Legal history Books

Book SynopsisA master storyteller presents a riveting drama of America''s first crime of the century--from murder investigation to a church sex scandal to celebrity trial--and its aftermath.In December 1832 a farmer found the body of a young, pregnant woman hanging near a haystack outside a New England mill town. When news spread that Methodist preacher Ephraim Avery was accused of murdering Sarah Maria Cornell, a factory worker, the case gave the public everything they found irresistible: sexually charged violence, adultery, the hypocrisy of a church leader, secrecy and mystery, and suspicions of insanity. Murder in a Mill Town tells the story of how a local crime quickly turned into a national scandal that became America''s first trial of the century.After her death--after she became the country''s most notorious factory girl--Cornell''s choices about work, survival, and personal freedom became enmeshed in stories that Americans told themselves about their new world of industry and women''s laborTrade ReviewMurder in a Mill Town is a murder mystery, a sex scandal, a legal thriller, and a crystal-clear primer on how the rise of capitalism transformed the most intimate aspects of American life—all rolled into one. It is an essential read for anyone interested in true-crime tales and their hold on American culture. * Debby Applegate, author of The Most Famous Man in America: The Biography of Henry Ward Beecher *A young mill girl. A married minister. An inconvenient pregnancy. A suspicious death. A sensational murder trial. Bruce Dorsey's deeply researched account shows that the case captured the attention of antebellum America not just because of its lurid combination of sex and violence, but also because of the ways it played out contemporary conflicts over the changing roles of women—and men. Two centuries ago, an illicit affair could threaten a man's status and a woman's life. Now, after the overthrow of Roe v. Wade, the tragedy of Sarah Maria Cornell remains urgent, illuminating, and haunting. * John Wood Sweet, author of The Sewing Girl's Tale: A Story of Crime and Consequences in Revolutionary America *This true crime history set in a New England mill town may seem familiar at first. But gradually peeling the onion, Bruce Dorsey reveals the exceeding strangeness of the times, reminding us that the past is a foreign country. * John Mack Faragher, Yale University *This is a story of ordinary people living in exceptional times, who find themselves caught up in a rapidly changing world—a story that involves not only the two central protagonists, but hundreds of trial witnesses whose testimony illuminates their historical experience in striking detail, and dozens of journalists and popular writers who search for broader meanings in this episode of personal violence. In strikingly accessible prose, Bruce Dorsey brings his characters to life on the page. * Karen Halttunen, author of Murder Most Foul: The Killer and the American Gothic Imagination *Murder in a Mill Town highlights how little we've learned or changed since the 1830s. It almost reads as an indictment about America's petty fears about sex, women, and undermining religion- "almost an indictment" because, in his precise writing and masterful contextualizing, Dorsey doesn't offer an opinion. He lets the horror of our culture speak for itself. * Tony Russo, New York Journal of Books *Table of ContentsPreface: Before the Curtain Rises Act I Murder 1. The Haystack 2. The Manufacturer 3. A Troubled Marriage 4. Native Sons 5. "Useful in this World" 6. "Factory Girl" 7. "Crazy Dow" 8. A Methodist Family 9. Moving Planet 10. Circuit Rider 11. Slanderer 12. Moral Police 13. Examination 14. Manhunt 15. "If I am missing" Act II Trial 16. Courtroom Tales 17. Physicians, Bodies, and Women 18. Doctor Visits 19. Sex Talk 20. Bad Stories 21. Passions and Self-Murder 22. "This most extraordinary of all cases" Act III Scandal 23. Mobs and More Murders 24. Conspiracies 25. Vindication 26. Camp Meetings 27. Seduction 28. Fake News 29. Stage and Song Coda Notes Index

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Book Synopsis'A fascinating, comprehensive study that forces us to think again about what law is, and why it matters ... For those who want to understand why human society has emerged as it has, this is essential reading' Rana Mitter, author of China's Good War The laws now enforced throughout the world are almost all modelled on systems developed in Europe in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. During two hundred years of colonial rule, Europeans exported their laws everywhere they could. But they weren't filling a void: in many places, they displaced traditions that were already ancient when Vasco Da Gama first arrived in India. Where, then, did it all begin? And what has law been and done over the course of human history? In The Rule of Laws, pioneering anthropologist Fernanda Pirie traces the development of the world's great legal systems - Chinese, Indian, Roman, and Islamic - and the innumerable smaller traditions they inspired.Trade ReviewFascinating, insightful and gripping, The Rule of Laws provides a comprehensive exploration of the history underpinning our modern legal systems. A triumph -- The Secret BarristerAn ambitious account of the rise and fall of the world's great legal systems ... richly informative and consistently thought-provoking .. Fernanda Pirie's work will command, and deserve, a wide readership -- Jonathan Sumption * TLS *Exceptionally rich -- Andrew Stark * Wall Street Journal *The Rule of Laws offers a pathbreaking and stimulating account of how societies across different regions and epochs drew upon secular, sacred, and scholarly traditions to create laws that organized the lives of their citizens ... This expansive narrative challenges what we think we know about legal history and the assumptions we make about law's future -- Edward J. Watts, author * Mortal Republic: How Rome Fell into Tyranny *The Rule of Laws is a fascinating, comprehensive study that forces us to think again about what law is, and why it matters ... For those who want to understand why human society has emerged as it has, this is essential reading -- Rana Mitter, author * China's Good War *In the exploration of Big questions concerning the law, legality, legal traditions and suchlike, [The Rule of Laws] will occupy an important position. It asks some fundamental questions, including where did the concept of law - and thence of the rule of law - originate? ... A vast canvas ... magisterial * The Commonwealth Lawyer *Agile [and] convincing ... A valuable study for students of the law and its evolution over the millennia * Kirkus *In this panoramic history, Pirie tells the story of the rise and fall of systems of law across the civilizations, empires, and societies of the ancient and modern world ... Pirie argues that if the history of law has a common theme, it is that laws are not simply rules -- G. John Ikenberry * Foreign Affairs *An intriguing synthesis of the history of global legal codes and their origins -- Jeffrey Meyer * Library Journal *The Rule of Laws is a great overview of the history of law, covering four millennia and many different societies ... accessible to a wide readership. It dispels ideas that our current Western form of law is natural and by doing so, give us the liberty to question how it can be used or altered to make the world a better place. It also leaves us with the idea that it can be taken away * Open Letters Review *

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Book Synopsis'Brilliantly gripping' Sunday Times; 'Compelling' Daily Mail; 'Heart-rending' Sunday Telegraph; 'Excellent' The Times; 'Engrossing' Independent The UK's only war crimes trial took place in 1999 and had its origins in the horrors of the Holocaust, but only now in The Ticket Collector from Belarus​ can the full story be told.  The Ticket Collector from Belarus tells the remarkable story of two interwoven journeys. Ben-Zion Blustein and Andrei Sawoniuk were childhood friends in 1930s Domachevo, a holiday and health resort in what is now Belarus. During the events that followed the Nazi invasion in 1941, they became the bitterest of enemies. After the war, Ben-Zion made his way to Israel, and ‘Andrusha the bastard’ to England, where he found work as a British Rail ticket collector in London. Trade Review'In this brilliantly gripping mix of true crime and narrative history, Mike Anderson and Neil Hanson tell the story of the first and only war crimes trial to be held on British soil... To their great credit, Anderson and Hanson avoid piling on the horror, letting the court transcripts speak for themselves.' -- Kathryn Hughes * Sunday Times *'Here we meet the gulf whose existence is so well illustrated in this book - that between court truth and historical truth. One of the great values of Anderson and Hanson's excellent work is to demonstrate that there are several distinct kinds of justice.' -- David Aaronovitch * The Times *'A riveting and haunting book that raises important questions about how far justice should reach when confronted with the worst of crimes.' -- Roger Alton * Daily Mail *'Sawoniuk ignored the advice of his own lawyers and took the stand. The old man's angry testimony is the high point of the book... The authors have interviewed most of the key players in this heart-rending tale and the result is a sensitive and well-balanced account of an extraordinary moment in British legal history.' -- Saul David * Sunday Telegraph *'An extraordinary tale, not least because of the light it throws on on the persistence and thoroughness of the British legal system... The account of how he was finally identified and tracked down makes lively reading... It makes for fascinating reading.' -- Caroline Moorehead * Spectator *'Engrossing. The book...arrive[s] in gift-wrapped form for any smart TV or film producer - with characters who don't so much as jump but leap off the page and into your imagination. Forgive the hyperbole but this is the story with everything... A terrific achievement.' -- Adrian Hennigan * Haaretz *

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Book SynopsisThe First Amendment to the US Constitution protects free speech, freedom of the press, freedom of association and assembly, and the right to petition the government. Why did the Framers protect these particular rights? What role were these rights intended to play in our democracy? And what force do they retain in today''s world? In this highly readable account, Ashutosh Bhagwat explores the answers to these questions. The first part of the book looks at the history of the First Amendment, early political conflicts over its meaning, and the lessons to be learned from those events about the nature of our system of government. The second part applies those lessons to our modern, fractious democracy as it has evolved in the age of the Internet and social media. Now as then, the key to maintaining that democracy, it turns out, is an active citizenry that fully embraces the First Amendment.Trade Review'By highlighting the First Amendment's too often neglected press, assembly, and petition clauses, Bhagwat shows how the democratic free speech tradition most closely associated with Louis Brandeis complements rather than contradicts the broadly libertarian understanding that finally emerged following the McCarthy era. Eschewing censorship, Bhagwat would turn to what Tocqueville identified as America's distinctive democratic strength - civil society institutions - to tackle our age's pathologies of information silos, Internet trolls, and fake news. Our Democratic First Amendment is at once clear-eyed and boldly free of cynicism.' Michael C. Dorf, Robert S. Stevens Professor of Law, Cornell University'Ash Bhagwat offers an original and powerful analysis of the core purposes of the First Amendment and of how those purposes should play out today. In particular, he notes that almost all of the Supreme Court's attention has focused on the freedom of speech, and that the Court has essentially written out of the First Amendment the freedom of the press, the right of assembly, the right of association, and the right to petition the government. It is only, he argues, by considering all of these rights in their relation to one another that the Court can come to a proper understanding of 'Our Democratic First Amendment'. Bhagwat then turns to the challenges of the present, including social media, the collapse of 'mainstream media', and the 'siloing' of American society. In the end, he offers suggestions for how, in the current state of affairs, we can still save our democracy.' Geoffrey R. Stone, Edward H. Levi Distinguished Service Professor of Law, University of Chicago'Bhagwat's eminently readable prose drives home the importance of speech, press, assembly, and petition to our current and future democratic experiment. Readers will benefit from this book's careful consideration of these rights individually and collectively, and how our use of them protects and performs sovereignty, citizenship, and democracy.' John Inazu, Sally D. Danforth Distinguished Professor of Law & Religion, Washington University, St. Louis'The First Amendment lists four specific freedoms of expression: speech, press, assembly (association), and petition, but the courts have tended to merge them all into one. This engaging book discusses each of these freedoms on its own terms, and explains for a general audience why they all matter now, more than ever. Whether you are liberal or conservative, this book will help you understand your rights as an American.' Michael W. McConnell, Richard and Frances Mallery Professor and Director of the Constitutional Law Center, Stanford University'This title is well sourced, remarkably engaging, and for students and scholars alike.' D. E. Smith, Choice'… an exceptional review of the First Amendment's principles and their interdependent purposes. These passages provide great value for theorists, scholars, and practitioners - and especially for students of American politics, constitutional law and history, and the Bill of Rights.' Andy Carr, Law and Politics Book ReviewTable of ContentsIntroduction; Part I. The Framers' Democrocratic First Amendment: 1. Freedom of speech and of the press; 2. Assembly and association; 3. The petition clause; 4. Cognate rights and democratic citizenship; Part II. The Democratic First Amendment in the Age of Twitter: 5. Cacophony: speech and press in the Internet era; 6. DeSiloing: of civic associations, book clubs, and taverns; 7. Why assembly and petition still matter; Conclusion.

