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The Green Bag
at one time. Secretary Danaher of the State Board of Law Examiners says that the lawyers are being admitted at the rate of a thousand a year. More than two-thirds of them come from New York City. There are at present about 18,000 lawyers in New York state. By a vote of 317 to 14, the national House of Representatives on July 12 adopted the resolution to submit to the legislatures of the several states an amendment to the Constitu tion, empowering the federal government to levy an income tax. As the resolution had already been adopted by the Senate, by a unanimous vote, the proposed amendment now goes to the legislatures for ratification. The amendment provides that Congress shall have the power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, with out apportionment among the several states and without regard to any census or enumera tion. The Alabama legislature has since voted in favor of the amendment. The Connecticut legislature has referred the matter to the next General Assembly. The Georgia senate has thrice refused to ratify the amendment. A post-office inspector put in the hands of Postmaster-General Hitchcock August 6 evi dence that the eighteen men arrested in Ohio in June were connected with the great Black Hand Society in Italy, and were working under a chief appointed by that society in Sicily, and put in charge of a large territory reaching as far west as Chicago, extending east ordinarily as far as Pittsburg, but on extraordinary occasions stretching its activi ties up to New York itself, though that city is believed to lie in another district. There is also evidence that two of the prisoners were in Palermo at the time of the murder of Lieutenant Petrosino of the New York detec tive bureau, and that money orders for $3,100, obtained by the band in Cincinnati, furnished the money used to shield the mur derers. Pennsylvania's new law providing for the probation, indeterminate sentence and parole for convicted criminals, which went into effect in July, owes its passage to the Pennsyl vania Society for the Promotion of Improved Prison Legislation, the Pennsylvania Prison Society and the American Society for Visiting Catholic Prisoners. It provides that when the person convicted of crime is a first offender
—except in thejcase of murder, administer ing poison, kidnapping, rape, arson or bur glary of an inhabited dwelling house—the judge may suspend the imposition of sentence usually provided by law and place the con vict on probation under such conditions as suit the case. In the indeterminate sentence the judge simply sentences the prisoner to prison for an indefinite term, naming the maximum and minimum limits prescribed for the offense, the minimum being onefourth of the maximum, unless otherwise provided. When, however, the person to be sentenced has already, for previous offenses, been in a penitentiary twice, for a year or more each time, the court must fix the maxi mum at thirty years. Prisoners whose mini mum terms of indeterminate sentence will expire in three months may apply for release on parole. During the period of parole the offender may be recommended to the Governo r for absolute pardon. The Commercial Law League of America listened to several helpful addresses at its annual meeting at Narragansett Pier, R. I., July 19-22, among them being a discussion of "Methods of Developing Commercial Prac tice" participated in by Albert N. Eastman of Chicago, A. H. Gleason of New York, C. Moultrie Mordecai of Charleston, S. C., and E. J. Thilborger of New Orleans. Ormsby McHarg, assistant secretary of the Depart ment of Commerce and Labor, urged that methods be more earnestly sought of dis tributing labor in sections where it is most needed; Japanese Consul-General Midzuno de clared that peace was the greatest asset of his people, and that the Japanese desire peaceful and happy commercial relations with us; and Speaker Burchard of the Rhode Island House of Representatives said that the relations between business and the law were never in so delicate and dangerous situation as now. Resolutions were passed recommending the following amendments to the national bankruptcy law: increasing jurisdiction over corporations, conferring upon trustees the rights of judgment creditors, the amendment preventing dismissal of proceedings except upon notice to all creditors. The committee also recommended an amendment declaring that voluntary bankrupts must have debts of at least $750. A resolution was passed urging an act increasing the salaries of judges of the United States District and Cir cuit Courts and authorizing a committee to urge the increase upon Congress.
