Freeman (ed.): The American State Reports, containing the cases of general value and authority, subsequent to those contained in the  American Decisions  and the  American Reports,  decided in the courts of last resort of the several state

Rood, John R.

English

University of Michigan School of Law

Michigan Law Review Volume 9 Issue 7 1911 Book Reviews John R. Rood University of Michigan Law School Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mlr  Part of the Legal Writing and Research Commons Recommended Citation John R. Rood, Book Reviews, 9 MICH. L. REV. 630 (1911). Available at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mlr/vol9/iss7/4  This Regular Feature is brought to you for free and open access by the Michigan Law Review at University of Michigan Law School Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Michigan Law Review by an authorized editor of University of Michigan Law School Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact mlaw.repository@umich.edu. BOOK REVIEWS. THI~ AM!lRICAN S'l'A'l'.E REFOR.'l'S, contairting the cases of general value and authority, subsequent to those contained iri the "American Decisions" and the "American Reports,'' decided in the courts of last resort of the several states, selected, reported, and annotated, by A. C. Free-man. Volumes r26-135 .. San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Com-pany, Law Publishers and Booksellers, 1909-n. We have frequently mentioned .this excellent series ii} these pages. But since the last mention the volumes above mentioned have appeared. The reviewer of such a. set has no easy task on. his hands. In the first place, every reader who has had any considerable experience in the use of law-books already 'knows the superior merits of this series quite as well as the reviewer, and very likely has the set in his case at easy reach from his desk. To say that this is the only series containing the choice cases of American Jurisprudence from the time of the settlement of America to the present time, is to say what everyone knows. To start a catalogue of the contents . and general merits of the set would be to start what could not be finished. To point out the most important features is to repeat former reviews. Noth-ing is left to say but to comment on the current volumes. These· seem to maintain the high standard set by their predecessors. The editor does not include any case in this series till it has appeared in the official series; but goes through all volumes of the state reports as they appear, page by page, and selects such of the cases as in the opinion of the ·editor are of command-ing importance. It is believed that one thing that has contributed in no small . degr~e to the success ~f this great work is the fact that the preparation of• · the first volume was intrusted to a lawyer and writer of very wide exper-ience, and that every volume that has been brought out in the many years since then has come through the hands of this same man, thus giving a uni-formity and continuity to the work, with the opportunity to profit by exper.-ience without losing by lack of knowledge of what had gone before. The chief fault of most of the smaller sets lies in the fact that they are a mere. lumber pile, the contents of which can be a~certained only by sorting it over page by page. But this set is so tied together by a system of annota-tion and cross-reference that as soon as a start is m£de, one case. leads to another on the same point, till the whole field is covered if the reader con-tinues his reading. There is one feature of the late volumes which the editor expressly notifies us is now being emphasized. In volume 135 at page 795, he says: "In recent monographic notes, we have been at some pains to point out what we may call popular legal fallacies, and the subject of this note falls readily into the category." As illustrating the same point we quote the following from page 330, which is the introduction of a long note ex- . pounding the proposition. "Conveyances in fraud of creditors are frequently declared to be void, both in the opjnions of courts and in the enactment of legislatures. But here, as in many other in~tances, judges and legislatures use the term 'void' without tr.<mght of its real significance. · A conveyance in fr:iud of the g,rantor's credit-)rs is not void. Even against his creditors it is merely voidable." -It is believed that if the lawyer wants a set of se!ected cases beyond the decisions of his own st;,ite, to coyer the whole field of the law, nothing equals this work. · J. R. R. 

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University of Michigan School of Law