Omaha daily bee., 1893-12-31
AMERICAS INFLUENcE UPON Law.

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realize what revolutions have been
wrought in American Jurisprudence in
the past hundred years. We have
been drifting very rapidly away from
the Blackstonian theory and practice of
the law. The American idea of reach
ing a conclusion by the shortest route
has brushed away most of the hoary and
harass ing incidents of common law
~pleadings and in the majority of the
states of the union codes have sup
planted the ancient forms and simplliied
litigation immensely. In American
courts amendments to the pl eadings,
Withdrawals of unsatisfactory W
and other means of correcting errors or
saving admitted rights have almost COM
pletely destroyed the happiness as well
as the professional success of the old
time lawyer who spent hours of the time
of the court and months of his own in
splitting hairs at points in the pleadings
which could not touch the merits of the
controversy. Our c~odification of the
Jaws and our revolution of the old
English system of courts and court pro-
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try to cut loose from her cumbersome
methods in many particulars n lately
learned lawyers in England have seri-
ously suggested further revision of tho
existing and ancient systems in the in
terest of simplicity and moro direct,
prompt and complete justice to litigants.
In an address upon the topic of "Amer-
;,,, D,nn,oss in.' T, ricnr,,lnrn - pra-
pared for tho Columbian exposition and
published in the fifth number of the
american Lar Rauie,C for the current
year, David Dudley Field treats of the
changes wrought by American jurispru-
dence in a most interesting manner.
| Passing hastily over the influence of
America in international law, whereby
we were the first to establish the right
| of expatriation for every human being
and have led the world to look with
favor upon international arbitration, he
cites the effect of American thought
upon the four great departments of
organic law: The law of persons, the
law of property, the law of obligations
and the law of procedure.
America placed her constitution be-
yond the reach of executive or legisla-
tive power and put the organic law
under the guardianship Of the judiciary
"a most startling departure from the es-
tablished precedents of the ages. The
greatest achievement ever made in the
cause of human progress was the total
and final separation of the state from
the church. No man under and by virtue
| of American law can step between his
fellow man and his Maker. American
| lawmakers have e~mancipated woman
/ from the domination of her husbands;
freed the honest debtor from a possible
| Imprisonment for life; rendered it i'm
possible for legislators to make q crime
| of that which was not a crime when it
was committed; have forbidden states to
impair the obligation of a contract be-
tweenman and man, and we have pro-
| claimed men everywhere equal before
| tho law, declaring that no person, how
| aver humble, shall be deprived of the
| inalienable rights of the Declaration of
| Independence without due process OF
law.
We have so long regarded these prin-
ciples as axions that it IS an effort to
think they were even c~ontroyerted in
| the colonies or in any other land. In the
matter of property rights we have cut
loose from the substance Of the feudal
law however we may cling to some of
its forms and f~ictions. AS early as 1929
a writer upon the subject was able to
cite twenty-one radical departures, the
object and effect of which was to render
the principles of law applicable to real
property more simple and equitable; the
rules of construction more conformable
to common sense; modes of transferring
it more cheap, direct and expeditions and
| the title more clear and more easily inves-
| tigated. Even in 1927 the revisers of the
! New York statutes had elaborated an al
most complete code OF real property.
In the vast legal domains of personal
property and personal contracts America
and England have kept we'll abreast
with Zach other ia the onward march of
progress. But in the department of
| procedure the United States was first of
! English-speaking nations to reject
the cumbersome and contradictory
methods of English common law,
which had been gathering through
i%mmemorial ages, No sutton is
now turned away for defect of form
and no witness is rejected who has sense
enough to think or voice enough to
| speak. Under the old system, as law
yers know, a litigant was Obliged TO
choose between the law and chancery
courts and woe be it to him il he chose
the wrong division or his lawyer made
a mistake in the form of his action. In
twenty-eight American states this
grotesque and illogical machinery has
been swept in whole or in part out of
existence. Codiication has ~reorganized