court.

The committee recommends the passage of an act to protect aliens in treaty rights. It seems that such an act was approved by the Association at its meeting in Salt Lake City,* and I will briefly state the provisions of the proposed act, which is printed in full in our report.

The act provides that the President of the United States is authorized to use the marshals of the United States and their deputies, to maintain the peace of the United States, when violated by the commission of such acts as are denounced; and when, in his judgment, the circumstances demand it, he is empowered to use the army and navy for the same purpose. An earlier section of the act provides that when aliens are defendants in a proceeding or prosecution, under the law of a state, the AttorneyRep. A. B. A. Vol. XL (1915), pp. 377-8.

General of the United States may be directed by the President to intervene in the suit, have it removed to the Federal Court and defend it at the expense of the Federal Government.

Mr. Wheeler has called my attention to what he considers the disregard, by the Supreme Court of the United States, of the act sponsored by this Association, and approved February 26, 1919, practically requiring the Appellate Court to disregard defects in the manner in which, and the process by which, suits are brought into the Appellate Court of the United States. Mr. Wheeler, in his communication, says:

"I have just been reading the last number of the Supreme Court Reporter (July 15, 1920). Almost the last case in the number, page 572, is Federal Trade Commission vs. Gratz. There is a decision on the question of pleading.' The court holds that a complaint filed by the Federal Trade Commission did not sufficiently show in what way the method of competition alleged was unfair.

"The case had been tried on the merits. Evidence had been taken as to the character of the alleged competition and had been fully heard before the Commission and in the Circuit Court of Appeals. The dissenting opinion by Judge Brandeis shows from the record just what this method was. The Commission held it to be unfair. He and Judge Clark concur, but the Supreme Court does not pass upon the merits.

"In the opinion no reference is made to the act of Congress which our committee recommended and which was finally passed and approved by the President, February 26, 1919. It certainly seems to me that the want of sufficiently detailed allegation as to the particular method alleged to be unfair should have been held cured by this act. It was an error as to matter of pleading. It was a technical error or defect.' It did not affect the substantial rights of the parties.' Both sides had been heard fully on the evidence and on the merits. No allegation is made of an unfair hearing or an insufficient opportunity to present evidence. Apparently the act was in the pressure of business overlooked.

"It seems to me that it is desirable that in your statement of the report you should call attention to this fact. The bill we recommended was designed to cure just such defects. When some years ago we had a hearing before President Wilson he asked us this question-If the bill is passed will the judges enforce it?"

Mr. Wheeler is of the opinion, in which I concur, that at least it can do no harm to keep reminding the Supreme Court of the United States, through this Association, that this act is upon the statute books.