At Buffalo

Half a century old, the American Bar Association convened last week at Buffalo; heard itself praised extravagantly by Commerce Minister Maurice Bokanowski of France and George K. Montgomery, staff-bearer of the Montreal bar; took satisfaction from the presidential address of Charles S. Whitman, one- time (1915-18) Governor of New York; and settled to its business.

President Whitman's satisfying speech traced the Association's history from its founding at Saratoga, N. Y., by a small group of men who saw that the nation's legal thought would need guidance; mentioned the understandings reached at conferences between the Association and the American Federation of Labor, looking toward the settlement of interstate industrial disputes; praised the Federal Radio Commission for "diligence and intelligence."

Chiefs. The Lord Chief Justice of England was present, the Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon Hewart, Baron Hewart of Bury. Mr. Chief Justice William Howard Taft of the U. S. Supreme Court introduced him. Lord Chief Justice Hewart denounced bureaucracy in government and then, once a newspaperman himself, loudly decried current tendencies in the press as menaces to society even graver than Communist propaganda. Chief Justice Taft courteously and instructively surveyed the English origins of U. S. law.

Oil. Secretary Hubert S. Work of the U. S. Department of the Interior asked the Association's mineral law section to urge the next Congress to legislate to conserve U. S. petroleum and gas resources, now being wasted through too much competition. Henry L. Doherty seconded Mr. Work, offering a brief for Federal adoption or promotion of the pool plan of conservation introduced last spring in the Seminole, Okla., field (TIME, May 23). James A. Veasey, counsel for the Carter Oil Co. at Tulsa, Okla., submitted that, though the industry is now overproduced and demoralized, it can right itself; Federal control would be unconstitutional.

Firearms. The National Association of Attorneys General passed a resolution asking the President to call a conference of state governors to regulate the use of firearms. The same body was asked to resolve, but did not, in commendation of Massachusetts' conduct of the Sacco-Vanzetti case.

"Weakest Link." Ill in Yonkers, N. Y., unable to attend, Samuel Untermyer, fiery Manhattan counselor, wrote a letter for President Whitman to read aloud. ". . . The administration of justice, which

I think we will all agree is the crucial test of a given state of civilization, is with us the weakest link in our chain of government. . . ." Mr. Untermyer then suggested spurs to "leaden-footed" U. S. justice--assessing dishonest litigants more heavily, taking action against perjurers.

Crime. State Senator Caleb H. Baumes of New York stated the view of crime which underlies the drastic criminal code written by him and lately enacted in his state. "Crime as a problem is mainly concerned with the hardened repeater ... an organized business comparing favorably with the methods employed by our best concerns. . . . The modern bandit shows no mercy whatsoever. . . . These Baumes laws have been passed in order to put real backbone into the work of the judiciary."

Justice Frederick E. Crane of the New York Court of Appeals elaborated the view that punishment of criminals should take the form of compulsory restitution to society of whatever the criminals have taken from society. "When a man has killed another, why should the widow be left to starve when this man, under the law, might be compelled to provide a living? . . ."

Air Law. The Association resolved, on a motion by Chester Welde Cuthell, chairman of its committee on air law that Congress should legislate to give the U. S. Department of Commerce authority to regulate transoceanic flights, in which more than two dozen lives have been lost this year, at a great cost to aviation's prestige and to agencies that must hunt for lost flyers. Secretary

William P. MacCracken Jr. of the Aeronautical Bureau of the Department of Commerce, also secretary of the American Bar Association, said his Department would gladly undertake whatever regulatory powers Congress might confer but added, ". . . Adoption of regulations will not end the loss of life in these pioneering enterprises."

Other Business. The Association voted: to incorporate itself in Illinois; to continue working for a constitutional amendment changing the inauguration date of U. S. presidents from March 4 to January 1, and fixing the opening of Congress on that day also; to restrict use of the title "attorney" to persons actually admitted to the bar."

Elections. To succeed President Whitman, the Association unanimously elected Silas Hardy Strawn, potent Chicago corporation lawyer, lately a presidential emissary to war-tangled China. Secretary Mac-Cracken and Treasurer John H. Voorhees of Sioux Falls, S. Dak., were reelected.