Law and Philosophy Commons^™

The Popularization Of Law, Huntington Cairns

Michigan Law Review

Law has been a major interest of the Western, and particularly the European, mind. Like physics it has provided a subject matter upon which many of the resources of the human intellect may be tested. It has yielded to many methods and, as a specialty with a circumscribed body of material, it has demanded the formulation of clear ideas so that interconnections are manifest and irrelevancies eliminated. Its great reward is the bestowal of the sense for style, which Whitehead has termed the ultimate morality of mind, and which is the product of specialization alone.

Jurisprudence On Parade, Hessel E. Yntema

Michigan Law Review

Jurisprudence is part of the pageant that makes history. This is a truism that, it may be added, obtains irrespective of the view held as to the significance of general legal theory. To some, the constructs of jurisprudence may seem but laggard symbols of more vital facts and trends. The degree of the lag exhibited by the more celebrated of such constructs may suggest to an anthropologically-minded observer, such as Thurman Arnold, that the apparent function of jurisprudence in the present social climate is neither to represent reality nor to control the administration of justice, but rather by the magic …

Corporate Personality, Henry Rottschaeffer

Michigan Law Review

A review of CORPORATE PERSONALITY By Frederick Hallis.

Law And The Modern Mind, Burke Shartel

Michigan Law Review

A review of LAW AND THE MODERN MIND By Jerome Frank.

The Paradoxes Of Legal Science: A Review, Rousseau A. Burch

Michigan Law Review

This book by the distinguished Chief Judge of the New York court of appeals deals with difficulties of the judicial process when its function is creative; that is, when a judge makes law for novel situations.

The title of the book assumes there is a science of law, and the introduction takes analogues of physical science for a starting point. In physics there are rest and motion, static and dynamic ; in social affairs there are stability and changes, conservation and progress. In making decisions, the judge may be concerned with the yea of action in alteration, and the nay …

Juristic Idealism And Legal Practice, Joseph H. Drake

Michigan Law Review

The relation of the "idea" of just law to the "principles" [Grundsaetze] of just law and the "model" [Vorbild] of just law is somewhat difficult to grasp and Stammler's application of the idea, through the intermediate principles and model, to the practice of just law, has given much trouble to the critics. A rule of law may be thought of as a particular conclusion, a principle as a general conclusion, while a standard or norm is a means of reaching conclusions. This is of course the old logical division of conceptions into particular, general and universal, …

Juristic Idealism And Legal Practice, Joseph H. Drake

Michigan Law Review

The leading exponent of juristic idealism in Germany is Rudolf Stammler, Professor in the University of Berlin. He is uncompromising in his idealistic theory. He even resents being called a pragmatic idealist, possibly lest the chameleon like connotation of this word might seem to detract in any way from the absolute character of his conception of the idea. He is to be thought of rather as the third of that great triumvirate of juristic idealists; namely, Socrates-Kant-Stammler. It is then rather a curious phenomenon that wl1en his juristic philosophy is transplanted to alien soil, it is the pragmatic element in …

Book Reviews

Michigan Law Review

A collection of book reviews by multiple authors.

Book Reviews

Michigan Law Review

A list of books received by Michigan Law Review

Legislation And Judicial Decision, Rudolf Stammler

Michigan Law Review

The discussions of the theme indicated by the title usually start from Montesquieu's theory of the three powers. This famous doctrine is developed in his work "De 1' esprit des lois" (1748) Bk. II, Ch. 6. This chapter is entitled "Of the English Constitution". It discusses however all states in general. In every state there are three sorts of powers, the legislative authority, the executive authority in matters dependent upon the law of nations, and the executive authority in everything dependent upon civil law. The last Montesquieu calls the judicial power, while the one mentioned in the second place is …

The Juridical Nature Of The State, Sir Paul Vinogradoff

Michigan Law Review

Of all varieties of social co-operation, one dominates the others. It is the State, and a fundamental problem in every system of law consists in settling the legal relations between the State and its members- both the individuals and the juridical persons.

