11 Ga. 47 | Ga. | 1851
By the Court.
delivering the opinion.
Neither can the Solicitor General, on the expiration of his term of office, properly be considered as having been discharged, by the State. The contract between him and the State is, that he will perform certain duties enjoined by law, for a specified term of time, for a stipulated compensation. Upon the expiration of the period of time for which he ¿was elected, he is out of office, by the express terms of the contract. The State does not discharge him, but his term of service expires, by the express stipulation of the contract made between himself and the State; and hence, the want of any analogy between such a contract and a contract with a private citizen for professional services, who discharges his counsel from his case before the termination of the suit in which he is employed. The administration of the law should be free from all temptation and suspicion, so far as human agency is capable of accomplishing that object; and in- our judgment, public policy most emphatically demands, that a Solicitor General who has been employed by the State, to prosecute defendants for a violation of her laws, for the compensation affixed by law, should not be allowed to defend such defendants from the charge contained in the indictment, after the expiration of his term of office, for a compensation to be paid by them for that purpose. Such a practice will have a tendency to greatly embarrass the administration of the Criminal Law; for, as the term of the office of Solicitor General is about to expire, prosecutors and others, who maybe intrusted to prosecute offenders, will necessarily be restrained from communicating