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Book SynopsisSHORTLISTED FOR THE CWA HISTORICAL DAGGER 2023SHORTLISTED FOR THE BLOODY SCOTLAND DEBUT PRIZE 2022SHORTLISTED FOR THE HISTORICAL WRITERS' ASSOCIATION DEBUT CROWN 2022Glasgow, 1817: Jean Campbell - a young, Deaf woman - is witnessed throwing a child into the River Clyde from the Old Bridge. If found guilty she faces one of two fates; death by hanging or incarceration in an asylum. But Jean's deafness leaves her isolated and unable to defend herself, until the authorities call in Robert Kinniburgh, a talented teacher from the Deaf & Dumb Institution.Through a difficult process of trial and error, Robert and Jean manage to find a rudimentary way of communicating with each other. As Jean grows to trust Robert, she reveals what really happened on that bridge over the river Clyde. And Robert, now embroiled in this dark case, must act quickly to ensure justice is served, before it is too late. 'Based on a case from Scottish legal history, Smith's novel skilfully combines crime fiction with a woman's struggle to speak the truth' The Times'Fascinating' Sally MagnussonTrade ReviewA striking and stylish literary page-turner that breathes life into the past, illuminating a fascinating corner of history by revealing its lost voices and contemporary resonance. Smith's evocative storytelling and willingness to probe the murkier reaches of the human psyche make her a talent to watch! * Zoë Strachan *A fascinating exploration of deafness and human value amid the sights, sounds and smells of urban Scotland in 1817. * Sally Magnusson *I loved Hear No Evil, beautifully written and a real page turner with characters whose company I enjoyed greatly. It evoked the Edinburgh of that time brilliantly and vividly and gave such a wonderful insight into the early quest to understand and give a voice to people who cannot hear. The historical evocation of Edinburgh and the dramatic murder story were both so well done and so rewarding. * Elisabeth Gifford *A compelling and thoughtful exploration of a deaf woman's struggle for justice in Regency-era Scotland * Rebecca Netley, author of THE WHISTLING *'Fascinating... gripped me from start to finish' * Westender Magazine *A richly evocative telling. You can almost smell the reek of the old Edinburgh streets. Feel the brutality and inhumanity of it all... A gentle read that belies its power. A stylish murder mystery illuminating a fascinating corner of history. * C&B News *In Sarah Smith's debut, Hear No Evil, Robert Kinniburgh, a teacher at Edinburgh's Deaf and Dumb Institution, is summoned to one of the city's jails, where an unusual prisoner awaits interrogation. Jean Campbell, a deaf woman, is accused of drowning her child, but communication with her has been impossible. Kinniburgh, who employs a form of sign language, becomes the means by which she can tell her story, and slowly the complex reality of what happened emerges. Based on a case from Scottish legal history, Smith's novel skilfully combines crime fiction with a woman's struggle to speak the truth. * The Times *Dramatic and evocative . . . a stunning debut * Dumfries & Galloway Life *

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Book Synopsis'As British official records are still "going missing", the significance of Cobain's work only increases' David Olusoga, author of Black and British 'In an astonishing book, the writer Ian Cobain reveals the mass destruction of records and archives, and the false memory it has left us with' Andrew Marr In 1889, the first Official Secrets Act was passed. Since then a culture of secrecy has flourished. As successive governments have been selective about what they choose to share with the public, we have been left with a distorted and incomplete understanding not only of the workings of the state but of our nation's culture and its past. Ian Cobain reveals how key moments in British history since the end of WWII have been manipulated by these official secrets. We follow the decades-long attempts to conceal the existence of Bletchley Park and its successor, GCHQ. We learn how a series of astonishing wars were fought during the 1960s and 1970s remained unreported. He also tells of the government's hidden links with terrorist cells during the Troubles, and reveals the state's peacetime surveillance techniques, not to mention its cynical manipulation of the criminal justice system and 'freedom of information'. Drawing on previously unseen material and rigorous research, The History Thieves is a gripping story of how a complex bureaucratic machine has been created by the British state, allowing governments to evade accountability and bury their secrets. 'An engrossing account of how government officials burned the records of imperial rule as the British empire came to an end' Book of the Week, Guardian 'An important book which deserves to change the way we see our recent past...' Daily MailTrade ReviewThis important and highly readable book proves that, in a so-called age of transparency, official secrecy is actually increasing - in government and the armed forces, in the courts and in Whitehall and the Security Services. Censorship is often imposed to hide embarrassment, but also to prevent accountability for malfeasance and illegality, and to distort deliberately the historical record. There is a new establishment at work, and it preens itself just like the old, possessing the power to suppress. Our only weapon against those Orwell used to call "the striped-trousered ones who rule" is to expose and deride them - a job Ian Cobain does most effectively -- Geoffrey Robertson QCA meticulously researched, eye-opening triumph. Essential reading in the age of Snowden and Assange -- Charles Cumming, author * A Divided Spy *Cobain's excellent book exposes the single most significant catastrophe of the 'War on Terror'. While the rebirth of torture has grabbed many headlines, the most dangerous fruit of the atmosphere of fear has been an industry of secrecy. Cobain teaches us both the history of this secretive snooping, and how it imperils us all today -- Clive Stafford SmithAs one would expect from the pen of an experienced investigative journalist, this is a "good read", thought-provoking throughout, frequently shocking, but sometimes amusing in its exploration of the more bizarre attempts of the powers to keep us in the dark... Cobain's book, I think, will open many eyes -- Mandy Banton * Commonwealth Journal of International Affairs *As British official records are still "going missing", the significance of Cobain's work only increases -- David Olusoga * Guardian *

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Book SynopsisThis textbook presents a clear exploration of the historical developments and ideas that give modern thinking its distinctive shape. It guides students through the rival standpoints on jurisprudence from the origins of Western jurisprudential thought and the classical tradition to the emergence of ‘modern’ political thought. Chapters on Hart, Fuller, Rawls, Dworkin and Finnis lead the reader systematically through the terrain of modern legal philosophy, tracing the issues back to fundamental questions of philosophy, and indicating lines of criticism that result in a fresh and original perspective on the subject. The third edition includes a new chapter on feminist legal scholarship and non-Western approaches. Praise for the previous editions: 'An ideal starting place for anyone interested in, or studying, legal philosophy ... Its simple but ambitious aim to provide a concise and accessible guide is easily achieved.' (Student Law Journal) 'A decent choice for an introductory course on jurisprudence, or for a serious student who wishes to study on his or her own.' (Canadian Law Library)Trade ReviewThis book is clear, concise and well laid out. -- Amy Elkington * University of Chichester *An ideal starting place for anyone interested in, or studying, legal philosophy … Its simple but ambitious aim to provide a concise and accessible guide is easily achieved. * Student Law Journal (of the first edition) *A decent choice for an introductory course on jurisprudence, or for a serious student who wishes to study on his or her own. * Canadian Law Library (of the first edition) *Table of Contents1. Justice, Law and History Morality History Law Situating Jurisprudence PART ONE FOUNDATIONS 2. Origins of the Western Jurisprudential Tradition A Basic Division Aristotelian Political Thought The Abandonment of Aristotle Justice and Community in Plato Suggested Reading 3. Jurisprudence – The Classical Tradition Positive Law Natural Law The Relationship between Natural Law and Positive Law Justice and Determination Human Knowledge of Natural Law A Word on Doctrines Suggested Reading 4. The Emergence of ‘Modern’ Political Thought Hobbes’s View of the Human Condition Law and Society The Political Context of Leviathan A Divided Inheritance Excursus Reason Sociability Absolutism The Right of Nature Suggested Reading 5. Images of Law from Grotius to Kant Grotius as a Natural Law Theorist A New Framework Suggested Reading PART TWO DEBATES 6. Positive Law, Positive Justice: Hart The Basic Dimensions of Hart’s Positivism The Nature of Law Law and Morality Natural Law Justice and Equality Suggested Reading 7. Justice in the ‘Real World’: Dworkin The Philosopher-Judge Could the Law be an Expression of Something other than ‘Integrity’? Objectivity, Truth and Scepticism Philosopher-Kings and Philosopher-Judges Suggested Reading 8. Justice and the Liberal State: Rawls Rational Reflection and Questions of Method The Problem of Justice The First Principle of Justice The Second Principle The Basic Structure in Context Suggested Reading 9. Justice and the Common Good: Finnis Introducing the Political Philosophy The Basic Goods The Status of Practical Reasonableness Order, Community and Justice Justice and Rights The Overall Direction of Finnis’s Account Suggested Reading 10. Justice and Legality: Fuller Legality and Justice Justice and the Institutional Reality of Law Eunomics: The Theory of Good Order The Direction of Fuller’s Thought Suggested Reading 11. Justice and Legal Order: Further Reflections Natural Right and Natural Law The Origin of the Law’s Authority Legal Order and Positive Law Summing Up Suggested Reading PART THREE CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES 12. Disruptive Theories Critical Theory Critical Race Theory Feminist Legal Theory Suggested Reading 13. Conclusions?

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Book SynopsisLee Johnson was a man with simple dreams. All he wanted was a steady job and a nice home for his wife and children, something better than the hard life he knew growing up. He never imagined that he would become the face of a David-and-Goliath showdown against one of the world’s most powerful corporate giants. But a workplace accident left Lee doused in a toxic chemical and facing a deadly cancer that turned his life upside down. In 2018, the world watched as Lee was thrust to the forefront of one the most dramatic legal battles in recent history. The Monsanto Papers is the inside story of Lee Johnson’s landmark lawsuit against Monsanto. For Lee, the case was a race against the clock, with doctors predicting he wouldn’t survive long enough to take the witness stand. For the eclectic band of young, ambitious lawyers representing him, it was a matter of professional pride and personal risk, with millions of dollars and hard-earned reputations on the line. For the public at large, the lawsuit presented a question of corporate accountability. With enough money and influence, could a company endanger its customers, hide evidence, manipulate regulators, and get away with it all, for decades? Readers will be astounded by the depth of corruption uncovered, captivated by the shocking twists, and moved by Lee’s quiet determination to see justice served. With gripping narrative force that reads like fiction, The Monsanto Papers takes readers behind the scenes of a gruelling legal battle, pulling back the curtain on the frailties of the American court system and the lengths to which lawyers will go to fight corporate wrongdoing.Table of ContentsIntroduction: Creve Coeur Chapter 1. Getting Dirty Chapter 2. Railroad Avenue Chapter 3. Making a Case Chapter 4. Joining Forces Chapter 5. Going after Goliath Chapter 6. In the Interests of Justice Chapter 7. Corporate Secrets Chapter 8. A Risky Plan Chapter 9. Just Past Midnight Chapter 10. Lizard Man Chapter 11. A Question of Science Chapter 12. San Francisco Showdown Chapter 13. The Cavalry Chapter 14. Staying Alive Chapter 15. The Trial Begins Chapter 16. For the Defense Chapter 17. An Unusual Case Chapter 18. Fighting Until the Last Breath Chapter 19. The Last Word Chapter 20. Verdict Epilogue: A Leaf That Doesn’t Die A Note on Sources Acknowledgements About the Author Index