Legal Standards And Ideals, Sir Paul Vinogradoff

Michigan Law Review

Provisions for the settling of conflicts constitute the greater part of any legal system. These conflicts are not entirely governed by self interest and the idea of ethical duty does not disappear from them: it asserts itself in the shape of the balance to be established ·by the court: while every litigant presses for the satisfaction of his own claims society is called upon to adjudicate fairly between the parties: the moral notion of justice appears as the impartial attribution of what everyone in society ought to have by right. We make distinctions between men in accordance with their greater …

Presumptions, Victor H. Lane

Michigan Law Review

Persistent controversial discussions furnish evidence that there are still uncertainties as to some phases of the nature as well as the law of presumptions. We have recently come much nearer to a common understanding in this field, due to most careful and thoughtful discussions of this subject by such masters of it as Thayer and Wigmore and Chamberlayne. It is 'less with the hope of adding significantly new matter than with the belief that even that which smacks of reiteration may still assist in drawing attention which, once aroused, may ultimately dispel the fog, that this brief discussion of the …

Fundamextal Tendencies In Modern Jurisprudence, Rudolph Stammler

Michigan Law Review

Empiricism is a variety of skepticism. Both refuse to consider the possibility of a fundamental ordering of the mental life. But they are differentiated one from the other in the manner of working out this refusal.

Fundamental Tendencies In Modern Jurisprudence, Rudolf Stammler

Michigan Law Review

The reception of Roman law presented new problems to jurisprudence.

At the end of the fifteenth century the reception of Roman law and canon law, together with the Lombard feudal law, was complete throughout the entire continent of Europe.

As a matter of fact, Roman law had come northward in the East from Constantinople at the same time that it was coming into Germany from the South and West; but that is for our question of no particular importance. The chief point is that everywhere there was the need of becoming familiar with this foreign law, so far as that …

The Juristic Philosophy Of Justice Holmes, John C.H. Wu J.D.

Michigan Law Review

Philosophy in the full sense," says William James, "is only man thinking, thinking about generalities rather than about particulars." In the same sense, we may describe juristic philosophy as man thinking about generalities in connection with law.

It is to be noted that I do not say "generalities of law;"--law itself being nothing more than a particular object-matter of knowledge, its generalities are to be handled by general jurisprudence rather than by juristic philosophy. By "generalities in connection with law", I mean the general problems of philosophy considered in relation to the study of law.

Book Reviews

Michigan Law Review

A collection of book reviews by multiple authors.

The Law Book Of The Future, William W. Cook

Michigan Law Review

In an article published in November, 1922, in the American Bar Association Journal on the "Power and Responsibility of the American Bar and its Relations to Democratic Institutions," the author pointed out the achievements of the profession in developing the law to meet the political and industrial needs of the American people. There is still other important work for the profession to do. Blackstone's and Kent's Commentaries have been outgrown and there is an imperative demand for a comprehensive and practical American treatise on all law for the use of law students and lawyers, legislators and the educated classes generally. …

The Separation Of Powers, John A. Fairlie

Michigan Law Review

One of the characteristics of both national and state governments in the United States is the existence of three separate departments,--the legislative, executive, and judicial, each coordinate and in the main independent of the others. The Constitution of the United States establishes three such departments,--Congress with legislative power, the President with executive power, and the Supreme Court and other United States courts to be established by law, with judicial power. Each of the state constitutions also provides for three similar departments in the state government.

Cause, Legal Cause And Proximate Cause, Albert Levitt

Michigan Law Review

Man is a social being; but neither by instinct nor through training does he always express himself so that no one is hurt through his self-expression. Each individual at some time or other acts in such a way that the result of his activity is an injury to himself, to another, or to the social organization of which he is a part. His activities, therefore, need to be watched and controlled. It is the function of the legal ordering of society to exercise such watchfulness and control. The law is a method of social control, and legal principles, concepts, standards …

Book Reviews

Michigan Law Review

A collection of book reviews by multiple authors.

