Encyclopaedia of Modern Philosophies of Law

To quote the statement of reasons given in the memorial presented at the annual meeting of the Association of American Law Schools:

“The need of the series now proposed is so obvious as hardly to need advocacy. We are on the threshold of a long period of constructive readjustment and restatement of our law in almost every department. We come to the task, as a profession, almost wholly untrained in the technic of legal analysis and legal science in general. Neither we, nor any community, could expect anything but crude results without thorough preparation. Many teachers, and scores of students and practitioners, must first have become thoroughly familiar with the world’s methods of juristic thought. It is the part of wisdom first to familiarize ourselves with what has been done by the great modern thinkers …. to catch up with the general state of learning on the subject but they must first be equipped with the state of learning in the world to date.”

Acting upon this memorial, the following resolution was passed at that meeting:
“That a committee of five be appointed by the president, to arrange for the translation and publication of a series of continental masterworks on jurisprudence and philosophy of law.”

The committee spent a year in collecting the material. Advice was sought from a score of masters in the leading Universities of France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and elsewhere. The present series is the result of these labors.

In the selection of this series, the purpose has been, not so much to cover the whole field of modern philosophy of law, as to exhibit faithfully and fairly all the modern viewpoints of any present importance. The older foundation-works of two generations ago are, with some exceptions, already accessible in English translation. But they have been long supplanted by the products of newer schools of thought which are offered in this series in their latest and most representative form. It is believed that the complete series will represent in compact form a collection of materials whose equal cannot be found at this time in any single foreign literature.