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Book SynopsisIn the wrong hands, math can be deadly. Even the simplest numbers can become powerful forces when manipulated by politicians or the media, but in the case of the law, your liberty,and your life,can depend on the right calculation.In Math on Trial , mathematicians Leila Schneps and Coralie Colmez describe ten trials spanning from the nineteenth century to today, in which mathematical arguments were used,and disastrously misused,as evidence. They tell the stories of Sally Clark, who was accused of murdering her children by a doctor with a faulty sense of calculation of nineteenth-century tycoon Hetty Green, whose dispute over her aunt''s will became a signal case in the forensic use of mathematics and of the case of Amanda Knox, in which a judge''s misunderstanding of probability led him to discount critical evidence,which might have kept her in jail. Offering a fresh angle on cases from the nineteenth-century Dreyfus affair to the murder trial of Dutch nurse Lucia de Berk, Schneps and Colmez show how the improper application of mathematical concepts can mean the difference between walking free and life in prison.A colourful narrative of mathematical abuse, Math on Trial blends courtroom drama, history, and math to show that legal expertise isn''t always enough to prove a person innocent.Trade ReviewBBC Focus (UK) "[Math on Trial] has all the marks of a good mystery: tense conflicts, diverse characters and shock conclusions...Numerical errors are not unique to the courtroom: similar issues crop up elsewhere in life, which makes this book's message all the more important. Gripping and insightful, it successfully highlights the dangers of carelessly sprinkling mathematics over real-world problems." Washington Independent Review of Books "Schneps and Colmez's clever use of headline-grabbing case studies and digestible explanations of mathematical problems combine to argue for the careful use of numbers by advocates and lay juries alike. Their warnings remain relevant today as courtrooms face greater use of DNA evidence and other sophisticated forensic technologies." MAA Reviews "The authors shine, and the dramatic presentation [of the court cases] will grip many readers... [Math on Trial] stimulates both thought and interest...Engaging reading." Publishers Weekly "An entertaining tour of courtroom calculations gone wrong... The cases they describe are independently interesting, and the mathematical overlay makes them doubly so... As the problems are unraveled and the correct analyses explained, readers will enjoy a satisfying sense of discovery. Schneps and Colmez write with lucidity and an infectious enthusiasm, making this an engaging and unique blend of true crime and mathematics." Kirkus Reviews "Fill[ed] with wonderful accounts of frauds and forgeries involving the likes of Charles Ponzi, Hetty Green and Alfred Dreyfus...the authors' analysis of the recent Amanda Knox case [is] particularly chilling... [Math on Trial is] intrinsically fascinating in its depiction of the frailty of human judgments." Steven Strogatz, Professor of Mathematics, Cornell University, and author of The Joy of x "Taut and gripping, Math on Trial just might establish a new genre, in which true crime story meets the best of popular science. Utterly absorbing from start to finish."

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Book SynopsisWomen before the court offers an innovative, comparative approach to the study of women’s legal rights during a formative period of Anglo–American history. It traces how colonists transplanted English legal institutions to America, examines the remarkable depth of women’s legal knowledge and shows how the law increasingly undermined patriarchal relationships between parents and children, masters and servants, husbands and wives. The book will be of interest to scholars of Britain and colonial America, and to laypeople interested in how women in the past navigated and negotiated the structures of authority that governed them. It is packed with fascinating stories that women related to the courts in cases ranging from murder and abuse to debt and estate litigation. Ultimately, it makes a remarkable contribution to our understandings of law, power and gender in the early modern world.Trade Review'this book skilfully ties together the varied experiences of women living and litigating in England and North America across the early modern period. The book will be of interest to historians of women and legal history in Britain and the Atlantic, and should be commended for bringing together scholars who are prone to focus on particular countries or jurisdictions as case studies.'Rebecca Mason, Reviews in History'Women before the Court offers much to scholars on both sides of the Atlantic. [...] This book may beconsidered required reading for scholars of women, family, property, commerce, and law in seventeenth-and eighteenth-century Anglo-America. It also provides a valuable comparative overview for scholars working on the same topics in other countries and regions. For its brevity, helpful exposition of many legal complexities, long time frame, and comparative structure, Women before the Court could also make an excellent choice as a classroom text.'Journal of British Studies -- .Table of ContentsIntroduction: ‘When Women goe to Law, the Devill is full of Businesse'Part I1 The varieties of Anglo-American law: property, patriarchy, and women’s legal status in England and America2 Women as plaintiffs and defendants: the common law, equity, and ecclesiastical jurisdictionsPart II3 Masters and mistresses, servants and slaves: patriarchy and subordinate agency in the household4 Wives and (unwed) mothers: women’s claims for financial support5 Inheritance and family feuds: the legal power of elite womenPart III6 Economic expansion and the erosion of patriarchyIndex

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Book Synopsis‘No freeman is to be taken or imprisoned, or dispossessed … except through the lawful judgment of his peers or through the law of the land.’ ‘To no one shall we sell, to no one shall we deny or delay right or justice.’ Magna Carta (or ‘Great Charter’ of English Liberties) is one of the most important documents in legal history. Originating as a peace treaty agreed between King John and a group of powerful barons at Runnymede near Windsor on 15 June 1215, it enshrined in law the concept of individual liberty and defined the role of the monarch towards the people. The charter was successively revised and reissued throughout the thirteenth century by England’s monarchs, and the ideas expressed in it had a profound influence, as seen in the United States Constitution and Bill of Rights. The Latin text of one version of this landmark document (the 1217 issue of Henry III) is transcribed here in full, together with a modern translation and an introduction which traces the background to the making of the charter and its subsequent revisions through the centuries. It also explains how this text has become an enduring symbol of freedom in Britain and throughout the world.

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Book SynopsisProvides a comprehensive and engaging introduction to copyright, patents, trademarks, and other forms of knowledge that are subject to global law and regulation.Trade ReviewIn the course of a book tracing the legal paths by which ideas about intellectual property has traveled, Vaidhyanathan illuminates conflicting truths... In this smart, engaging book, surprisingly provocative for a short introduction, he won this reader. * Karin Wulf, The Scholarly Kitchen *A wonderfully accessible avenue into a wholly confusing topic, making it another truly spectacular addition to the OUP Very Short Introduction series. This is a book for law buffs, experts on rules and regulations, and anyone looking to widen their economic and political understanding of the world or make a splash at an incredibly specific pub quiz. * Jade Fell, Engineering & Technology *Table of ContentsPreface Chapter 1: How to Read Starbucks; or Why Intellectual Property Matters More Than You Think Chapter 2: Copyright, Commerce, and Culture Chapter 3: Patents and their Discontents Chapter 4: Trademarks and the Politics of Branding Chapter 5: Other Rights: Domain Names, Publicity, Trade Secrets, Data, and Designs Conclusion: The Politics of Resistance and the Access to Knowledge Movement Acknowledgements Useful Web Sites References Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisVery Short Introductions: Brilliant, Sharp, InspiringFor 30 years, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Linda Greenhouse chronicled the activities of the U.S. Supreme Court and its justices as a correspondent for the New York Times. In this Very Short Introduction, she draws on her deep knowledge of the court''s history and of its written and unwritten rules to show readers how the Supreme Court really works.Greenhouse offers a fascinating institutional biography of a place and its people--men and women who exercise great power but whose names and faces are unrecognized by many Americans and whose work often appears cloaked in mystery. How do cases get to the Supreme Court? How do the justices go about deciding them? What special role does the chief justice play? What do the law clerks do? How does the court relate to the other branches of government? Greenhouse answers these questions by depicting the justices as they confront deep constitutional issues or wrestle with the meaning of conTrade Review[A] new one-of-a-kind book on the Supreme Court." * SCOTUSblog *Linda Greenhouse has long been one of the most astute observers of the U.S. Supreme Court and most trusted translators of its mysteries and traditions. This elegant and concise guide is invaluable for beginners and veteran court watchers alike. An ideal introduction to the Court for students and citizens of all ages. * Jeffrey Rosen, professor of law, George Washington University, and legal affairs editor, The New Republic *There is hardly anyone in the country, outside the Court, who knows the institution and its practices as well as Linda Greenhouse does. * Melvin I. Urofsky, author of Louis D. Brandeis: A Life *Greenhouse cogently illustrates the history, functions, composition and importance of the Supreme Court. In a slim volume that you can literally carry around in your pocket, you will find a wealth of knowledge." * Yale Daily News *[A]n amuse-bouche of a book . . . short, but pithy. After finishing this book, readers should be inspired to take up [Greenhouse's] implicit invitation to read about the Court and its impact on shaping American law in a more substantial, meatier format. * Judicature *For those interested in how cases come to be heard by the Court, the process leading to a decision and the Court's relationship with the other branches of the federal government and the public, this is an excellent way to begin. * Washington Independent Review of Books *Table of ContentsList of illustrations Acknowledgments 1 Origins 2 The Court at work (1) 3 The justices 4 The chief justice 5 The Court at work (2) 6 The Court and the other branches 7 The Court and the public 8 The Court and the world Appendix 1: U.S. Constitution, Article III Appendix 2: The Supreme Court's rules Appendix 3: Chart of the Justices References Further reading Websites Index

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Book SynopsisLord Denning was the most famous English judge of the twentieth century. Arguably, he was the most famous of any century. His judgments were legendary for both their style and substance. The style was instantly recognisable, with his short sentences and unique method of storytelling. The substance was always less about law and more about justice, as Denning looked for the fairest outcome to every case before him. Over time, Denningâs views on justice and his manipulation of precedent became increasingly controversial. As society changed around him, headhered rigidly to the Edwardian morality of his childhood. His report on the Profumo Affair â the most sensational political scandal of post-war Britain â was dismissed by some as an âestablishment whitewashâ. His rulings in trade union disputes earned him many critics, while his dismissal of the appeal of the âBirmingham Sixâ falsely convicted of a terrorist atrocity became notorious when a gross miscarriage of justice was later uncovered. Yet enough goodwill remained for him to be called after his death âthe best-known and best-loved judge in the whole of our historyâ by the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Bingham. For all his controversies, there is no question that Denning led an extraordinary life. Born into a family of modest means in a small Hampshire town in 1899, he went on to gain two firsts from Oxford and a commission in the First World War, before becoming a successful barrister and serving almost 40 years as a senior judge. This book looks at that remarkable life story as well as assessing Denningâs legacy, showing how he continues to influence, inspire and occasionally infuriate.Trade Review"In this excellent book, James Wilson has managed to capture both the man and the judge." From the foreword by Rt Hon Lord Neuberger of Abbotsbury "easy to read, full of interesting information and very well produced... a readable, honest and accurate portrait of the man and some of his most interesting and significant judgments." The Law Society Gazette "This is not the first book to have considered Denning's career nor is likely to be the last; but, by making full use of archive material in its treatment of Denning's life outside as well as inside the law ...it is for now the best." The Times Literary Supplement "A review of Lord Denning's life and work from a greater distance and perhaps with more rounded perspective than earlier biographies is certainly welcome... provides not only a detailed, insightful, and accessible account of Lord Denning's life and career; it also includes reliably succinct and yet scholarly accounts of his contributions... one can only agree with Lord Neuberger's assessment in the foreword that 'Wilson has managed to capture both the man and the judge'. New Law JournalTable of ContentsLawyers on Lord Denning Lord Denning on Lord Denning Preface Note on Currency Chapter I: Beginnings – From Whitchurch to Oxford Chapter II: The First World War Chapter III: 1920s – From Oxford to the Bar Chapter IV: 1930s – From First Marriage to the Second World War Chapter V: The Second World War Chapter VI: Judicial Beginnings – Wills, Wives and Wrecks Chapter VII: 1945–47 – Second Marriage, Second Judicial Role Chapter VIII: The Court of Appeal Chapter IX: The House of Lords Chapter X: Master of the Rolls – Appointment and Beginnings Chapter XI: Profumo Chapter XII: Master of the Rolls – Travel and Other Engagements Chapter XIII: Master of the Rolls – Pre-trial Remedies Chapter XIV: Master of the Rolls – Common Law Chapter XV: Master of the Rolls – Family Law Chapter XVI: Master of the Rolls – Employment Law Chapter XVII: Master of the Rolls – Public Law Chapter XVIII: Master of the Rolls – Security of the Realm Chapter XIX: Master of the Rolls – A Belated Author Chapter XX: Master of the Rolls – Resignation Chapter XXI: Later Years Chapter XXII: The End Chapter XXIII: A Final Judgment Appendix I: Denning in the Law Reports Appendix II: Societies and Other Organisations Appendix III: Select Bibliography Acknowledgements Notes Index

