Law Society’s Gazette, July 1951

As it was a hundred years ago – a sidelight on legal history

The Law Society’s 1851 annual report gave the membership of the Society as 1,320 [there are more than 150,000 on the Roll today], of whom 1,026 practised in London and 294 in the country. London members paid an admission fee of £15 and an annual subscription of £2; country members £10 and £1 respectively.

It was not until 2 November 1874 that all members of the profession were given the title of solicitor, but even in 1851 the case for and against its exclusive use had become a popular subject for debate. It became one of sufficient importance to find its way into the formal atmosphere of the Society’s lecture hall, where Mr Samuel Warren made a (to our minds) somewhat rhetorical appeal for the retention of ‘the good old Saxon word "attorney"’…

Lectures were given regularly on Monday and Friday evenings at 8pm ‘so as to interfere as little as possible with the business of the day’. The use of the phrase ‘as little as possible’ and the fact that the library was widely used as late as 10pm suggest that the professional day was longer in 1851.

The Council consisted of 30 members [today there are 92] and all of them belonged to London.

The predominance of Town members on the Council is fully explained by the difficulties of travel (the first railways date from the 1820s) and by the fact that there were ordinary meetings of the Council once a week and special meetings many times a year.

It is not easy to say whether there was more business for solicitors then or whether less of it took longer to complete. In relation to the general population there were fewer solicitors, and one would have thought that there would have been a heavier demand on their services.

On the other hand, Mr Samuel Warren publicly advised parents not to make their sons attorneys on the ground, among others, that ‘the tendency has been and will continue to be, to simplify legal procedure’ and as a result to dispense with the services of the solicitor – a prophecy which the succeeding century did not fulfil.

T.H.