American Law in the Twentieth Century

by Lawrence M. Friedman

• ISBN13: 9780300091373
• ISBN10: 0300091370
• Format: Trade Book
• Copyright: 2002-02-08
• Publisher: Yale University Press

Summary

In this long-awaited successor to his landmark work A History of American Law, Lawrence M. Friedman offers a monumental history of American law in the twentieth century.

The first general history of its kind, American Law in the Twentieth Century describes the explosion of law over the past century into almost every aspect of American life. Since 1900 the center of legal gravity in the United States has shifted from the state to the federal government, with the creation of agencies and programs ranging from Social Security to the Securities Exchange Commission to the Food and Drug Administration. Major demographic changes have spurred legal developments in such areas as family law and immigration law. Dramatic advances in technology have placed new demands on the legal system in fields ranging from automobile regulation to intellectual property.

Throughout the book, Friedman focuses on the social context of American law. He explores the extent to which transformations in the legal order have resulted from the social upheavals of the twentieth century -- inc

Table of Contents

Preface	ix
Introduction: The Way We Were, the Way We Were Going to Be	1	(14)
Part I The Old Order
Structure, Power, and Form American Public Law, 1900-1932	15	(14)
The Legal Profession in the Early Twentieth Century	29	(15)
The Law of Business and Commerce	44	(36)
Crime and Punishment in the New Century	80	(31)
Race Relations and Civil Liberties	111	(40)
Part II The New Deal and Its Successors
The Roosevelt Revolution	151	(33)
War and Postwar Prosperity and the Flowering of the Welfare State	184	(21)
Crime and Criminal Justice in the Postwar World	205	(46)
Courts, Trials, and Procedures in the Twentieth Century	251	(29)
Race Relations and Civil Rights	280	(69)
The Liability Explosions Personal-Injury Law in the Twentieth Century	349	(28)
Business Law in the Age of Change	377	(22)
The Law of Property	399	(31)
Family Law and Family Life	430	(27)
Internal Legal Culture: The Legal Profession	457	(48)
American Legal Culture in the Twentieth Century	505	(18)
Part III The Way We Live Now: The Reagan and Post-Reagan Years
Backward and Forward Counterrevolution and Its Aftershocks	523	(25)
Getting Around and Spreading the Word	548	(24)
Law An American Export	572	(16)
Taking Stock	588	(21)
Notes	609	(72)
A Bibliography Note	681	(10)
Index	691