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Jefferson's Louisiana (Hardcover, Revised ed.)
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Jefferson's Louisiana (Hardcover, Revised ed.)
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The Purchase of all of Louisiana in 1803 brought the new American
nation into contact with the French Creole population of the Lower
Mississippi Basin. The Spanish called it Baja Luisiana. While the
settlement in and around the city of New Orleans (the capital of
the province when it was ruled by Spain) was not large, it had well
established governmental and legal institutions. Which system of
law would prevail in this volatile corner of the North American
continent, a region that was distant and strategically vulnerable
to rival European powers -- Spain, France and Great Britain - who
still coveted the vast empire that was Louisiana? This was one of
the most vexing problems that confronted the Administration of
Thomas Jefferson. Reflecting contemporary American opinion,
Jefferson did not believe that the United States would be able to
incorporate Lower Louisiana into the Union on a basis of equality
as a separate and independent state until the very character of its
people and the institutional foundation of its culture had been
thoroughly transformed. The pivotal issue that came to symbolize
this conflict was the struggle between Louisiana civil law and
Anglo-American common law. That Louisianians would remain committed
to their civil law heritage was by no means certain. But the
enactment of the Civil Law Digest by the territorial legislature in
1808 was a major event in the evolution of Louisiana's increasingly
complex legal regime. Jefferson's Louisiana shows how this
important moment came at a time when political forces and outside
events joined together to reinforce local determination to resist
total Americanization and to preserve Louisiana's established legal
culture. The book reconnects a segment of American legal history to
the general history of the period. In addition to official records,
it also uses archival sources that demonstrate how the struggle
between civil law and common law forces affected people who were
either outside of, or but marginally connected to, legal and
governmental structures. As stated in the Introduction to this
revised edition of Jefferson's Louisiana, "The Civil Law Digest of
1808 was not only a foundational legal document but a constitutive
cultural moment in historical time - an effort by the people of
Louisiana to preserve language, culture, and historical memory as
well as law." George Dargo grew up in Brooklyn, New York. A
graduate of Erasmus Hall High School and Columbia College, he
completed his Doctorate in the Department of History at Columbia
University and, later, earned his law degree at Northeastern
University. His previous books include Roots of the Republic, Law
in the New Republic, and A History of the U.S. Court of Appeals for
the First Circuit. He now teaches law at New England Law/Boston.
Along with his wife Lois, he lives in Brookline, Massachusetts.
"This penetrating book, first published in 1975, has already
influenced and shaped the work of a whole generation of historians
and scholars. With this new revised edition published by The
Lawbook Exchange, its influence will continue and increase. George
Dargo's work remains the indispensable point of departure for those
who wish to understand the complex and contingent historical forces
at play in Louisiana's successful retention of its civilian legal
heritage. A valuable feature of this revised edition is a new
introductory essay from the author summarizing and evaluating in a
most lucid and balanced way the various debates among scholars that
have appeared or continued since the original edition. And the
timing of this publication seems perfect-given the recent
celebration of the Bicentennial of the Digest of 1808, which itself
embodied the "clash of legal traditions." Vernon Valentine Palmer
Thomas Pickles Professor of Law, Tulane University.
General
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