Detention without Trial in the Second World War: Comparing the British and American Experiences

My interest in the detention of citizens, without trial, in Britain during the war of 1939-1945 arose as a byproduct of a more general interest. The study of cases has long been central to the common law tradition. But the legal dramas we examine so minutely are too often both contextless and dehumanized. Real people assume the masks of the law, becoming plaintiffs and defendants, offerors and offerees, grantors and contingent remainderpersons, concealed from us by the forms into which their problems have been packaged for legal analysis. Two English leading cases, decided by the House of Lords on November 3, 1941, strikingly illustrate this point. Their names are Liversidge v. Anderson and Greene v. Secretary of State for Home Affairs. In both cases individuals, Robert William Liversidge, alias Jack Perlsweig, and Ben Greene respectively, attempted to challenge the legality of their detention without trial under Regulation 18B of the wartime Defense Regulations. The defendants in the cases were Sir John Anderson, Home Secretary in 1939-1940, and his successor, Herbert Morrison, who took office in October 1940. These cases are regarded as major decisions in English and Commonwealth constitutional law. Their counterparts in the United States are the Supreme Court decisions concerning the treatment, including detention, of Japanese American citizens after the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, particularly the decisions in Korematsu v. United States and Ex Parte Endo, both decided on December 18, 1944. These American cases at least reveal the official reason why the individuals were detained; their English counterparts give virtually no indication as to who Liversidge and Greene were, why the authorities had locked them up, and why the government lawyers had been prepared to resist their attempts to secure liberty. There is a real sense in which the reported decisions give no indication as to what the litigation was really about. I have attempted to recreate the historical context of these cases and to locate them in the general history of civil liberty during the Second World War. This is in part a comparative study. Both in Britain, the original home of the common law, and in the United States of America, its present day principal place of residence, individuals were detained without trial in the name of military necessity or national security. Some few turned to the courts to vindicate that most basic of all civil rights, the right to personal freedom. They had little success. In Britain, one individual, a Captain Budd, secured his liberty through habeas corpus proceedings in May 1941. Curiously enough, the score in the United States seems to have been the same, Mitsuye Endo having secured her complete liberty through legal action in 1944

Herbert Hart Elucidated

There are a number of good biographies of judges, but very few of individual legal academics; indeed, so far as American legal academics are concerned, the only one of note that comes to mind is William Twining\u27s life of Karl Llewellyn. Llewellyn was, of course, a major figure in the evolution of American law, and his unusual life was a further advantage for his biographer. In this biography, Nicola Lace has taken as her subject an English academic who also had an unusual career, one whose contribution was principally not to the evolution of the English legal system but to legal philosophy. To write such a person\u27s life requires, because of the very abstract questions involved, special qualities of understanding and exposition. Lacey has these qualities, and this is a fine piece of work and a good read

Herbert Hart Elucidated

There are a number of good biographies of judges, but very few of individual legal academics; indeed, so far as American legal academics are concerned, the only one of note that comes to mind is William Twining\u27s life of Karl Llewellyn. Llewellyn was, of course, a major figure in the evolution of American law, and his unusual life was a further advantage for his biographer. In this biography, Nicola Lace has taken as her subject an English academic who also had an unusual career, one whose contribution was principally not to the evolution of the English legal system but to legal philosophy. To write such a person\u27s life requires, because of the very abstract questions involved, special qualities of understanding and exposition. Lacey has these qualities, and this is a fine piece of work and a good read

The Joseph and Edythe Jackier Rare Book Room: The Invention of Printing and the Common Law Tradition

An account of the books included in the dedicatory exhibit at the Joseph and Edythe Jackier Rare Book Room, April 14 1996

Decorum or Deterrence? The Politics of Execution in Malawi, 1915-1966

This article is not the final print version. The print version is available at http://www.Bergpublishers.com.Capital punishment - specifically public execution - is here investigated not simply as a judicial punishment, but as a lens through which to view the civil and socio-political development of Malawi from the colonial to early independence eras. Public executions were an exceptional measure, employed at times of marked social and political unrest, being ordered by the colonial government in response to the Chilembwe Uprising in 1915 and by Prime Minister Banda in 1965 in the aftermath of the Cabinet crisis and Chipembere Uprising. This article looks at the continuities and changes in the practice and signification of these judicial killings

Functional alpha-1B adrenergic receptors on human epicardial coronary artery endothelial cells

Alpha-1-adrenergic receptors (α1-ARs) regulate coronary arterial blood flow by binding catecholamines, norepinephrine (NE), and epinephrine (EPI), causing vasoconstriction when the endothelium is disrupted. Among the three α1-AR subtypes (α1A, α1B, and α1D), the α1D subtype predominates in human epicardial coronary arteries and is functional in human coronary smooth muscle cells (SMCs). However, the presence or function of α1-ARs on human coronary endothelial cells (ECs) is unknown. Here we tested the hypothesis that human epicardial coronary ECs express functional α1-ARs. Cultured human epicardial coronary artery ECs were studied using quantitative real-time reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction, radioligand binding, immunoblot, and 3H-thymidine incorporation. The α1B-subtype messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) was predominant in cultured human epicardial coronary ECs (90–95% of total α1-AR mRNA), and total α1-AR binding density in ECs was twice that in coronary SMCs. Functionally, NE and EPI through the α1B subtype activated extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) in ECs, stimulated phosphorylation of EC endothelial nitric oxide synthase (eNOS), and increased deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) synthesis. These results are the first to demonstrate α1-ARs on human coronary ECs and indicate that the α1B subtype is predominant. Our findings provide another potential mechanism for adverse cardiac effects of drug antagonists that nonselectively inhibit all three α1-AR subtypes