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John Phillip Reid - Legislating the Courts - 9780875803876 - V9780875803876
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Legislating the Courts

€ 37.05
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Description for Legislating the Courts Hardcover. Focuses on generally unknown events and policies to demonstrate judicial dependence and legislative supremacy over the judiciary. This book disproves the validity of that assumption for state constitutionalism by concentrating on the law of New Hampshire - representative of the law in other jurisdictions - between the years 1789 and 1818. Num Pages: 232 pages. BIC Classification: 1KBBEH; LAZ; LNAA. Category: (UP) Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly. Dimension: 250 x 150 x 15. Weight in Grams: 666.

In the first decades of the nineteeth century, legal reformers in the United States strove to standardize courtroom procedures and expand judges' power at the expense of jurors while simultaneously imposing uniformity upon judicial decision making. Reid's previous book, Controlling the Law, offered a case study of this process, focusing on New Hampshire Chief Justice Jeremiah Smith and Governor William Plumer. Now in Legislating the Courts, Reid returns to the careers of Smith and Plumer to continue the story of judicial authority in the early republic.

American constitutional historians and lawyers generally assume that the current doctrine of judicial supremacy ... Read more

To illustrate his points, Reid refers to three government practices that together with other matters altered judicial salaries—mandated by the constitution to be "permanent" and "honorable"—and that created a dependent judicial system. The first practice, "restoring litigants to their law," gave litigants who had lost a jury trial and had judgments pronounced against them the option to petition the legislature to be relieved from the judgment and to be granted a new jury trial. In the second practice the legislature acted on the premise that it had the authority to investigate the conduct of judges and require them to explain why they behaved in certain ways. Finally, in the third practice, the legislature exercised the authority to remove judges from their tenure at "good behavior" by "legislating" them out of office and then appointing a new bench.

Despite an attempt to subordinate the judiciary to the will of the citizenry, as represented by the state legislature, Reid finds that judges managed to maintain their autonomy, subject only to the dictates of the law.

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Product Details

Format
Hardback
Publication date
2008
Publisher
Northern Illinois University Press United States
Number of pages
232
Condition
New
Number of Pages
232
Place of Publication
, United States
ISBN
9780875803876
SKU
V9780875803876
Shipping Time
Usually ships in 7 to 11 working days
Ref
99-1

About John Phillip Reid
John Phillip Reid is Professor of Law Emeritus at New York University and the author of numerous books on legal history, including Controlling the Law and The Ancient Constitution and the Origins of Anglo-American Liberty.

Reviews for Legislating the Courts
A rich, interesting, and useful follow-up to his Controlling the Law. Another of John Reid's gems: well-researched, well-written, and one that will be of real interest and use to all American legal historians.
Peter Karsten, University of Pittsburgh A fascinating examination of the emergence of judicial independence and legal professionalism in New Hampshire. Reid's sound common sense and profound ... Read more

Goodreads reviews for Legislating the Courts


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