The Society wishes all its members and friends the best of health in this challenging time.

Forthcoming Events

Entries in the 2020 Annual Essay competition have started coming in already!

Please remind any prospective essayists that the society welcomes essays on the full range of Australian Legal History. Further details are at:  2020 Essay Conditions and Guidelines – Final

Coming Presentations

• The legal history tutorial by Chief Justice Bathurst on “The History of Defamation Law” will be presented on 24 September 2020 using the Court’s remote facilities

 

• the Lecture presented under the joint auspices of the Ngara Yura Committee of the Judicial Commission of NSW and the Forbes Society, to be given this year by Professor Lyndall Ryan under the title “Making the Past Visible: The Colonial Frontier Massacre Map Project and the Legacies of Frontier massacres”. This lecture will be held in Banco Court on Thursday 5 November 2020 at 5.15 pm.

 

 

Obituary to  Philip Selth OAM

The following Obituary to Philip was first published in the New South Wales Bar Association, InBrief on 7 July  2020. It is reproduced with the permission of the author, Bret Walker SC. It can be found at: PHILIP ALAN SELTH OAM

Philip Selth OAM was the founding Honorary Executive Director of the Society, then variously a member of the Advisory Board and Councillor. Philip’s support for the Society and its legal history work was vital.

Photo courtesy Australian Dictionary of Biography – one of the many history projects which Philip supported so passionately. He wrote six entries in the ADB. Click on the following link for a piece written by Philip on his experience with the ADB:    Philip Selth in the ADB 

Further Details from the NSW Bar Association are available at: VALE PHILIP ALAN SELTH OAM

 

 

2020 Forbes Lecture

2020 Forbes Lecture:  Justice Leeming of the NSW Court of Appeal delivered the Forbes Lecture on Tuesday 19 May 2020 at 5.30 pm.

The title was: : “Lawyers’ uses of history, from Entick v Carrington to Smethurst v Commissioner of Police”. Justice Leeming’s excellent presentation  the first time the Society used social media to broadcast a lecture live.

Download the Lecture here: Forbes Lecture 2020_ Justice Leeming

Further details of forthcoming lectures are available at:

2020 Annual Forbes Lecture Programme

 

DON’T FORGET!!!

Time to Renew Subscriptions Please,

Subscription Renewal Form:  FFS Membership application – renewal 20-21

Have you considered donating to the Society? 

 The Society welcomes donations to support research activities, such as  that outlined in the Current Research Page of this Website. Anyone wishing to donate should download the following form: Forbes Fund Donation Form

Forbes Flyer:

David Ash has published the latest edition of the Forbes Flyer which includes a commentary on the current situation, as well as a review of Sir Frederick Jordan – Fire under the frost,   Keith Mason, 2019, The Federation Press, 260pp. Click on the following link for the flyer: Forbes Flyer – No 41 – Autumn 2020

The Previous editions of the Forbes Flyer is available on the Forbes Flyer Page of this website.

The flyer includes an index of articles since its inception.

 

2019 was a very productive year for the Society. Many thanks to all our presenters and the many members and guests who attended our lectures, presentations and other functions.

 

Our last events were in November and included:

A lecture co-sponsored by the Forbes Society and the Selden Society,  was presented by the Hon John Bryson QC titled “Henry VIII’s Will and the Politics of Succession” on Wednesday 6 November 2019, which   was very well attended, with nearly 100 people in Banco Court to hear the analysis of the circumstances and implications of Henry VIII’s Will.

The lecture was introduced by Justice Lucy McCallum of the NSW Court of Appeal.

2019 Annual General Meeting

The 2019 Forbes Society AGM was held on Tuesday 19 November 2019 in the Federal Court Conference Room 18.47, Level 18, 184 Phillip Street, Sydney.

Click on the following tabs for documents related to the AGM: Notice of AGM 2019;  FFS Council nomination form 2019; Minutes of AGM – 14.11.2018; FFS proxy form 2019; Circular resolution 30 October 2019; 2019 Society & Fund Financial Report; Management Representation letter – 30 Oct 2019

 

OUR LATEST SEMINAR –

History of the Legal Profession in NSW, was on Thursday 19  September 2019.  We are very grateful to the Chief Justice, the Hon T F Bathurst AC, for presenting this seminar in Banco Court.

 

Acknowledgement:

We are very grateful to Professor Anne Twomey   who delivered the 2019 Forbes Lecture  on Wednesday 5 June 2019 . Further details are in the Forbes Lecture Page of the website.

 

Recent Publications of Note:

 The Constitution and Government of Australia, 1788 to 1919 By William Pitt Cobbett Edited by Anne Twomey

 

 Between 1910 and 1919, William Pitt Cobbett, former Professor of Law and Dean of the Sydney Law School, wrote what would become his great opus on the Constitution and Government of Australia but the manuscript was never published. Its publication had been frustrated in the period following his death by the High Court’s judgment in the Engineers Case in 1920 and the new constitutional order it created.

A century later, Professor Anne Twomey, has edited Cobbett’s original manuscript, taking care to preserve the integrity of his work. The Federation Press, with the support of the Francis Forbes Society for Australian Legal History, will publish this important historical work which provides a detailed perspective of how the Constitution operated in the first two decades after Federation.

Click on the following for further details: eCard_The Constitution and Government of Australia

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Free Hands and Minds

Pioneering Australian Legal Scholars

Susan Bartie

 

Peter Brett (1918–1975), Alice Erh-Soon Tay (1934–2004) and Geoffrey Sawer (1910–1996) are key, yet largely overlooked, members of Australia’s first community of legal scholars. This book is a critical study of how their ideas and endeavours contributed to Australia’s discipline of law and the first Australian legal theories. It examines how three marginal figures – a Jewish man (Brett), a Chinese woman (Tay), and a war orphan (Sawer) – rose to prominence during a transformative period for Australian legal education and scholarship.

Ranging from local experiences and the concerns of a nascent Australian legal academy to the complex transnational phenomena of legal scholarship and theory, Free Hands and Minds makes a compelling case for contextualising law and legal culture within society. At a time of renewed crisis in legal education and research in the common law world, it also offers a vivid, nuanced and critical account of the enduring liberal foundations of Australia’s discipline of law.

 Susan Bartie is Lecturer in Law at the University of Tasmania, Australia.

    344pp   |   Hardback   |

Discount Price: £56

Order online at www.hartpublishing.co.uk – use the code CV7 at the checkout to get 20% off your order!

Book Launch:

Launch of Sir Frederick Jordan: Fire under the frost, by the Hon Keith Mason AC QC – Tuesday 26 November 2019

The Federation Press cordially invited Forbes members to the launch of Sir Frederick Jordan: Fire under the frost, by the Hon Keith Mason AC QC. The book was launched by the Hon Justice Stephen Gageler AC in Banco Court.

Forbes members may recall the lecture delivered by the Hon Keith Mason on 10 October 2017, titled “Sir Frederick Jordan’s brushes with ‘degenerate art’”.

April 2020 saw the launch of a new book by Associate Professor Catherine Bond on  the legal experiences of a range of people living in Australia during the First World War. Further details are available on the following link: Law in War Bond

ALSO

The result of a long term research project by Malcolm Oakes SC is now available. It is a List of non-practice published works by members of the New South Wales Bar. This is a fascinating account of the many contributions to Australian social and literary life made by barristers. It is well worth a look at the following link:  List of non-practice published works by members of the NSW bar

The list is alphabetical by author and includes man well known barristers, including CEW Bean, HV Evatt, Ian Barker QC and many others.

 

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