And what of the coroner? Every authority worthy of credence is agreed that this office, above all others in the county, has long outlived its usefulness. That one small head should contain the necessary skill of criminal investigator, medical expert and magistrate is far too much to expect of any ordinary mortal. A few states, following Massachusetts, which abolished the coronership in 1877, have created an office under various titles, such as “medical examiner,” “county physician” (New Jersey), “medical referee” (New Hampshire), etc. They have modernized the coronership by stripping it of its magisterial powers and taking it off the ballot. In most cases the new medical officer is an expert pathologist and his services are often of the greatest value in criminal and civil actions and to the cause of science. In New York City the coroners now in office in the five boroughs will go out of office on January 1, 1918, their powers of investigation will then be transferred to a chief medical examiner appointed by the mayor, and a corps of assistants who will be equipped with ample laboratory facilities. The judicial duties of the coroner will be turned over to the city magistrates. As for the district attorney,[16] his proper relations to a criminal trial and to the public seem to be generally misunderstood. He is the state’s advocate as against the breaker of the law. But it is no part of his business to send every alleged offender to the penitentiary. The efficiency of the prosecutor is not to be determined by a high record of convictions. He is not, properly, a man-hunter. Nor is it his province to decide when he shall bear down hard upon offenders and when he shall soften justice. His functions, in short, are administrative and not political. And when that fact is admitted every reason why he should be popularly elected falls. In the ideal county, efficiency in the administration of justice will not be a perennial local campaign issue, for the prosecutor will be appointed by some responsible state authority, such as the governor or attorney general, not as a reward for political services but on the basis of merit and fitness. Or if, perchance, it shall be deemed unwise so to centralize authority, it would at least be logical to let the county authorities do the appointing.