Book Reviews, Edwin W. Patterson, Edson R. Sunderland, C E. Griffin

Michigan Law Review

The title of this brilliant little volume might, more accurately, have been, "The Spirits of the Common Law," for it depicts the common law as the battleground of many conflicting spirits, from which a few relatively permanent ideas and ideals have emerged triumphant. As a whole, the book is a pluralistic-idealistic interpretation of legal history. Idealistic, because Dean Pound finds that the fundamentals of the 'common law have been shaped by ideas and ideals rather than by economic determinism or class struggle; he definitely rejects a purely economic interpretation of legal history, although he demands a sociological one (pp. io-ii). …

Book Reviews, Nathan Isaacs, Horace Lafayette Wilgus, Arthur H. Basye, Leonard D. White, Victor H. Lane, Edwin D. Dickinson

Michigan Law Review

What does a judge do when he decides a case? It would be interesting to collect the answers ranging from those furnished by primitive systems of law in which the judge was supposed to consult the gods to the ultra-modern, rather profane system described to me recently by a retrospective judge: "I make up my mind which way the case ought to be decided, and then I see if I can't get some legal ground to make it stick." Perhaps the widespread impression is the curiously erroneous one lampooned by Gnaeus Flavius (Kantorowitz). The judge is supposed to sit at …

Book Reviews, Edwin C. Goddard, Evans Holbrook, Ralph W. Aigler, Edwin D. Dickinson

Michigan Law Review

Books in general, law books in particular, are like people. Most of them are ordinary, some useful, some not, but if they had not appeared they would not have been greatly missed, having appeared they will live their few years and at least seem to be forgotten. A few are so outstanding that they make a strong impress on their time and live on beyond the period of a life. If not great they have great influence and make notable contributions. Among the notable books of our time in the field of property law may be mentioned Jarman on Wills …

Copyright And Morals, Edward S. Rogers

Michigan Law Review

The basis for national copyright legislation in this country is Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution: "The Congress shall have power * * * to promote the progress of science and useful arts by securing for limited times to authors and inventors, the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries."

German Legal Philosophy, John M. Zane

Michigan Law Review

Annexed as an appendix to the translation of Kohler's Philosophy of Law is an appreciation of the work by Adolf Lasson, 1 who complains that he himself once wrote a philosophy of law which has sunk into oblivion, probably for the reason, as he modestly suggests, that he knew so much of systematic philosophy that he had no time to acquire any "special scientific learning either in the law or any other special department of knowledge."2 This complaint is a confession, child-like and amusing in its vanity, which could be dismissed without comment, were it not something that is wholly …

New Law Of Nations, Joseph Kohler

Michigan Law Review

If the article upon the New Law of Nations had been written by an obscure man for a sensational periodical, it would not have been worthy of serious consideration. It appeared in September, 1915, however, in the ZEITSCHRIFT FUR V6LKERRECHT, generally reputed to be the leading periodical devoted to international law, published in the German language. Its author, Dr. JOsEF Ko.HLER, is generally conceded to be the most distinguished living German jurist. His PHILOSOPHY OF LAW was deemed worthy of translation into English and appeared as Volume 12 of the Modern Legal Philosophy Series.' Dean Roscog POUND has referred.to him …

Inquiry Concerning Justice, Floyd R. Mechem

Michigan Law Review

Justice, said Daniel Webster, "is the greatest interest of man on earth." Alexander Hamilton, in the Federalist, declared "Justice is the end of government. It is the end of civil society. It has ever been, and ever will be, pursued until it be obtained, or until liberty be lost in the pursuit."

Nature Of Legal Rights And Duties, Joseph W. Bingham

Michigan Law Review

One cannot long talk on a legal topic without using the words right and duty or some synonyms. It is familiar hearsay that a purpose of law is to create, delimit, and protect rights and to define and enforce duties. Therefore it is of importance to inquire what is meant by "a right" and by "a duty" when we use these terms in legal discussion. The question is a linguistic one; but in the process of finding the proper answer, we shall have to analyze some of our common sorts of mental concepts and perhaps shall finish with a clear …

What Is The Law? Ii, Joseph W. Bingham

Michigan Law Review

I shall now discuss briefly the nature of the causal effects of precedents upon judicial decisions and the justifications for those effects. One frequently hears laymen scoffing at the respect which courts pay to precedents and sometimes displaying a lamentable ignorance both of the nature of the influence which precedents have on the law and of the reasons for the existence of that influence. The influence of past example on human action pervades all human conduct and endeavor at all times. That influence is fundamental. It occurs through instinctive as well as intelligent processes and sometimes runs to unreasonable extents. …