The prominence of law and lawyers in popular culture is shown in the wealth of late-nineteenth to mid-twentieth century postcards and ephemera collected in this book. From humorous cards depicting love, divorce, drinking and cute animals and children in legal garb to serious depictions of women lawyers, courthouses and law firm libraries, they are a rich source for understanding popular opinions of lawyers, the courts, and the law. MICHAEL H. HOEFLICH is the John H. & John M. Kane Professor of Law at the University of Kansas School of Law. He is the author of numerous books including Roman and Civil Law and the Development of Anglo-American Jurisprudence (1997), Sources of the History of the American Law of Lawyering (published by The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd., 2007) and Legal Publishing in Antebellum America (2010).

With a preface by Michael H. Hoeflich, John H. & John M. Kane Professor of Law, University of Kansas School of Law and an introduction by William E. Butler, John Edward Fowler Distinguished Professor of Law, Pennsylvania State University Dickinson School of Law and Emeritus Professor of Comparative Law at University College London; Academician of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. Includes the text of Vol. 1, No. 1 (Oct. 21, 1876) to Vol. 1, No. 26 (April 14, 1877), originally published: St. Paul, Minn.: J.B. West & Co. 1876-1877. "In 1876, John B. West, twenty-four years old, launched a new publication that would within a decade evolve into the National Reporter System. As a traveling salesman for an office supply company in St. Paul, young West visited many Minnesota attorneys. He learned that the official publishers of court reports were chronically slow. West was later to say that if the official state publishers had been properly doing their jobs there would have been no need for his reporters. His first publication, The Syllabi was an eight-page weekly news-sheet that contained "prompt and reliable intelligence as to the various questions adjudicated by the Minnesota Courts at a date long prior to the publication of the State Reports." Its immediate popularity among the bar soon forced it to outgrow its original format and coverage. In early 1877, only six months after it had begun, The Syllabi was replaced by the North-Western Reporter. The reporter, another weekly, was also a transitional publication. It contained the full text of all Minnesota Supreme Court decisions and Minnesota federal court decisions, as well as those from the Wisconsin Supreme Court in cases "of special importance." This publication lasted two years, four semi-annual volumes. In 1879, West announced a new series of the North Western Reporter (the first of the modern West regional reporters) that would publish the full text of all current supreme court decisions from Iowa, Minnesota, Michigan, Nebraska, Wisconsin, and the Dakota Territory. The Federal Reporter and the Supreme Court Reporter began within the next two years and, in 1885, West Publishing (as it was incorporated in 1882) announced the publication of four new reporters that, along with its current reports, gave it nationwide coverage. (.) The National Reporter System was soon proclaimed to have "Unquestionably revolutionized the whole plan of law reporting." --Thomas A. Woxland & Patti J. Ogden, Landmarks in American Legal Publishing. An Exhibit Catalogue 38-40.

Seeking to fill a gap in our knowledge of the legal history of the nineteenth century, this volume studies the influence of Roman and civil law upon the development of common law jurisdictions in the United States and in Great Britain. M. H. Hoeflich examines the writings of a variety of prominent Anglo-American legal theorists to show how Roman and civil law helped common law thinkers develop their own theories.

Intellectual leaders in law in the United States and Great Britain used Roman and civil law in different ways at different times. The views of these lawyers were greatly respected even by nonlawyers, and most of them wrote to influence a wider public. By filling in the gaps in the history of jurisprudence, this volume also provides greater understanding of the development of Anglo-American culture and society.

Jurist of the 18th and 19th centuries were often in disagreement as to the proper method of instructing students who wished to take up the practice of law. This volume distills the essential elements of the controversy over legal education and offers many articles and papers on the topic that are no longer available in print. A compilation of seventeen essays by influential legal scholars of the period, it presents arguments for and against the educations approaches that dominated English and American legal study for more than two centuries. Dean Hoeflich's introduction examines the historical and legal context that formed the background of the controversy. Many of the essays that follow are polemical contributions to the debate on the relative merits of apprenticeship and academic training--the methods oflegal education that were commonly practiced. Some authors favored a pragmatic, non-elitist training, others recommended greater emphasis on systematization and method through the teaching of logic, moral philosophy, or Roman law. Still others proposed a blending of approaches or altogether new types of legal education--some of which were frankly utopian. Several essays focus on the need to develop American legal education independent of English models. Renowned jurists such as Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., and William Blackstone are represented, together with lesser known legal thinkers credited with substantial or original contributions to the field. The editor provides supplementary notes on the authors, a bibliographyu, and an index.