REPORT AND RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE MUNICIPAL

COURT COMMISSION OF THE CITY

OF NEW YORK

HON. ALFRED E. SMITH, Governor of the State of New York, Executive Chambers, Albany, New York:

In August, 1923, stating that you were satisfied that there was urgent and immediate need for practical reforms in the Municipal Court of the City of New York, you requested the Hon. Aaron J. Levy and the undersigned to act as a commission to inquire into the situation, and make findings and recommendations in order that you might present to the next Legislature adequate and suitable measures for the relief of the Court and its general reorganization. (See Appendix I.)

Accordingly, on September 20, 1923, the undersigned, one being a justice of the Court, and seven representatives of the six Bar Associations of the City, met in the Aldermanic Chambers at the City Hall, New York City, with its chairman, the Hon. Aaron J. Levy presiding, and organized the commission by electing Alfred Gregory secretary. After this meeting the chairman did not take part in the work of the Commission.

The Commission has held public hearings in all of the Boroughs of the City of New York. It has conferred with the justices of the Appellate Term of the First Department, with Mr. Justice Cropsey, of the Second Department, and thirty-two justices of the Municipal Court. It has heard the clerks, assistant clerks, stenographers, attendants and interpreters, and also the marshals of the City. All the lawyers and laymen, who have requested a hearing, have been heard. The Commission has advertised for suggestions, has requested opinions from competent and expert authorities, and has received the criticisms and suggestions of some three hundred forty-six different persons. The Commission has made special investigations in several directions.

After consideration of all the foregoing, the Commission hereby renders its report.

PRELIMINARY STATEMENT

The business of this court is transacted by forty-eight justices in twenty-five independent court houses scattered throughout the five boroughs. It is a loose association of forty-eight Justices of the Peace and their clerks and attendants. It represents an unsuccessful effort to merge forty-eight Justices of the Peace into a metropolitan court. The result is that it possesses the vices of both and the virtues of neither.