America's Greatest Institutional Treatise By Lucien Hugh Alexander Of the Philadelphia Bar ANDREWS' American Law* marks an epoch in American jurispru dence. As said by the Columbia Law Review: — It is the first serious attempt which has been made on this side of the Atlantic at the complete classification of our legal system, and this attempt must be conceded to rank as a real achievement. It is an extraordinary example of analysis and criticism, reminding one of Austin in the refinement of its reason ing, and the minuteness of its observations. This work deserves and is entitled to receive more than passing comment. Trained in the art of editing law books, the author has brought to the task that experience which one would expect to find in the editor of Cooley's Blackstone, of two editions of Stephen's Plead ing, and of the modern edition of the Works of James Wilson. In the front rank of practitioners at the Chicago bar, and later in New York, a man of philosophical temperament and unusual powers of condensation and expression, long the Chairman of the American Bar Association's Committee on Classifica tion of the Law and the author of the noteworthy report on that subject pre sented at the 1902 Meeting (25 A. B. A. Reports, 425-475), his training and equipment for the work were all that could be desired. Law has by some one been described as a lawless science, and American insti tutional law has undoubtedly lacked •ANDREWS' AMERICAN LAW. A Commen tary on the Jurisprudence, Constitution and Laws of the United States. Byjames DeWitt Andrews, LL.D. Second edition. Callahan & Co., Chicago, 1908. 2 v., pp. xxii, 2026; index.
both co-ordination and perspective. As heretofore practised in America law writing has been mainly an art; but Andrews, following the lines laid down by James Wilson, America's first great jurist, has-made it a science, and forced it for the first time to bow to the inex orable domination of scientific methods. Andrews' American Law is a direct result of the classification advised by Wilson more than a century ago, and it bears the impress of his creative genius. He planned it in outline and began the work. Dane, in 1823, pointed out both its necessity and its utility. Walker (p. xii of Preface) spoke of it as a desideratum, and a communication from Henry T. Terry to the American Bar Association in 1889 constituted so strong an appeal that a Committee on Classification of the Law was created. James C. Carter in 1889 and Judge Dillon as late as 1897 emphasized the need of such a work as that before us, and Austin Abbott strongly stated the necessity. Other names could be added, but these suffice to show that what our author attempted has by our ablest practical jurists been regarded as a work of great public interest and of practical utility to the profession. For upwards of a century, indeed since the days of Chancellor Kent, there has been a demand on the part of the profession for some logical plan of ar rangement, under which the principles, doctrines and rules which make up the body of our law could be arranged with cases illustrating their application, for a work which, while a practical aid
