se
as well as promote efficiency. Mr. Garrett very forcibly says:

"Law Reform hangs fire for want of an officer of State armed with the
power of conducting the necessary inquiries and investigations, and
supplying the necessary driving force to initiate and prepare the
requisite legislative measures and to pass them through Parliament, and
with strength to overcome the _vis inertiae_ of a preoccupied and
ill-informed public and the active opposition of vested interests.
Without such an officer the cause of reform is hopeless." It is now and
in the immediate future that such reform is, and will be, most pressing.
A reformed is naturally also a reforming Parliament as it was after
1832.

There are a large number of reforms in the law which ought to be taken
in hand at once. The nature of the amendments needed is clear; all that
is required is that they should be brought in proper form before
Parliament, and that the Government should use its influence to get them
passed. It would be difficult for the Lord Chancellor to see to this
work efficiently and regularly along with his other duties, and it is
certainly impossible for the Law Officers, whose duty it is to represent
the Crown in the Courts and to advise the Government on questions of
law, to undertake this duty. It could be done if a capable solicitor or
barrister who had experience of cases relating to property, not just a
successful advocate but a lawyer well acquainted with the practical
difficulties which make amendment in the law desirable, were put in
charge of the work.

It is a complete mistake to imagine that devolution to other bodies of
the legislative powers of Parliament would do what is required in this
respect. Such a delegation as regards many subjects would make confusion
worse confounded. Questions relating to marriage and personal status,
naturalisation, the law of companies, all branches of commercial law,
the law of contracts, and the law relating to devolution of property,
should be dealt with by one body, whose aim should be to assimilate the
law on these subjects over as wide an area as possible. Endless trouble,
litigation and uncertainty arise from an unnecessary variety of laws on
such subjects as these. It would be well, indeed, with regard to such
subjects, to endeavour to assimilate the law of the Colonies and of the
Mother Country, and to enter into negotiations with other countries to
facilitate their commercial intercourse by enac