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Book SynopsisLondon abounds with all manner of ludicrous laws, and not all of these curious statutes have been relegated to the past. Despite the efforts of the Law Commission there are medieval laws that are still in force, and the City of London and its livery companies have their own legal oddities. Laws are made in the capital because parliament is here; so are the Old Bailey, the Law Courts, the House of Lords and, now, the Supreme Court. The privy council, which sometimes has to decide cases, also sits in London, and there were other courts that used to sit in London, from prize courts concerning war booty to ecclesiastical courts. Having maintained its ''ancient rights and freedoms'' under Magna Carta, the City felt free to enact its own laws, many of which seem to have had to do with what people could wear. Until quite recently, for example, a man could be arrested for walking down the street wearing a wig, a robe and silk stockings - unless he was a judge. And

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Book SynopsisA rollicking collection of barely believable stories from five centuries of legal history – you’ll be gripped by these tales of murder, intrigue, crime, punishment and the pursuit of justice. Meet the only dead parrot ever to give evidence in a court of law, the doctor with the worst bedside manner of all time, the murderess who collected money from her mummified victim for 21 years, and explore one of the most indigestible dilemmas – if you’d been shipwrecked 2,000 miles from home, would you have eaten Parker the cabin boy? The tales within these pages are bizarre, fascinating, hilarious and, most importantly, true. This brand new edition, redesigned in splendid hardback for 2019, is the perfect gift for lawyers, armchair detectives and true crime aficionados everywhere.

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Book SynopsisA long-overdue exposé of the astonishing yet shadowy power wielded by the world’s largest law firms. Though not a household name, Jones Day is well known in the halls of power, and serves as a powerful encapsulation of the changes that have swept the legal profession in recent decades. Founded in the US in 1893, it has become one of the world’s largest law firms, a global juggernaut with deep ties to corporate interests and conservative politics. A key player in the legal battles surrounding the Trump administration, Jones Day has also for decades represented Big Tobacco, defended opioid manufacturers, and worked tirelessly to minimise the sexual-abuse scandals of the Catholic Church. Like many of its peers, it has fought time and again for those who want nothing more than to act without constraint or scrutiny — including the Russian oligarchs as they have sought to expand internationally. In this gripping and revealing new work of narrative nonfiction, New York Times Business Investigations Editor and bestselling author David Enrich at last tells the story of ‘Big Law’ and the nearly unchecked influence these firms wield to shield the wealthy and powerful — and bury their secrets.Trade Review‘A withering study of how big law got into bed with the 45th president … Informative and disturbing … as much a rebuke of one large firm as it is an indictment of Trump’s Republican party.’ -- Lloyd Green * The Guardian *‘A blistering study.’ -- Lawrence Douglas * TLS *‘Servants of the Damned is a feat of thoughtful, detailed research, rendering with clarity and even compassion the moral drift of ‘big law.’ As an attorney, I found it illuminating — but this is important reading for anyone concerned about law and policy.’ -- Ronan Farrow, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Catch and Kill‘This fascinating book is somehow both devastating and rollicking all at the same time. Enrich brings us into the room to watch how a modest law firm built on honourable service gradually becomes an uber-shield for the worst of American greed and abuse — all in the quest for enormous billable profits and outsized power. From handling a fatal gas explosion to terrorising a tobacco whistleblower to aiding Donald Trump, it's all in here.’ -- Carol Leonnig, Pulitzer Prize–winning co-author of A Very Stable Genius and author of Zero Fail‘A fast-moving, damning book … Essential reading for students of the Trump corruption machine.’ -- Kirkus Reviews, starred review‘The legal industry has sold its soul to deep-pocketed corporations and polarising politicians, according to this impassioned indictment of international law firm Jones Day and its peers … Enrich’s history of Jones Day probes the corrosion of ethics after the advent of law firm ads in the 1970s touched off a spiral of money-grubbing, and sketches engrossing vignettes of the predatory culture that resulted … a vivid, crackling account of the law at its most bullying. Readers will be outraged.’ * Publishers Weekly *Praise for Dark Towers: ‘A revelatory book about the rise and fall of the world’s biggest bank … Has all the elements of a page-turning mystery novel.’ * Washington Post *Praise for Dark Towers: ‘Enrich compellingly shows how unchecked ambition twisted a pillar of German finance into a reckless casino where amorality and criminality thrived.’ * New York Times Book Review *Praise for Dark Towers: ‘In Dark Towers, David Enrich tells the story of how one of the world’s mightiest banks careened off the rails, threatening everything from our financial system to our democracy through its reckless entanglement with Donald Trump. Darkly fascinating and yet all too real, it’s a tale that will keep you up at night.’ -- John Carreyrou, Pulitzer Prize winner and New York Times bestselling author of Bad Blood

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Book Synopsis2022 Hywel Dda Award (University of Wales Literary Awards)A ground-breaking study of the lawbooks which were created in the changing social and political climate of post-conquest Wales.The Middle Ages in Wales were turbulent, with society and culture in constant flux. Edward I of England's 1282 conquest brought with it major changes to society, governance, power and identity, and thereby to the traditional system of the law. Despite this, in the post-conquest period the development of law in Wales and the March flourished, and many manuscripts and lawbooks were created to meet the needs of those who practised law.This study, the first to fully reappraise the entire corpus of law manuscripts since Aneurin Owen's seminal 1841 edition, begins by considering the background to the creation of the law from the earliest period, particularly from c.1100 onwards, before turning to the "golden age" of lawmaking in thirteenth-century Gwynedd. The nature of the law in south Wales is also examined in full, with a particular focus on later developments, including the different use of legal texts in that region and its fourteenth- and fifteenth-century manuscripts. The author approaches medieval Welsh law, its practice, texts and redactions, in their own contexts, rather than through the lens of later historiography. In particular, she shows that much manuscript material previously considered "additional" or "anomalous" in fact incorporates new legal material and texts written for a particular purpose: thanks to their flexible accommodation of change, adjustment and addition, Welsh lawbooks were not just shaped by, but indeed shaped, medieval Welsh law.

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Book SynopsisDeals with a murder trial in the insular Bukharan-Jewish community of Forest Hills, Queens, that captured national attention. The defendant, Mozoltuv Barukhova, a beautiful young physician, is accused of hiring an assassin to kill her estranged husband, Daniel Malakov, a respected orthodontist, in the presence of their four-year old child.Trade Review"[Malcolm] is acute—and devastating."—Emily Bazelon, New York Times Book Review (Editor's Choice)"Reading [Malcolm], you have the sensation of encountering a mind at once incredibly blunt and terrifically precise: a sledgehammer that could debone a shad. That rare and strange effect could only be produced by an intellect as formidable as Malcolm’s."—Kathryn Schulz, Boston Globe"This is shrewd and quirky crime reporting at its irresistible and disabused best."—Louis Begley, Wall Street Journal"In Iphigenia in forest Hills, Janet Malcolm turns her excellence in first-person reportage to the American justice system, by way of a real jury trial in New York City in 2009. . . . A gripping read."—Marcel Berlins, The Times"[Malcolm] is an excellent observer, with a good eye for detail."—Lynn Barber, The Sunday Times"Ms. Malcolm’s books have wintry atmospheres—both intellectual and aesthetic—that derive partly from the way she takes facts and attaches them, like someone hanging tea-light candles from high rafters, to mythology and classic literature."—Dwight Garner, New York Times"It would be interesting to put Tom Wolfe (a humidifier) and Ms. Malcolm (a dehumidifier) on the same court case and let them fight it out for the available oxygen in the room."—Dwight Garner, New York Times"[Malcolm's] observations about the legal system in America are fierce and finely ground."—Dwight Garner, New York Times"This new book does for the courtroom what Malcolm’s previous books did for biography, journalism and psychoanalysis. It shows that in a high-stakes trial nobody, least of all the judge, is an entirely disinterested player."—Jonathan Bate, The Sunday Telegraph"Janet Malcolm’s new book, Iphigenia in Forest Hills, is a slim little volume. If it is a cold night and you don’t mind a few wrinkles, you can read the entire thing in the bath. If it is not a cold night, it will feel like one by the time you finish."—Kathryn Schulz, Boston Globe"Iphigenia in Forest Hills is an incendiary book that begins and ends—like any good epic must—in medias res. . . . It's a story that discomfits as much as it explains. Not for Malcolm the journalism of 'reassurance' or 'rhetorical ruses,' her small book with big stakes and mythic underpinnings flies close to the sun. It unsettles and scorches and soars."—Parul Sehgal, Bookforum"Absorbing. . . . Iphigenia in Forest Hills casts, from its first pages, a genuine spell—the kind of spell to which Ms. Malcolm’s admirers (and I am one) have become addicted."—Dwight Garner, New York Times Book Review"Janet Malcolm has produced another masterpiece of literary reportage."—Geoff Dyer, FT.com"Malcolm’s interpretation is . . . astonishing. . . . Under her brilliant gaze, a seemingly incidental detail shines suddenly with meaning."—Elizabeth Gumport, The Guardian"This absorbing book is [Malcolm’s] account of a trial that throws an unflattering spotlight on the US justice system, and will make every American cross their fingers and hope never to sit in the dock."—Rosemary Goring, Glasgow Herald"If you have never read Malcolm, you are in for a treat. All her books are short and sharp and fiercely intelligent: as one of her colleagues put it, her ‘blade gleams with a razor edge’….Trials make great theatre and the five week trial of Borukhova and Mallayev offered Malcolm some very colourful characters."—Craig Brown, The Mail on Sunday"Malcolm has written a fascinating story….her essay’s after effect is entirely disproportionate to its brevity. The disquiet stays with you. It’s there in the pit of your stomach."—Rachel Cooke, The Observer"As soon as I read this bizarre murder story, I felt impelled to read it again. It is impossible to put down."—Julia Pascal, The Independent". . . . it’s after the trial, when Malcolm gets among the Bukharan families in their homes, that she is most splendidly and poignantly in her element. Her presence in the text is lighter, her touch firmer and more delicate, and her attention more warmly and accurately attuned, than those of any other writer I can think of. All her life she has been perfecting this superb narrating and analytical voice and I for one would follow it anywhere."—Helen Garner, Sydney Morning Herald"A prize-winning journalist discovers the elements of Greek tragedy in a sensational murder trial. This is a riveting account of the recent bizarre and intriguing Borukhova case. Janet Malcolm’s journalistic brilliance paints an unsettling picture of a fractured marriage, legal manoeuvrings and a fatal custody battle that precipitated murder."—Granta"Janet Malcolm’s characteristically incisive account of a murder trial."—Geoff Dyer, Prospect Magazine"A passionate, incredulous indictment of the American legal system and its brutal bureaucracy."—Christopher Hirst, The Independent iA Lifetime Achievement award for 2011 was given to nonfiction writer and journalist Janet Malcolm by the English-Speaking Union of the United StatesRunner-up for the Biography/Autobiography category at the Los Angeles Book FestivalFinalist for the 2012 Book of the Year in the True Crime category, as awarded by ForeWord Magazine

