Contributions, items of news about courts, judges and lawyers; queries or comments, criticisms on various law ques- tions; addresses on legal topics, or discus- sions upon points of interest, as well as important decisions. are solicited from members of the bar and those interested in legal proceedings. Decisions from each Law Journal enters upon its fifth year of literary life, and it is with feelings of pride and gratification that its pub- lisher and editor assure its subscrib- ers that it is no longer a mere venture, The publication of a state law jour- nal must necessarily be largely a labor of love. Its circulation is so limited port these decisions. Unless the attorneys interested in a case assist us in this way it will not be possible to make as good a report of a decision as we desire. While any assistance on this line will be highly appreciated by the Journal, it will also redound to the benefit of the profesion throughout the state. We propose to add several new features to the Journal during the coming year, and will spare no pains or expense to make it deserving of the patronage we ask for it. A NEW DEPARTURE. Beginning with this number of the Journal we will furnish a digest of the current decisions of the Supreme Court of Minnesota, referring to the advance sheets of the Northwestern Reporter where the cases are reported in full. The cases will be classified in each number on the same general plan, so that, when the numbers have accumulated, very little time will be consumed by a lawyer using this digest in ascertaining whether the Supreme Court has recently passed upon any question being examined. The Minnesota Law Journal will in this way provide the profession with an accurate digest of the decisions of the Supreme Court in advance of any other publication, and when a volume has been completed and bound it will contain a digest for the year covered by it of all Minnesota cases alone, and a subscriber will not be compelled to hunt through the thousands of cases decided in other states, digested in the American or General Digest, to find the decisions of his own state on the points he is seeking light upon. LIABILITY OF STOCKHOLDERS IN MANUFACTURING CORPORATIONS. Judge Brill of the District Court of Ramsey county in the case of the National German American Bank V. Haynie et al., reported in this number of the Journal, decides that the liability of а stockholder under the constitutional provision of this state is to be determined by the terms of the articles of incorporation, and that the stockholders in an association, that by its articles is thorized to engage in manufacturing TIONAL BANK STOCK AS COLLATERAL SECURITY. The Supreme Court of the United States in Pauly v. National Bank, which is reported in full herein, passed upon the liability of one to whom stock of a national bank had been transferred as collateral security, and held that where the name of the transferee "never appeared upon or in the stock or other corporate books" of the bank except as "pledgee," and there was no element of fraud or collusion in the transaction, he could not be held liable as a shareholder under section 5151 of the United States Revised Statutes. This decision is of such general interest and so fully reviews and distinguishes the former decisions of the court upon the point involved, that we have thought it well to call attention to it. NEGLIGENCE OF RAILWAYS IN THEIR DUTY TO TRESPASSERS. The dissent of Magruder, C. J., in the late case of Wabash R. R. Co. v. Jones (45 N. E. 50), Supreme Court of Illinois, while taken on a point of pleading, marks an attempt to escape the consequences of the Illinois rule on the subject of duty to tresspassers on railroads, (says the American Law Register and Review). The material facts were that a child was injured, while walking on the track, in a manner and for a purpose pursued by many of the community and sanctioned by a usage of twenty-five years. The railroad company sought to escape liability for its servant's alleged want of care, on the ground that plaintiff was a trespasser. To this view the majority of the Court inclined. The jurisdictions adopting the Illinois view hold that the railroad never has any duty toward persons found on its tracks other than the duty to avoid willful injury, unless those persons have been positively invited by the railroad company to go upon its tracks. They draw a sharp "distinction between cases where there is a mere naked license or permission to enter upon or pass over an estate and cases where the owner or occupant holds out any enticement, allurement or inducement to persons to enter upon or pass over his property:" Ry. v. Bodemer, 139 Ills. 596 (1892). The view which is found in the majority of American jurisdictions is clearly expresed by Boggs, P. J. in the decision of this same case in the Appellate Court: 123 Ills. 125 (1893). "We do not think that this evidence was admitted for the purpose, as is supposed, of establishing a legal right in the plaintiff to be upon the track; its admission was proper for another pur* * If the evidence * * pose. tended to show that persons were likely to be upon the track at the time and at the place where the appellee was injured, and that the company had notice thereof and had reason to anticipate the presence of persons there, though trespassers, then the evidence was competent." * * This theory does not require the railroad constantly to exercise vigilance, in order to ascertain whether the track is free; the company is not required to anticipate the presence of any unauthorized persons upon its tracks, in the absence of knowledge or notice. "The degree of care required in the operation of trains is proportioned to the danger likely to result therefrom." Texas & P. R. Co. v. Watkins, 26 S. W. 760 (1894). This is the rule followed in New York, Pennsylvania, Missouri, Powell v. R. Co., 59 Mo. Ap. 626 (1894); Wisconsin, Johnson v. R., 86 Wis. 63, 56 N. W. 161 (1893), and most of the Western states. The Massachusetts view is somewhat uncertain. In Chenery v. Fitchburg, etc., R., 160 Mass. 211, it was held that the existence of a license by acquiescence to cross at a private way was a question for the jury. The Illinois rule prevails in Alabama and a few other states. The first case in Illinois laying down the rule now followed in that state was R. v. Godfrey, 71 Ills, 