On April 15, A Companion to American Legal History, edited by Sally Hadden and Al Brophy, will be published. The volume, part of the remarkably useful Blackwell Companions to American History series, includes twenty-eight essays, organized into four sections: (1) Chronological Overviews; (2) Individuals and Groups; (3) Subject Areas; and (4) Legal Thought. Sally and Al lined up a terrific group of contributors to tackle the wide-ranging topics included in the volume. (Among the contributors are the Legal History Blog’s own Karen Tani, who co-authored, with Felicia Kornbluh, an essay on “Siting the Legal History of Poverty: Below, Above, and Amidst,” and Clara Altman, who wrote an essay on "The International Context: An Imperial Perspective on American Legal History.")
What I'm Looking Forward To: A Companion to American Legal History
This is such an impressively ambitious project and is sure to provide an indispensible resource for legal historians. I had a chance to read a number of the essays in draft, and they were all excellent: filled with information and citations yet also readable and engaging. They offer an easy way to get up to date on various areas of legal history. I am really looking forward to having the final product on my desk.
You can get a preview of the book now on Amazon. The preview includes the table of contents and excerpts from many of the entries. You can also read Sally and Al’s lovely brief introduction to the volume. The publisher's site also has some preview material, including the full text of Elizabeth Dale's opening essay, "Reconsidering the Seventeenth Century: Legal History in the Americas."
As to my own contribution to the Companion, I was invited to write an essay on the legal history of the period between 1920 and 1970. In 8000 words. Including references. It was by far the hardest 8000 words I ever produced. My job was made somewhat easier by the fact that many issues were already well covered in the topical essays. But still, this was an intimidating—and often deeply frustrating—assignment. I felt like I spent as much time struggling over what not to talk about as I did over what I actually did cover. In the end, I just had to make the hard choices, explain why I think they make sense, and hope the essay coheres in an way that is both useful and insightful.
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