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Book SynopsisWhen a young woman killed herself in the office she shared with her employer in 1920s Shanghai, the city reeled in shock. Xi Shangzhen became a symbol of the failures of the Chinese Republic as well as the broken promises of citizens’ rights, gender equality, and financial prosperity that were betokened by liberal democracy and capitalism.Trade ReviewA fascinating and thoughtful analysis of the changing mores of a turbulent but lively period—the early 1920s—in China…The Suicide of Miss Xi is brilliantly written…Some of the pressures on Miss Xi have eerie echoes in today’s China. -- Rana Mitter * The Telegraph (India) *Makes a critical contribution by bringing the economy, market, and capitalism into our understanding of May Fourth politics…[A] rich, nuanced, and engaging book, which reflects both an experienced historian’s deep thinking on modern Chinese history and a comprehensive dialogue with previous scholarship. -- Madeleine Yue Dong * Journal of Asian Studies *Compelling…A rich analysis of 1920s China and its fragile democracy…An invaluable contribution to the literature on the early Chinese republic as she masterfully weaves together an analysis of gender, legal, and economic perspectives…Remarkable in its breadth and depth, Goodman’s study is a significant addition to a growing literature on the early republican era that explores changing notions of citizenship and of the republic itself. -- Susan Fernsebner * Journal of Social History *A remarkably rich and thought-provoking microanalysis of early Republican Shanghai…Goodman challenges us to reread May Fourth lives and fault lines and to rethink the sources and challenges of democratic quests in the past and present…[A] must-read book. -- Ling Ma * Twentieth-Century China *A wonderfully evocative, beautifully written, and deeply researched account of life in 1920s Shanghai that brings together commerce, capitalism, democracy, and the new republic. We meet ambitious new women, scandalous men gambling on stock exchanges, and corrupt warlords pulling the strings of justice from behind the scenes. And throughout it all is the press, not merely as historical source, but as an active player in all that happens. -- Henrietta Harrison, author of The Man Awakened from Dreams: One Man’s Life in a North China Village, 1857–1942We will never be certain why Xi Shangzhen killed herself, but in this masterful study Goodman shows what we can learn from her death. Shanghai emerges more complicated than ever, roiled by a 1920s scandal involving office workers, feminists, civic notables, stock-market speculators, journalists, feckless judges, and military men. A flawless work of scholarship and a mesmerizing read. -- Gail Hershatter, author of Women and China’s RevolutionsIn a vivid and compelling book, Goodman uses the workplace suicide of Xi Shangzhen to plumb transforming gender ideals regarding women in the workplace and the greater public realm, the utility and societal effects of financial and commodities markets, and the integrity of the law and the courts. Deeply researched and well written, this is a significant contribution to scholarship on modern Chinese history. -- Peter J. Carroll, author of Between Heaven and Modernity: Reconstructing Suzhou, 1895–1937Through a detailed exploration of the scandalous 1922 suicide of the Shanghai female office worker Xi Shangzhen, this elegantly written book illuminates crucial facets of that strange interregnum in Chinese history when, in the absence of any effective government, a variety of experiments in civic sovereignty were put into practice. Goodman looks at commercial and civic organizations, gender, financial speculation, and a complicated legal system in piecing together the latent democratic possibilities in a space she provocatively calls ‘a public without a republic.’ -- Theodore Huters, author of Bringing the World Home: Appropriating the West in Late Qing and Early Republican ChinaThis fascinating study rewrites the history of Chinese democracy by centering it in a robust public culture of print and civic associations. Extensively researched and eloquently presented, it captures republican articulations of citizenship over thorny issues of women and money. This is a must-read for anyone seeking to understand the elusive conditions of democracy under Chinese capitalism. -- Wen-hsin Yeh, author of Shanghai Splendor: A Cultural History, 1843–1949As its title indicates, this book is about the suicide of Xi Shangzhen…This forgotten event, which Bryna Goodman recovered from extensive archival research, provides a prism through which to understand urban society in Republican China during the late 1910s and early 1920s…Despite the deep engagement with existing histories and theories, Goodman manages to keep the voices of the protagonists at the center of her compelling narrative. -- Limin Teh * Nan Nü *

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Book SynopsisThis book, the first comprehensive study of criminal speech in eighteenth-century New England, traces how the criminalization, prosecution, and punishment of speech offenses in Massachusetts helped to establish and legitimate a social and cultural regime of politeness. Analyzing provincial statutes and hundreds of criminal prosecutions, Kristin A. Olbertson argues that colonists transformed their understanding of speech offenses, from fundamentally ungodly to primarily impolite. As white male gentility emerged as the pre-eminent model of authority, records of criminal prosecution and punishment show a distinct cadre of politely pious men defining themselves largely in contrast to the vulgar, the impious, and the unmanly. Law, as manifested in statutes as well as in local courts and communities, promoted and legitimized a particular, polite vision of the king''s peace and helped effectuate the British Empire. In this unique and fascinating work, Olbertson reveals how ordinary people intTrade Review'Olbertson reveals how, prior to the Revolution, prosecution of speech misbehavior increasingly marked the boundaries between the refined and the vulgar. Convictions (and acquittals) for threats, contempt, defamation, and false reports distinguished the 'lower sort' from their 'betters'. Slowly but surely, Massachusetts judges and juries gave greater weight to sensibility, civility, and credibility as markers of distinction, while moving away from prosecuting sinful speech and toward defining genteel masculinity. A tour de force.' Sally E. Hadden, Western Michigan University'Olbertson builds on two generations of scholarship that have taught us to understand New England's legal culture as enmeshed with English notions of hierarchy. She transforms our understanding by her relentless and pointed focus on the ways speech offences were, for a time at least, integral to governance. A witty and beautifully researched study of how, in a time and place that prized sincerity and restraint and deference, noise and irreverence were everywhere.' Hendrik Hartog, author of The Trouble with Minna: A Case of Slavery and Emancipation in the Antebellum North'Kristin Olbertson has given us a wide-ranging, wonderfully textured, and deeply insightful exploration of how generations of elites in early Massachusetts reinforced their identity and patrolled the boundaries of the status they claimed by criminalizing the speech of people they deemed their inferiors or who might challenge their authority. The Dreadful Word is a masterly accomplishment that teaches us not simply to see the past with new understanding, but to hear it, as well.' Bruce H. Mann, Harvard Law School'Through her careful and perceptive scholarship Kristin Olbertson has deepened our knowledge of law as an instrument for maintaining social, gender, and racial hierarchies in the eighteenth century.' Lyndsay Campbell, Criminal Law and Criminal Justice BooksTable of Contents1. Introduction; 2. A politer peace; 3. Sensibility; 4. Civility; 5. Credibility; 6. Cacophony; 7. Respectability; Bibliography; Index.

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Book SynopsisThis book examines the powerful influence of civil law on understandings and responses to madness in England and in New Jersey. The influence of civil law on the history of madness has not hitherto been of major academic investigation. This body of law, established and developed over a five hundred year period, greatly influenced how those from England’s propertied classes understood and responded to madness. Moreover, the civil law governing the response to madness in England was successfully exported into several of its colonies, including New Jersey. Drawing on a well-preserved and rare collection of trials in lunacy in New Jersey, this book reveals the important ties of civil law, local custom and perceptions of madness in transatlantic perspectives. This book will be highly relevant to scholars interested in law, medicine, psychiatry and madness studies, as well as contemporary issues in mental capacity and guardianship.Trade Review'James Moran has provided an important addition to the historiography of psychiatry and mental health provision in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. His new book contributes significantly to shifting the historical emphasis away from asylums and towards extra-institutional approaches to the card of the insane.'Social History of Medicine'Madness on Trial, introduces a ‘treasure trove’ of an alternative archive, in the form of documents relating to civil proceedings in lunacy from eighteenth- and nineteenth-century New Jersey. [it] is a welcome addition to the history of mental illness, and is a very useful and accessible work for anyone interested in mental health law and community or family practices of care.'Journal of The Historical Association'This is an excellent book: it offers a rich and deep inquiry into the legal and transatlantic histories of lunacy across place and space, also illuminating imperial legal practices around insanity. Moran’s original history provides a new set of insights into the interpretation of insanity through laws, the way law was used by different people, and the translation of imperial law into colonial contexts. This has not been achieved for the transatlantic historical site in such a deliberate and detailed way before now [...] Moran’s historical work is innovative. He makes a variety of new statements of method, purpose, evidence, and interpretation in and across legal and asylum histories. This field of madness, insanity, families, and institutions has a deep and sustained readership and continues to garner interest among students and researchers. Moran’s book also traverses multiple fields and readers, and will bring legal-historical methods and ideas to a wider audience.'Canadian Bulletin of Medical History'Madness on Trial thus offers a rich history of lunacy investigation law as well as points to new resources for scholars studying madness, mental health, and civil law in the pre-asylum era.'William J. Ryan, Journal of Early American History -- .Table of ContentsList of tablesAcknowledgments1 Introduction: civil law and madness in transatlantic context2 Suing for a lunatic: lunacy investigation law, 1320-18903 Indefinite mental states: negotiating the legal definition of madness4 Trials of madness: family struggles over property in England5 Care and protection: managing madness in England 6 Atlantic crossing: lunacy law as colonial inheritance7 Family, friends and neighbours: localizing madness in New Jersey8 Asylum in the community: managing madness in New Jersey 9 Orders in lunacy: lunacy investigation law and the asylum reconsidered10 ConclusionBibliographyIndex

