The Life of the Law: The People and Cases that Have Shaped Our Society, from King Alfred to Rodney King [Paperback]

Alfred H. Knight (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0195122399 | ISBN-13: 978-0195122398 | Publication Date: July 2, 1998 | Edition: 195

Law is intended to apply to common life and should be comprehensible to ordinary folk, but increasingly, it is not. The meaning of the law is becoming inaccessible, not only to the public but to the bar itself. In The Life of the Law, Alfred H. Knight outlines how some of the main contours of American law came to be as he recounts twenty-one stories beginning with Alfred the Great in the late ninth century and ending with the Rodney King trials in 1993.
Knight gives us a veritable "biography" of our legal tradition by focusing on the key individuals, and the pivotal cases that have helped to mold the law as we know it today. The Life of the Law finds a riveting story behind each historic decision and recounts the tales with both narrative flair and ironic wit.
The law is a living organism, constantly changing as new cases are decided, building on and modifying decisions that went before. Every case, no matter how lofty the principles involved, represents a human drama, a clash of competing desires. Alfred Knight's reflections on how twenty-one of these cases have left their mark on our society will inform and fascinate anyone interested in the law.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Alfred H. Knight, a trial lawyer in Nashville and former prosecutor, captures the arc of Anglo-American law in this sweeping work by focusing on several significant cases. He highlights the trials of Sir Thomas Moore, John Peter Zenger, Clarence Earl Gideon and others to show how the sum of these high-profile and rather disparate cases have contributed to help develop a system of justice. In each of these landmark cases, the desire to protect the individual has triumphed, supporting that belief over time until it has become among our guiding principles of jurisprudence. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly

Knight, a Nashville lawyer and former federal prosecutor, here makes law accessible with lively, textured sketches of landmark cases and principles. He recounts the story of the Magna Carta, which actually focused on obscure issues and mundane problems but contained the seed of modern constitutionalism: the king is subject to the law. He explains how precedent has been used to incrementally transform the common law (of liability, etc.) but has been treated more cavalierly when the Supreme Court addresses constitutional questions. Knight does not preach legal majesty: while he suggests that Court rulings on press freedom have fostered a free society, the "trick will be to maintain that marketplace in times of peril." Similarly, after tracing the history of the Fourth Amendment's protection against unlawful searches and seizures, Knight observes that the Court has been recently moving backward; there is no straight line of constitutional progress. In a few places?as when he erroneously suggests that the Rodney King case was the first time the legitimacy of a jury's decision was questioned?Knight stumbles, but this is mostly a savvy popularization.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA; 195 edition (July 2, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0195122399
• ISBN-13: 978-0195122398
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #118,159 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #100 in Books > Law > Legal History

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Readable, accurate and illuminating legal history for laymen, August 22, 1999

By 

Richard M. Howland (Amherst, Massachusetts USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Life of the Law: The People and Cases that Have Shaped Our Society, from King Alfred to Rodney King (Paperback)

A well-researched and readable legal history that casts a greater understanding of the law and the tradition of the American legal system. Most important it introduces the lay reader to legal thinking not as a scholar, but as a citizen for whom law is a fact and not an option.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Written like a story instead of a textbook., September 1, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Life of the Law: The People and Cases that Have Shaped Our Society, from King Alfred to Rodney King (Paperback)

To combine history and law together and make it interesting is difficult. This book kept my attention from start to finish because it was told more as a story than a textbook. Each chapter is about a different legal principle. He examines the history of each principle in a way that stripped me of my belief that the law was made by inspired visionaries back in 1776. The history he presents shows that the law as we know it today evolved from many lawyers, judges and jurys redefining the law to fit new problems. Because it reads like a story, it was a pleasure to read.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Captivating legal history and principle., August 3, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Life of the Law: The People and Cases that Have Shaped Our Society, from King Alfred to Rodney King (Paperback)

This book is a sheer delight. Witty, insightful and entertaining. What a great introduction to the history, politics and philosophy behind our system of jurisprudence.