Description
Book SynopsisIn the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, English and American lawyers appealed to the ancient constitution as the cornerstone of liberty. The author demonstrates that this concept of an unchanging, ancient constitution, furnished English common lawyers and parliamentarians an argument with which to combat royal prerogative power.
Trade ReviewA first-rate tour de force by a master.... A valedictory statement of a major theme in [Reid's] lifetime's work.
-- G. Ellis Sandoz, Louisiana State University
[Reid] makes a fine case for his view that ancient legal constitutional concepts were among the most important causes of the American Revolution.
-- Stephen Presser, Northwestern University School of Law
Reid clearly presents thoughtful and penetrating studies that will be of great service to anyone interested in understanding the legal roots of Anglo-American liberty.
* The American Journal of Legal History *
Table of ContentsTable of Contents
Introductory Note
1 Forensic History
The Legal Perspective
2 The Advocacy of Lawyers
Uses of the Ancient Constitution
3 The Authority of the Past
The Theory of the Past
4 The Advocacy of the Past
Waging Forensic History
5 Forensic Techniques of Ancient Constitutionalism
Forensic Techniques of Timeless Constitutionalism
6 The Forensic History of Gothicism and Saxonism
7 The Forensic History of the Norman Conquest
The Eighteenth-Century Conquest
The Evidence of Conquest
The Unrevolutionary Revolution
8 The Forensic History of Reform
Forensic History of Magna Carta
Forensic History of the New Jurisprudence
9 The Forensic History of Liberty Notes
Short Titles
Acknowledgments
Index