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Book SynopsisBooks about the work of James Joyce are an academic industry. Most of them are unreadable and esoteric. Adrian Hardiman's book is both highly readable and strikingly original. He spent years researching Joyce's obsession with the legal system, and the myriad references to notorious trials in Ulysses and Finnegans Wake. Joyce was fascinated by and felt passionately about miscarriages of justice, and his view of the law was coloured by the potential for grave injustice when policemen and judges are given too much power. Hardiman recreates the colourful, dangerous world of the Edwardian courtrooms of Dublin and London, where the death penalty loomed over many trials. He brings to life the eccentric barristers, corrupt police and omnipotent judges who made the law so entertaining and so horrifying. This is a remarkable evocation of a vanished world, though Joyce's scepticism about the way evidence is used in criminal trials is still highly relevant.Trade ReviewEven to those who find Ulysses somewhat impenetrable and to those who never even attempt to read Finnegans Wake, Joyce in Court is a pleasure to read and a real treasury of Joycean history in context * Dublin Sunday Business Post *He has the gifts of clarity, expertise and a deep knowledge of what he is talking about... This book is a worthy tribute to a person of many talents who fortunately chose to devote a lot of them to a body of work which was ideally suited for him' * Irish Times *Hardiman has approached the oeuvre with refreshing clarity... he is a highly enlightened and consistently humane reader of Joyce' * Daily Telegraph *This tremendously well-researched and marvellously insightful book is a delight for lawyers and lovers of literature alike * Irish Independent *With forensic care, Hardiman takes us through the trials of Emmet and the invincibles. His advantage is that he knows the book as well as he knows the law, and so misses no chance to connect what happened legally with what enters the minds and conversations of the fictional characters... [Hardiman] writes with clarity and with a lawyer's eye as he describes what the authorities did to prevent the book being published' -- Colm Toibin, GuardianHardiman's enthusiastic tracing and interpretation [...] does it a great service * The Sunday Times *Hardiman's detailed survey of [insurance law, libel, the tort of criminal conversation] undoubtedly renews and enriches our reading of Joyce's work as a whole... Its treatment of individual cases is fascinating' * Literary Review *The book reads like one of [Hardiman's] elaborate court arguments and it is redolent with the knowledge for which he was renowned. It is a seemly memorial of his professional life in the courts as well as his parallel life as historian and literary scholar * Irish Examiner *A fascinating exploration of Joyce's obsession with the legal system that looks at the many trials referenced in Ulysses and Finnegan's Wake * Irish Times, Best books of 2017. *[Hardiman] sheds new light on James Joyce's Ulysses by way of the 18 civil cases referred to in its text... Provides an insightful consideration of Joyce's masterpiece from a refreshingly different angle' * Publishers Weekly. *Consistently informative and entertaining, and very often fascinating. It deserves a place in ever Irish lawyer's library * Law Society Gazette *

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Book SynopsisThis brilliant new book explores the lives of eight generations of the greatest kings and queens that this country has ever seen, and the worst. The Plantagenets their story is the story of Britain.England's greatest royal dynasty, the Plantagenets, ruled over England through eight generations of kings. Their remarkable reign saw England emerge from the Dark Ages to become a highly organised kingdom that spanned a vast expanse of Europe. Plantagenet rule saw the establishment of laws and creation of artworks, monuments and tombs which survive to this day, and continue to speak of their sophistication, brutality and secrets.Dan Jones brings you a new vision of this battle-scarred history. From the Crusades, to King John's humbling over Magna Carta and the tragic reign of the last Plantagenet, Richard II this is a blow-by-blow account of England's most thrilling age.Trade Review‘Stonking narrative history told with pace, wit and scholarship about the bloody dynasty that produced some of England’s most brilliant, brutal kings’ Observer ‘Colourful and engaging … Jones has produced an absorbing narrative that will help ensure that the Plantagenet story remains stamped on the English imagination’ Sunday Times ‘Unapologetically about powerful people, their foibles, their passions and their weaknesses … vivid descriptions of battles and tournaments, ladies in fine velvet and knights in shining armour crowd the pages of this highly engaging narrative’ Evening Standard ‘Action-packed … Filled with fighting, personality clashes, betrayal and bouts of the famous Plantagenet rage’ Daily Telegraph ‘Dan Jones expertly weaves an enormous medieval tapestry, ranging from the Middles East of Richard the Lionheart's Third Crusade to the battlefields of the Hundred Years War’ Sunday Telegraph ‘This is an unashamedly royal history and even the most insatiable appetite for chivalric deeds and aristocratic violence will be sated by its conclusion’ Sunday Times

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Book SynopsisWritten by one of early America's most eminent historians, this book masterfully discusses the debates over constitutionalism that took place in the Revolutionary era.Trade ReviewThis book distills the core insights of a long career into a single small volume that grabs the reader's interest from the first page and never lets go. * Jessica T. Mathews, Foreign Affairs *With characteristic insight, sobriety, and wisdom, Gordon Wood had given us much to consider in this thoughtful study of how the framers of the American Republic imperfectly but determinedly set us on a journey toward a more perfect Union. Wood's scholarship always repays our careful attention, and this incisive new book joins the large company of his invaluable contributions to understanding America's complexities and contradictions. * Jon Meacham, author of The Soul of America: The Battle for Our Better Angels *No one has done more to teach us about the origins of American constitutionalism than Gordon S. Wood. Now, at a moment when we are trembling over the strength of our constitutional system, Wood gives us a deft shorthand account of how it all began. For anyone who wants to understand what made American constitutionalism such a vital political experiment, this is the place to start. * Jack Rakove, author of Beyond Belief, Beyond Conscience: The Radical Significance of the Free Exercise of Religion *Gordon Wood's Power and Liberty conveniently encapsulates more than a half-century of scholarship by the leading historian of American constitutionalism during the founding era and the early republic. * William E. Nelson, author of E Pluribus Unum: How the Common Law Helped Unify and Liberate Colonial America, 1607-1776 *Gordon Wood has packed a lifetime of learning into this splendid little volume. In his capable hands, our founding charters, grown stale from familiarity, regain their freshness and allure as revolutionary documents that redefined our politics. Wood has an uncanny ability to project himself into the past and to report on his findings as if he had been a personal witness to those distant events. * Ron Chernow, author of Alexander Hamilton *Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction Ch 1. The Imperial Debate Ch. 2 State Constitution-Making Ch. 3 The Crisis of the 1780s Ch. 4 The Federal Constitution Ch. 5 Slavery and Constitutionalism Ch. 6 The Emergence of the Judiciary Ch. 7 The Great Demarcation Between Public and Private Epilogue Notes Index

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Book SynopsisWinner of the Ramnath Goenka Award 2020On 26th January 1950 India became a republic, shedding its last links with its colonial past and inaugurating a new era of liberty and freedom. With fundamental rights and civil liberties guaranteed by the state, the new constitution was universally acclaimed as the world's greatest experiment in liberal government'. This idealistic birth of a new republic meant a clean break with a repressive past. And yet, barely twelve months later, the very makers of the constitution were denouncing their own creation. Passed in June 1951, the First Amendment to the Constitution was a pivotal moment in Indian constitutional history. Sixteen Stormy Days explores the contentious legacy of this First Amendment which drastically curbed freedom of speech, restricted freedom against discrimination and circumscribed the right to property. It follows the sixteen days of debate that led up to it, the people that created it, the great battle waged against it andTrade Review‘A page-turner’ * Soutik Biswas, India Correspondent, BBC *‘Exhaustively researched… very readable…’ * Open Magazine *‘A compelling read’ * Firstpost *‘History written as thriller… exceptional’ * LiveMint *‘A scintillating examination of the First Amendment… Brings the legacies of Nehru and Modi uncomfortably close…’ * The Telegraph *‘Extremely well researched, beautifully written and qualitatively brilliant’ * Comparative Constitutional Law and Administrative Law Journal *‘…simply written, yet riveting account will appeal to legal and academic scholars, as well as a wide readership of interested citizens’ * South Asia Research *This riveting book highlights Nehru’s role in post-colonial India’s first constitutional crisis. Singh’s nuanced perspectives comprehensively capture the historical and legal contexts that defined the event. It is masterfully written—a book for anyone who wants to look behind the veil of the world’s largest constitutional democracy. -- Adeel Hussain, Associate Professor of Legal Studies, New York University, USAThis book is dynamite. It will shock those who take a rosy view of the Constitution and the freedoms it grants to Indian citizens. This story, so far untold, should lead to a serious re-examination of the history and contents of the Constitution. -- Lord Meghnad Desai, Emeritus Professor, London School of Economics, UKA long overdue study of the way in which the liberties guaranteed by India’s constitution were sabotaged by the very government that had promulgated it, thus returning the newly independent state to its colonial origins. -- Professor Faisal Devji, University of Oxford, UKThis blow-by-blow account of the first amendment of the Indian Constitution—arguably the most far-reaching—upends many a comforting myth about the Indian republic. Singh’s gripping account of this hitherto understudied and high-stakes political battle is at its provocative best when it challenges efforts at understanding the past through the lens of one-dimensional heroes and villains. -- Mrinalini Sinha, author of Spectres of Mother India: The Global Restructuring of an EmpireTable of ContentsIntroduction 1. The Build Up 2. Will the People Wait 3. The Deepening Crisis 4. The Gathering Storm 5. The Clouds Burst 6. The Battle Rages 7. The Aftermath Notes Index

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Book SynopsisArgues that African American literature has profound and deliberate legal roots. Tracing this throughline from the eighteenth century to the present, Christopher Brown demonstrates that engaging with legal culture in its many forms - including its conventions, paradoxes, and contradictions - is paramount to understanding Black writing.

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Book SynopsisDavid Kennedy and Martti Koskenniemi, two leading critics of law’s role in global life, join together to explore the origins and destiny of efforts to build law into the fabric of global life. Erudite, open-minded, and at times personal, Of Law and the World is a poignant conversation about humanity’s struggle to live together.Trade ReviewOver the last four decades, David Kennedy and Martti Koskenniemi have occupied a unique space that was, simultaneously, at the top of the international law world and on its cutting edge. This book offers an enthralling tour of the intellectual and professional world they inhabited and sought to disrupt. A front-row seat to a fireside chat about how to plot critique. -- Vasuki Nesiah, New York UniversityIn their engrossing exchanges about the deepest problems in their field, David Kennedy and Martti Koskenniemi continue to exemplify international legal theory in the least pretentious and most productive sense. Though entitled to review their accomplishments, they realize they are just at the start of making sense of what international law is and what it does—and generously take the reader with them on a journey that matters to everyone. -- Samuel Moyn, Yale UniversityRich and revealing dialogues between two grand figures of North Atlantic international legal scholarship who have been friends and colleagues for almost four decades. Kennedy and Koskenniemi illuminate their separate trajectories, common projects, and intellectual and personal influences. Their lively conversations are also disarming as a chronicle of a critical generation in international law. -- Hilary Charlesworth, Melbourne Law SchoolAn exhilarating gaze across the world—uniquely insightful, challenging, and provocative. -- Philippe Sands, University College LondonThe conversation you’ve always hoped to overhear. Of Law and the World offers the followers and critics of Martti Koskenniemi and David Kennedy, two of the most influential international legal scholars of our time, the rare experience of being a fly on the wall of their virtual living room. -- Doreen Lustig, Tel Aviv UniversityThis is revelatory stuff, chock-full of insight, inspiration, humanity, and rage. -- Susan Marks, London School of Economics and Political Science

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Book SynopsisHow did pre-modern merchants provide for predictability in situations of legal pluralism?

