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Show ? i CORPORATION COUNSEL. lit I i ! ' The cases against various individuals ill which the city has brought within a few I j " days for lewd conduct, illustrates a very .1; serious delect in corporation management. 11 We refer to the matter of counsel. When j f tlie cit.v found that the ordinance under I ; ; which these cases were brought was j attacked, and attacked by one of the strongest legal firms in the city, the city ; ' employed additional counsel to aid the . regular city attorney. In this there is ! nothing improper of itself, for frequently I there maybe need to employ assistant ' t: counsel, owing to the amount of work to ! - le done, and for other very proper I reasons. But none of these reasons ' ' apply to the present case, while the rea- 1 "on for which the city engaged one of the leading firms of attorneys is in reality an t. ji-i outrage upon the citizens. The city f ; ; authorities engaged additional counsel I ; :'! ' the present instance because the regu- . j lar city attorney was not considered equal jj to the occasion. It is true that the city j I I ' attorney is absent at present, arid that I ; I : I ' ''is assistant brought these cases: but . j ' j, had the regular city attorney been here i J I ' ' I would the case have been any different? j , ! 'T The present city attorney was not chosen I , j ' :f- on account of his eminence at the bar by " j. ' any means, but lie was chosen to give i f a sinecure to the son of a prominent j Mormon. His predecessor in office, ' : i i is at present in the Penitentiary, I r was given the place because lie had to live, and ompatent attor- ; j neys were dismissed to give place to I f this needy attorney. During the time t j this same needy attorney was coriwration counsel, the city paid for the services ; of private counsel more than the salary of i ! the regularity attorney. AVhy was this i , done? Merely because the corporation i i ' counsel was totally unfit and incompetent i 4s to do the city's legal business. The same i ! thing is litfdone to-day, and it is an -! i outrage in the taxpayers. Why do not the city authorities employ as regular counsel attorneys of the same ability and eminence as the special counsel they always employ when the city gets into a tight place ? If ihe regular city' counsel were not the city counsel, it would never enter the heads of the city authorities to employ such attorneys asjspecial counsel. When the present city attorney was engaged, en-gaged, the City Council found it necessary to go to Ogden to get him, and they did not go to Ogden to get him because of his great superiority over all members of the Salt Lake bar, either. The city j should employ the best of counsel and j should get the best where it can, but this j it has not done. City affairs are too im- i portant to be intrusted in the hands of j those who are not competent, and the er- J roneous legal opinion of a city attorney may cost the tax payers many thousand dollars. A city attorney should be among the ablest members of his profession, be- j cause upon his judgment and learning de- j pend the rights not of one or two or three individuals, but the rights of every taxpayer, tax-payer, as a taxpayer, in the city limits. ' The citizens are entitled to the best legal j ability to be had, but they have not got j it by any means. |