page_title: Halsbury's Laws of England
section_title: First edition
hierarchical_section_title: Halsbury's Laws of England / First edition
caption_attribution_description: Halsbury's Laws of England, 1st ed, copyright/title page
context_page_description: Halsbury's Laws of England is a uniquely comprehensive encyclopaedia of law, and provides the only complete narrative statement of law in England and Wales. It has an alphabetised title scheme covering all areas of law, drawing on authorities including Acts of the United Kingdom, Measures of the Welsh Assembly, UK case law and European law. It is written by or in consultation with experts in the relevant field.
  Halsbury's Laws has an annual and monthly updating service. The encyclopaedia and updates are available in both hard copy and online with some content available for free online.
context_section_description: The first edition was published in 31 volumes from 1907 to 1917. Since then, new editions have been launched at intervals of about 20 to 30 years.
  Volume 1 was published in 1907. Its articles run from action to bankers and banking. The volume deals with action, admiralty, agency, agriculture, aliens, allotments, animals, arbitration, auction, bailment and bankers and banking.
  Volume 2 was published in 1908. Its articles run from bankruptcy to bills of exchange. It contains but four treatises, upon bankruptcy and insolvency (335 pages), barristers (67 pages), bastardy (28 pages) and bills of exchange, promissory notes and negotiable instruments (124 pages).
  Volume 5 (companies) is devoted entirely to company law, and forms a treatise of 768 pages on that subject. After a general consideration of the nature and domicile of companies, the work considers briefly the history of company legislation. Then follows an elaborate treatise on the Companies Act 1908. Special companies, like banking, insurance and public service companies, are considered; as well as chartered companies, the livery companies of the city of London, quasi-corporations, and illegal companies; and a few pages are devoted to foreign companies. The reviewer in the Harvard Law Review thought the table of cases cited must contain at least five thousand cases. He said the importance of this treatise was at once apparent; and that to the commercial lawyer in the Eastern cities of the United States it would be exceedingly useful.
  The articles in volume 11 run from descent to ecclesiastical law. It contains a short article on descent and distribution; a discussion of discovery, inspection and interrogatories, under the English practice; an elaborate article on distress; an article on easements and profits, which the Harvard Law Review said was the most interesting article in the volume to an American lawyer; and an elaborate disquisition on ecclesiastical law.
  The articles in volume 12 run from education to electric lighting and power. The Harvard Law Review said that the articles on education and elections had comparatively little value to the American bar, but the hundred pages devoted to electric lighting and power were useful.
  Volume 20 was published in 1911. Its articles run from markets to misrepresentation. It contains articles on markets and fairs (59 pages), master and servant (221 pages), medicine and pharmacy (82 pages), the Metropolis (106 pages), mines, minerals and quarries (156 pages) and misrepresentation and fraud (110 pages). According to the Harvard Law Review, the article on master and servant was of constant interest to an American lawyer; and that on misrepresentation and fraud, from the master hand of G Spencer Bower, was a valuable treatise in itself.
  Volume 21 was published in 1912. Its articles run from mistake to partition. It contains articles on mistake (34 pages), money and money lending (29 pages), mortgage (283 pages), negligence (134 pages), notaries (9 pages), nuisance (72 pages), Parliament (197 pages) and partition (59 pages). The Harvard Law Review said that the standard set by the preceding volumes appeared to be maintained and that the series, up to this volume, was a collection of very admirable treatises on English law.
caption: The title and copyright page of volume 1 of the first edition of Halsbury's Laws of England (1907).
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