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Book SynopsisAn account of a fundamental change in American legal thought, from a conception of law as something found in nature to one in which law is entirely a human creation.Before the late 19th century, natural law played an important role in the American legal system. Lawyers routinely used it in their arguments and judges often relied upon it in their opinions. Today, by contrast, natural law plays virtually no role in the legal system. When natural law was part of a lawyer''s toolkit, lawyers thought of judges as finders of the law, but when natural law dropped out of the legal system, lawyers began thinking of judges as makers of the law instead.In The Decline of Natural Law, the eminent legal historian Stuart Banner explores the causes and consequences of this change. To do this, Banner discusses the ways in which lawyers used natural law and why the concept seemed reasonable to them. He further examines several long-term trends in legal thought that weakened the position of natural law, including the use of written constitutions, the gradual separation of the spheres of law and religion, the rapid growth of legal publishing, and the position of natural law in some of the 19th century''s most contested legal issues. And finally, he describes both the profession''s rejection of natural law in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and the ways in which the legal system responded to the absence of natural law.The first book to explain how natural law once worked in the American legal system, The Decline of Natural Law offers a unique look into how and why this major shift in legal thought happened, and focuses, in particular, on the shift from the idea that law is something we find to something we make.Table of ContentsIntroduction Part I: Before the Transition Chapter 1: The Law of Nature Chapter 2: The Common Law Part II: Causes of the Transition Chapter 3: The Adoption of Written Constitutions Chapter 4: The Separation of Law and Religion Chapter 5: The Explosion in Law Publishing Chapter 6: The Two-Sidedness of Natural Law Part III: The Transition and After Chapter 7: The Decline of Natural Law and Custom Chapter 8: Substitutes for Natural Law Chapter 9: Echoes of Natural Law Index

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Book SynopsisThe Oxford Handbook of the History of International Law provides an authoritative and original overview of the origins, concepts, and core issues of international law. The first comprehensive Handbook on the history of international law, it is a truly unique contribution to the literature of international law and relations. Pursuing both a global and an interdisciplinary approach, the Handbook brings together some sixty eminent scholars of international law, legal history, and global history from all parts of the world. Covering international legal developments from the 15th century until the end of World War II, the Handbook consists of over sixty individual chapters which are arranged in six parts. The book opens with an analysis of the principal actors in the history of international law, namely states, peoples and nations, international organisations and courts, and civil society actors. Part Two is devoted to a number of key themes of the history of international law, such as peace and war, the sovereignty of states, hegemony, religion, and the protection of the individual person. Part Three addresses the history of international law in the different regions of the world (Africa and Arabia, Asia, the Americas and the Caribbean, Europe), as well as ''encounters'' between non-European legal cultures (like those of China, Japan, and India) and Europe which had a lasting impact on the body of international law. Part Four examines certain forms of ''interaction or imposition'' in international law, such as diplomacy (as an example of interaction) or colonization and domination (as an example of imposition of law). The classical juxtaposition of the civilized and the uncivilized is also critically studied. Part Five is concerned with problems of the method and theory of history writing in international law, for instance the periodisation of international law, or Eurocentrism in the traditional historiography of international law. The Handbook concludes with a Part Six, entitled People in Portrait, which explores the life and work of twenty prominent scholars and thinkers of international law, ranging from Muhammad al-Shaybani to Sir Hersch Lauterpacht.The Handbook will be an invaluable resource for students and scholars of international law. It provides historians with new perspectives on international law, and increases the historical and cultural awareness of scholars of international law. It is the standard reference work for the global history of international law.Trade ReviewThe Handbook on the History of International Law is an excellent and up-to-date contribution to a broad topic that has increasingly attracted the interest of academia in the last years. The editors certainly succeeded in bringing together a broad range of renowned experts on the various fi elds covered. It certainly deserves its place in the bookshelves of any international lawyers library. * Ralph Janik, Austrian Review of International and European Law Online *Shelley's interlocutor in Ozymandias paints a bleak picture of the fate which has befallen the Pharaoh's statue: 'Nothing beside remains. Round the decay / Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare / The lone and level sands stretch far away ' ... Thanks to interventions such as those organised by Fassbender and Peters in this excellent volume, the historians of international law need not fear such a fate befalling their discipline-indeed, its future has never seemed brighter or more vibrant. * Cameron A. Miles, The British Yearbook of International Law *By any measure, the book is a substantial achievement, and it will be widely and rewardingly consulted for many years to come. * Jacob Katz Cogan, University of Cincinnati, American Journal of International Law *Impressive and timely volume * Rose Parfitt, Global Law Books *The volume does a marvelous job of hemming the topic in, but pays a price for its breadth and the erudition of its contributors by leaving the reader ungratefully greedy for further contextualization and (historical) policy detail - sparking this hunger in the reader though is a true vindication of a handbook of this sort. * Wouter P. F. Schmit Jongbloed, ASIL Cables *The Oxford Handbook of the History of International Law innovatively and comprehensively provides a timely and ambitious global history of international law from the sixteenth century to the mid-twentieth century. Under the skilled editorship of Bardo Fassbender and Anne Peters, the contributors, experts who themselves come from all parts of the world, present a history that imagines international law as the product of different regions, cultures, actors, and eras. Setting a new agenda for the field, the Handbook will be the indispensable starting point for students and researchers exploring the history of international law. * ASIL Award Citation *There is no doubt that The Oxford Handbook of the History of International Law will become what editors and authors intended," the new standard reference work for the global history of international law," provides the reader with a broad spectrum of useful information on a high level which is not easily assembled. * Karl Heinz Ziegler, German Yearbook of International Law *Table of ContentsPART ONE: ACTORS; PART TWO: THEMES; PART THREE: REGIONS; I. AFRICA AND ARABIA; II. ASIA; III. THE AMERICAS AND THE CARIBBEAN; IV. EUROPE; V. ENCOUNTERS; PART FOUR: INTERACTION OR IMPOSITION; PART FIVE: METHODOLOGY AND THEORY; PART SIX: PEOPLE IN PORTRAIT

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Book SynopsisThe commonly held view about English administrative law is that it is of recent origin, with some dating it from the mid-20th century and some venturing back to the late 19th century. English Administrative Law from 1550: Continuity and Change upends this conventional thinking, charting its development from the mid-16th century with an in-depth examination of administrative law doctrine based on primary legal materials, statute, and case law. This book is divided into four parts. Part 1 sets out the book''s principal thesis, contrasting standard perceptions concerning the existence of English administrative law with the reality of its emergence from the mid-16th century. Part 2 is concerned with Regulation and Administration from the mid-16th century to the end of the 19th century. There is detailed analysis of the regulatory and administrative state, which includes chapters on the way in which administrative policy was developed through individual decision-making and rulemaking, and t

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Book SynopsisPolicing Women examines for the first time the changing historical landscape of women's experiences of their contact with the official state police between 1800 and 1950 in the Western world.Drawing on and going beyond existing knowledge about policing practices, the volume discusses how women encountered the official police, how they experienced that contact, and the outcomes of that contact in the modern Western world. In so doing, it is an original and much needed addition to the literature around changes in policing, women's experiences of the criminal justice system, and women's experiences of control and regulation. The chapters uncover such experiences in a range of countries across Europe, the USA, Canada, and Australia. Importantly, the collection focuses upon a crucial epoch in the history of policing a 150-year period when policing was rapidly changing and being increasingly placed on a formal level. Bringing together scholarly work from expert contributoTrade Review"As the position of women in the world undergoes perhaps more scrutiny than ever, there isn't a better time to situate the present through an analysis of the past. Policing Women shines an important light on women's actual experiences of being policed across the Western world. These fascinating histories (all based upon original empirical research) serve to illuminate issues around power, identity and control, yet also dispel many of the complacent assumptions about gender and offending." Dr. Sarah Charman, University of Portsmouth"This volume is a valuable and multifaceted analysis of how women actually behaved versus expectations of how women should behave, and of the diverse and sometimes contradictory ways that police officers treated women in relation to those expectations. It balances legal analysis and statistics with lively and illuminating examples of brawling, insults, and thefts. The authors make detailed and significant use of local and regional records."Professor Joanne Klein, Boise State UniversityTable of ContentsIntroduction SECTION 1: Gender, Attitudes and Policing 1. Policing women in urban Scotland c.1890-1950LOUISE JACKSON AND RIAN SUTTON2. Policing women and girls in Canada from the late nineteenth to the mid-twentieth CenturyTAMARA MYERS3. Policing Australian Women: beyond Sex and SecretsALANA PIPERSECTION 2: Space, Place and Social Control4. The policing of female drunkenness in two northern English boroughs, c.1869-1875CRAIG STAFFORD5. The policing of women in the northwest of England, 1856-1901GUY WOOLNOUGH6. Women, police, and social control in Bologna between the eighteenth and mid-nineteenth centurySANNE MUURLING7. ‘A Very Friendly Feeling Which is Perfectly Natural’: police and sex workers in progressive era BaltimoreKATIE M. HEMPHILL SECTION 3: Police Culture, Practice and Identity 8. ‘It would be a great evil to let so bad a Character … go at large’: convict women and the Irish police, the 1860s-1900ELAINE FARRELL9. Character and crime: police classification of female offenders in late nineteenth century EnglandJO TURNER10. ‘I don’t care about you, I’ll write to the procurer!’ Women’s threats, insults, and violence against policemen, 1863-1913MARION PLUSKOTA SECTION 4: Mobility, Migration and Race11. Policing migrant women: patterns of mobility, control and expulsion in the German Empire, 1870-1914BEATE ALTHAMMER12. Policing emancipation: white law enforcer sexual violence against Black women in the reconstruction US South, 1865-1877ELIZABETH M. BARNES13. ‘Where are the Race Police Women?’ African American policewomen in the Black press and on the beat in early twentieth-century AmericaELIZABETH EVENS Conclusion

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Book SynopsisThe Snail and the Ginger Beer tells the full story of the remarkable case of Donoghue v Stevenson which represents, perhaps, the greatest contribution made by English and Scottish lawyers to the development of the common law. It provides vivid biographical sketches of the protagonists and of the great lawyers who were involved in the case.Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Notes and Acknowledgements Prologue 1. Mrs Donoghue Travels to Paisley 2. Into the Scottish Courts 3. In the House of Lords 4. A Legal Cast List: Judges and Lawyers 5. Roots of the Neighbour Principle 6. Home Reaction 7. Into the Common World 8. Conclusion Selected Bibliography; Index

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Book Synopsis'A Victorian Tragedy', for the first time, describes how the landmark court case of Banks v Goodfellow (1870) came about, what happened to the protagonists and how an enlightened judgment provided a practical definition of testamentary capacity that has since been used throughout the common law world law.Table of ContentsIntroduction Chapter One - Who was John Banks the Elder? Chapter Two - John Banks the Elder: His Life, Illness and Death Chapter Three - The Wills of John Banks the Elder Chapter Four - Margaret Banks Goodfellow: The Niece and Beneficiary of the Last Will Chapter Five - The Trials of the Will Chapter Six - John Banks the Younger: The Claimant Chapter Seven - Edward Barron Goodfellow: The Defendant Chapter Eight - The Questions that still Remain Appendix I -Information Appendix II - Biographical Sketches of the Judges and Principal Barristers Appendix III -The Judgment in Queen’s Bench Endnotes Index

