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THE GREEN BAG
Be that as it may, a change gradually took place whereby the use of bags became restricted to the more distinguished mem bers of the profession. Illustrative of this is an interesting incident connected with the common-law Bar of England, which occurred in 1780, when Edward Law joined the northern circuit. He received numer ous briefs, and Wallace, complimenting him on his success, presented him with a bag. "Lord Campbell asserts that no case had ever before occurred where a junior had won the distinction of a bag during the course of his first circuit." The same usage appears to have con tinued for some thirty years or more, for, one signing himself "Caucidicus" writes: "When I entered the profession (about 1810) no junior barrister presumed to carry a bag in the Court of Chancery, unless one had been presented to him by a King's Counsel; who, when a junior was advancing in practice took an opportunity of compli menting him on his increase of business and giving him his own bag to cany home his papers. It was then a distinction to carry a bag and a proof that a junior was rising in his profession. I do not know whether the custom prevailed in other courts." This absolute barrier, however, was gradu ally broken down and left only distinctions as to the color of the bag. Blue bags and at times purple bags were carried generally by the humbler "Chancery jurors," while the leading chancery practitioners were alone permitted to carry red bags. Probably the last prominent appearance of the green bag in history to date was in so-called Green Bag Inquiry. "A green bag full of documents said to be seditious was laid before Parliament by Lord Sidmouth in 1817. An 'inquiry' was made into these documents and it was deemed advisable to suspend the Habeas Corpus Act." The downfall of the green bag was very rapid after this discreditable affair, and at the present time its use as a mark of dis tinction seems confined to a few university
towns where it is still faithfully carried by the proud law student and the humble laundryman. Now and then a writer in some legal periodical, perhaps yearning for some badge which shall distinguish him from the "unusually intelligent" juryman, voices a call for a revival of green bag carry ing. Such an article appeared in the Albany Law Journal of 1872 (V. v., p. 225) and was quoted in the Pittsbiirg Law Journal of a later date by another enthusiast, who urged "that the lawyers while in professional attendance on behalf of their clients at any one of the aforenamed and mentioned courts, shall carry their green bags, or blue, red, or purple bags and wear silk or stuff gowns according to seniority and ability," and to quote the language of that Albany Journal, "as becoming the dignity, solem nity, authority, and learning of the Bench and Bar." The article was apparently serious, and should not be handled with irreverent fingers. Yet fancy takes the wayward mind into the crowded court room of to-day filled with silk and stuff gowns concealing the slender or rotund outlines of our legal brethren, each noble counsellor carrying a gay colored bag, classified (by a committee of the Bar Asso ciation supposedly!) according to seniority and ability. With apologies to Mark Twain one might phrase it thus: Watch, O clients, how you pay. For the scale of charges runs this way: A green bag man, Hundred dollars a day, A blue bag man, Eighty dollars a day, A red bag man, Fifty dollars a day, Charge, ye lawyers, charge this way, Charge for the brown hair less than gray, A purple bag means little pay. But a green bag charges what he may. Charge, ye lawyers, charge this way.
No, despite the plea of "Fritz," of Pittsburg, the green bag has been relegated to the things that were. Even its traditions are so mixed as to be incapable of amalga