REVIEWS
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.1937.tb00016.x |
| Date | 01 September 1937 |
| Published date | 01 September 1937 |
Sept.,
1937
MODERN LAW REVIEW
I69
REVIEWS
A CONCISE HISTORY
OF
THE
COMMON
LAW.
By THEODORE
PLUCKNETT.
Second Edition. Butterworth
&
Co.
1936.
20s.
net.
This Journal, which intends to devote itself mainly to the study of
law, as
it
functions, and of its relations to the other social sciences, can-
not give much scope to detailed reviews of the historical learning of the
law. But the line of demarcation between the history of law and the
living law
is
not and ought not to
be
so
sharp, as it sometimes appears
and least of all in this country.
No
one ought to be more grateful for
the existence of a book such as Professor Plucknett’s masterly treatise
than the lawyer who wants to study the living law in its social function.
Here the very method
is
applied to the study of legal history, which
we should like to see applied to the modern law. The political, economic,
social and religious conditions which have made the law, are seen, in
their true significance.
It
is admittedly more difficult to perceive clearly
the social foundations of the law in one’s own days than in the past.
The distance of historical events makes respectable the same propositions
which would often appear revolutionary and subject to strong political
controversy,
if
applied to modern times. And yet the modern lawyer
cannot afford to disregard these social foundations of the law, least of all,
when society, national and international, is
so
rapidly changing
as
it is
at
the present day.
It
is in the nature of law that it must achieve stability,
but
it
must not do
so
at the cost of reality. Professor Plucknett’s book
is
eminently qualified to help the modern lawyer in finding the right way
between the dangers of getting lost in technicalities and analysis on one
side, and of destroying the stability of the law on the other.
FUNDAMENTAL
PRINCIPLES
OF
!I’HE
SOCIOLOGY OF
LAW.
By
EUCEN
EHRLICH. Translated by WALTER
L.
MOLL.
Harvard
University Press.
Professor Ehrlich’s work, here admirably translated, is not the
systematic exposition of the sociology of law which the title suggests.
It
is rather a series of independent essays somewhat loosely linked, and
all designed to emphasise from different angles the essential theme of
the book, summed up by the author himself in the single sentence: “The
centre of gravity of legal development lies not in legislation. nor in juristic
science, nor in judicial decision, but in society itself.” The lack of system
is
not a fault but rather a merit, since
it
implies the candid recognition of
the fact that the sociology of law is still in its initial stages of growth.
It
does, however, make the task of the reviewer difficult, especially as he
is not a lawyer. All that he can attempt to do is to indicate what
sort
of problems a sociologist would expect to find in a work of this kind and
how they are here handled. Perhaps the most important problems would
be
these:
(i)
what is the nature of legal norms, and how are they to be
distinguished from other social norms, such as those of morals, religion.
convention and fashion
;
(ii)
what are the conditions, social, economic
and political, under which legal rules arise and become differentiated from
the other forms of social regulation; (iii) what influences are exerted by
the various forms of social rules upon one another; to what extent, for
example,
is
law affected in its historical evolution by changes in moral
outlook; (iv) bow
is
actual law related to ideal justice and are there
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