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Book SynopsisAfter examining more than 700 lawsuits decided by the supreme courts of former slave states, Giuliana Perrone asserts that slavery remained actionable in American law well after its ostensible demise. An important study for scholars of slavery and the US Civil War.Trade Review'The monumental history of Emancipation and Reconstruction is irresistible, but it can be deceptive. Giuliana Perrone directs us to the quieter lanes of American common law discourse, where the bitter realities of abolition's adjudication are to be found - the 'smaller, private legal matters' that piled up routinely, remorselessly, in the shadow of slavery. Those of us who wonder at Reconstruction's rejection and Emancipation's dire legacy can learn much from this eloquent history of legal failure.' Christopher Tomlins, author of In the Matter of Nat Turner: A Speculative History'Nothing More Than Freedom is the first comprehensive history of state appellate law, where the afterlife of slavery lasted for decades. Giuliana Perrone shows us that even the supposed common-law rights of property and contract were limited by previous enslavement across former slave states, where the badges of servitude outlived emancipation.' Ariela Gross, co-author of Becoming Free, Becoming Black: Race, Freedom, and Law in Cuba, Virginia, and Louisiana'Nothing More than Freedom is a fresh and provocative take on legal change at a crucial juncture in American history. Judges who confronted slavery's demise in the aftermath of the Civil War made active choices about whether to adjust legal rules to accommodate this transformation in minimal ways or to root the edifice of slavery entirely out of the law.' Cynthia Nicoletti, author of Secession on Trial: The Treason Prosecution of Jefferson Davis'Perrone delivers an unflinching look at how American judges perpetuated the vestiges of slavery through state-based private law, fatally undermining the abolitionist promise of the Reconstruction Amendments. Now, when so many are entranced by the fiction of colorblindness, Perrone's excavation of ongoing slavery-based logics in American law and commerce is a welcome counterpoint.' Dylan C. Penningroth, author of The Claims of Kinfolk: African American Property and Community in the Nineteenth-Century South'… a rigorous, essential work of legal history, far from easy reading but fascinating throughout. … Highly recommended.' P. Harvey, ChoiceTable of ContentsIntroduction: an abolitionist vision; 1. The contract controversy; 2. 'Wreck and ruin'; 3. 'By force it was destroyed'; 4. Confederate reckonings; 5. Life after the death of slavery; 6. 'Back into the days of slavery'; 7. 'The grave question'; 8. Final failure; Epilogue: an abolitionist revision.

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Book SynopsisPeter Goodrich looks beyond Judge Schreber's mental health to evaluate his jurisprudential theory. Goodrich analyses Schreber's Memoirs, interpreters and intellectual context to show how Schreber challenges the legal thought of his era and opens up a potentially vital approach to contemporary jurisprudence.

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Book SynopsisThis is a highly original, interdisciplinary study of the archaic Greek word nomos and its family of words. Includes extracts from ancient sources, in both the original and English translation, to give us a new and complete understanding of nomos and its foundational place in the Western legal tradition.

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Book SynopsisUsing archaeological evidence, written sources and place-names, this book provides a comprehensive analysis of the Viking legal system and assembly sites, showing that this formed an integral part of Norse culture and identity, to the extent that the assembly institution was brought to all Norse settlements.

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Book SynopsisPolice Matters moves beyond the city to examine the intertwined nature of police and caste in the Tamil countryside. Radha Kumar argues that the colonial police deployed rigid notions of caste in their everyday tasks, refashioning rural identities in a process that has cast long postcolonial shadows.Kumar draws on previously unexplored police archives to enter the dusty streets and market squares where local constables walked, following their gaze and observing their actions towards potential subversives. Station records present a textured view of ordinary interactions between police and society, showing that state coercion was not only exceptional and spectacular; it was also subtle and continuous, woven into everyday life. The colonial police categorized Indian subjects based on caste to ensure the security of agriculture and trade, and thus the smooth running of the economy. Among policemen and among the objects of their coercive gaze, caste became a pTrade ReviewThis book contributes a great deal to the study of policing and to Tamil Nadu studies. * Choice *

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Book SynopsisWhy are we still arguing over the Parthenon Marbles? This book offers a fresh take on the history of those famous pieces of ancient sculpture removed from the Acropolis in Athens by Lord Elgin’s men in the early 19th century. It explains how they became the cause célèbre of the larger debates around cultural heritage and restitution now taking place. The subject is one that is currently embroiling museums, governments, universities and the public at large. Herman provides a balanced, thorough and critical account of the history of the Marbles, while considering the legalities of their initial removal and the ethics of their retention by the British Museum. It incorporates the views of curators, museum directors, lawyers, archaeologists, politicians and others in both London and Athens. It explains why this particular dispute has not been satisfactorily resolved, and suggests new ways of seeking resolution – for the Parthenon Marbles and for the many other cultural treasures held in museum collections outside their countries of origin. The book sets out a way forward for this famously intractable dispute, one based on evidence of past practice, legal rules around the transfer of cultural objects and the role of museums in negotiating international exchanges.Trade ReviewEssential reading for those interested in the dispute, and indeed in the wider debate around repatriation of cultural objects. -- James Morton * The Times *[An] even-handed and refreshing approach to this immensely complex dispute … An important contribution has been made to identify areas of compromise that might help resolve this long-running dispute. * Returning Heritage *Alexander Herman has written a lucid and engaging guide to the world’s longest-standing cultural dispute. Like so many of us, he hopes for its resolution, and is scrupulously fair and even-handed in explaining how this might happen. * Barnaby Phillips, author of 'Loot: Britain and the Benin Bronzes' *Anyone with an interest in world history and cultural heritage will learn a lot from reading this careful study of the world's toughest argument over art and restitution. Its approach is both rigorous and empathetic, an impressive combination. * Bruce Clark, Economist writer on history, culture and ideas, Author of 'Athens: City of Wisdom' *It is a remarkable achievement to write with such balance and authority on so fraught a question, even more impressive when so many believe they have an answer; from now on no-one should venture an opinion without reading this gripping and important analysis. * Sir Alan Moses, former Lord Justice of Appeal and co-chair of the UK's Spoliation Advisory Panel *Table of ContentsIntroduction: A Matter Yet Unresolved 1. From the Slopes of Mount Pentelikos 2. A Story with Neither Hero Nor Villain 3. A Firman by Any Other Name 4. Albion's Verdict 5. The History of a Claim 6. The (un)titled Masterpiece 7. Wellington and International Law 8. The View from Athens 9. Inside the British Museum 10. Resolving the Dispute

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Book SynopsisThe fourth edition of this acclaimed textbook addresses the developments in English contract law since the last edition, including the impact of the withdrawal of the UK from the European Union, and new case law on the role of good faith, the doctrine of consideration, rectification of written contracts for mistake, economic duress, illegality, contractual interpretation, and damages for breach of contract. The book introduces the lawyer trained in a civil law jurisdiction to the method of reasoning in the common law, and in particular to the English law of contract. It is written for the lawyer – whether student or practitioner – from another jurisdiction who already has an understanding of a (different) law of contract, but who wishes to discover the way in which an English lawyer views a contract. However, it is also useful for the English law student: setting English contract law generally in the context of other European and international approaches, the book forms an introductory text, not only demonstrating how English contract law works but also giving a glimpse of different ways of thinking about some of the fundamental rules of contract law from a civil law perspective. After a general introduction to the common law system – how a common lawyer reasons and finds the law – the book explains the principles of the law of contract in English law covering all the aspects of a contract from its formation to the remedies available for breach, whilst directing attention in particular to those areas where the approach of English law is in marked contrast to that taken in many civil law systems.Trade ReviewThe fact that there is a whole section dedicated on explaining Common Law and the Sources of the Law is a great addition for first year students who come from different jurisdictions as well as more mature students who have already obtained a law degree in another jurisdiction and are getting acquainted with English Contract law. -- Maria Tatsiou * UCLan Cyprus *Prof. Cartwright's is a truly excellent book, particularly helpful to students and lawyers from non-Common Law jurisdictions wishing to understand English contract law -- Jean-Sebastien Borghetti * Université Panthéon-Assas (Paris II) *Table of ContentsPreface Part I: An Introduction to the Common Law 1. The ‘Common Law’ 2. Finding the Law Part II: The Law of Contract 3. Introduction to the English Law of Contract 4. The Negotiations for a Contract 5. Formation of the Contract: Contract as ‘Agreement’ 6. Form, Consideration and Intention 7. Vitiating Factors: Void, Voidable and Unenforceable Contracts 8. Finding the Terms of the Contract 9. Controlling the Content of the Contract: ‘Unfair’ Contracts 10. Who has the Benefit of the Contract? Who is Bound by the Contract? 11. Change of Circumstances 12. Remedies for Breach of Contract

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Book SynopsisThis book examines one of the most fundamental issues in twelfth-century English politics: justice. It demonstrates that during the foundational period for the common law, the question of judgement and judicial ethics was a topic of heated debate – a common problem with multiple different answers. How to be a judge, and how to judge well, was a concern shared by humble and high, keeping both kings and parish priests awake at night. Using theological texts, sermons, legal treatises and letter collections, the book explores how moralists attempted to provide guidance for uncertain judges. It argues that mercy was always the most difficult challenge for a judge, fitting uncomfortably within the law and of disputed value. Shining a new light on English legal history, Justice and mercy reveals the moral dilemmas created by the establishment of the common law.Trade Review‘Justice and Mercy is a remarkable book…the book resounds with the historiographic traditions and conflicts among the different schools of legal history and of intellectual history, both in Britain and on the continent. While the author is obviously well aware of them, she manages to avoid the pitfalls of adding to these ongoing conflicts.’Esther Cohen, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, The Medieval Review'I dearly wish this excellent book had been available twenty years ago when I was writing one of my own on the changing ways that the human urge to vengeance were expressed c. 1000–1300. Philippa Byrne, a first-time author, has assembled an amazing amount of difficult theological material, much direct from manuscript, to make a persuasive and novel case that judges had to include in their sentencing policy what she calls “reciprocal mercy,” a kind of subset of “deliberative” justice, generated in the schools by “a sophisticated and long-running debate about judicial ethics”. [...] This is an enviably able, solid, fresh, and exciting first book that will give all kinds of readers much to think about.'Paul R. Hyams, Speculum -- .Table of ContentsPrologue: the vanishing adulteress1 Introduction2 The problem with mercy: the schools3 The problem with mercy: the courts4 Twelfth-century models of justice and mercy5 Who should be merciful?6 Judgement in practice: the Church7 Histories of justice: the crown, persuasion and lordship8 Love your enemies? Popular mercy in a vengeance culture9 ConclusionBibliographyIndex

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Book SynopsisThis book examines one of the most fundamental issues in twelfth-century English politics: justice. It demonstrates that during the foundational period for the common law, the question of judgement and judicial ethics was a topic of heated debate – a common problem with multiple different answers. How to be a judge, and how to judge well, was a concern shared by humble and high, keeping both kings and parish priests awake at night. Using theological texts, sermons, legal treatises and letter collections, the book explores how moralists attempted to provide guidance for uncertain judges. It argues that mercy was always the most difficult challenge for a judge, fitting uncomfortably within the law and of disputed value. Shining a new light on English legal history, Justice and mercy reveals the moral dilemmas created by the establishment of the common law.Trade Review‘Justice and Mercy is a remarkable book…the book resounds with the historiographic traditions and conflicts among the different schools of legal history and of intellectual history, both in Britain and on the continent. While the author is obviously well aware of them, she manages to avoid the pitfalls of adding to these ongoing conflicts.’Esther Cohen, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, The Medieval Review -- .Table of ContentsPrologue: the vanishing adulteress1 Introduction2 The problem with mercy: the schools3 The problem with mercy: the courts4 Twelfth-century models of justice and mercy5 Who should be merciful?6 Judgement in practice: the Church7 Histories of justice: the crown, persuasion and lordship8 Love your enemies? Popular mercy in a vengeance culture9 ConclusionBibliographyIndex

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