500 (1874). This case (which did not go quite the length of the principal case, since the decision was based partly on the contributory negligence of the plaintiff) seems to have been decided largely on the authority of the Pennsylvania cases of R. v. Hummel, 44 Pa. 375, and Gillis v. R., 59 Pa. 129. In R v. Hummel, Strong, J., employed what is now generally regarded as a mistaken analogy in the following language: "There is as perfect a duty to guard against accidental injury to a night intruder into one's bed-chamber as there is to look out for trespassers upon a railroad where the public has no right to be." The Supreme Court of Nebraska, R. v. Wymore, 40 Neb. 645, 58 N. W. 1120 (1894), refused to follow this ruling, This expression of Mr. Justice Strong was, nevertheless, quoted with approval by Sharswood, J., in Gillis v. R. (supra), and the latter judge on the authority of R. v. Hummel (supra) dissented in Kay v. P. R. Co., 65 Pa. 269 (1879). It was held, in this case, distinguishing and virtually overruling R. v. Hummel (at least so far as it was made use of in the Illinois cases), that if a railroad company allowed the neighboring population to use its tracks as a way, the presumption of a clear track could not arise as in other parts of the road, and that greater precaution was necessary under these circumstances than elsewhere. To the same effect is Taylor v. Canal Co., 113 Pa. 162 (1886). The Illinois courts continue to cite R. v. Hummel (supra) and Gillis v. R. (supra), as though they embodied the Pennsylvania law on the subject. The Supreme Court of Washington, in a case almost on all fours with the present one, Roth v. Union Depot Co., 13 Wash. 525 (1896), have gone into a most elaborate and exhaustive survey of the authorities, and have reached a conclusion contrary to that of the Illinois court. It is interesting to observe that Hoyt, C. J., dissents. on the ground that he can see no difference between the duty of a railroad to trespassers, and that of any other land holder. This analogy is surely a false one. Certainly a railway does owe some duty of caution toward persons whose presence on the track it has reason to anticipate. Common justice and humanity demand that a railroad use a greater degree of care in a crowded country where it knows that trespassers are likely to be, than in lonely and unfrequented places. To this demand the great majority of authorities respond, and the Supreme Court of Illinois, when it frees the railroad in such cases from liability for all negligence except such gross want of care as will amount to willfulness, announces rule of law which few jurisdictions approve. CONFIDENTIAL a COMMUNICATIONS BETWEEN HUSBAND AND WIFE. In a forgery prosecution and conviction in Beyerline v. State (Ind.), 45 N. E. Rep. 772, the Supreme Court investigated the question how far communications between husband and wife are privileged. It was held competent to show by the wife's evidence that he took her by the neck, and led her into a bed-room, where he made her sign her name to a promissory note. The objection made to this evidence was that it detailed a confidential communication made to the wife by her husband. The Court properly replied that in the conduct, shown in the evidence, the husband was occupied in a double wrong, instead of being engaged in a confidential communication, such as the marital relation would shield from public exposure. The Court treated further on the subject, as follows: "It is not every conversation between husband and wife, nor every word or act said or done by either in the presence of the other, that is protected under the seal of secrecy, but only such communications, whether by word or deed, as pass from one to the other by virtue of the confidence resulting from their intimate relations with one another. Where the criminal, in seeking advice and consolation, lays open his heart to his wife, the law regards the sacredness of their relation, and will not permit her to make known what he had thus communicated, even as it will not ask him to disclose it himself. But if what is said or done by either has no relation to their mutual trust and confidence as husband and wife, then the reason for secrecy ceases. Accordingly, many conversations and actions by and between husband and wife have been held not to be privileged. In Beitman v. Hopkins, 109 Ind. 177, 9 N. E. 720, which was an action to set aside an alleged fraudulent conveyance made by a husband to his wife, the wife was allowed to give evidence as to negotiations between her and her husband prior to and resulting in the conveyance of the land to her. The ruling of the trial court in admitting the evidence was approved, this Court holding that the negotiations were in no sense such communications as are made incompetent by the statute. So, in Brown v. Norton, 67 Ind. 424, it was held that a wife might testify as to a parol contract entered into between her husband and another person; and in Schmied v. Frank, 86 Ind. 250, a like ruling was made concerning evidence given by a wife as to conversations between her and her husband, whereby she constituted him her business agent. In Williams v. Riley, 88 Ind. 290, it was likewise held that a wife should have been permitted to testify that she was present when a certain note executed by her husband and others had been paid. 'Husband and wife,' said the Court in that case, 'are not longer incompetent witnesses for or against each other, except that neither of them is allowed to testify in relation to a communication made by the other.' A similar holding was made in Jack v. Russey, 8 Ind. 180. In divorce and other like proceedings a still larger liberty is permitted. Smith v. Smith, 77 Ind. 80, was an action for divorce brought by a wife. It was there held proper for her to testify as to her conduct as a wife, and as to her husband's habits of intoxication and his abuse of her. Also, in Stanley v. Stanley, 112 Ind. 143, 13 N. E. 261, being an action on an ante-nuptial bond given by the husband, it was held that the wife might testify as to the conduct of the husband in matters relating to the alleged violation of the conditions of the bond. And in Mainard v. Reider, 2 Ind. App. 115, 28 N. E. 196, which was an action by a husband to recover for the seduction of his wife, the evidence of the husband as to statements made in his presence |