(Excerpt from A Western Journey With Mr. Emerson AS we cr...)
Excerpt from A Western Journey With Mr. Emerson AS we crossed Illinois, in the long, de lightful leisure of our first day in the Huron, Mr. Emerson began by pulling out of his satchel a little German diction ary and a small volume that Mr. George Bancroft had Sent him as a New Year's. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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(State to the contrary notwithstanding. So far as the grou...)
State to the contrary notwithstanding. So far as the grounds for this remarkable power are found in the mere fact of a constitution being in writing, or in judges being sworn to support it, they are quite inadequate. Neither the written form nor the oath of the judges necessarily involves the right of reversing, displacing, or disregarding any action of the legislature or the executive which these departments are constitutionally authorized to take, or the determination of those departments that they are so authorized. It is enough, in confirmation of this, to refer to the fact that other countries, as France, Germany, and Switzerland, have written constitutions, and that such a power is not recognized there. The restrictions, says Dicey, in his admirable Law of the Constitution, placed on the action of the legislature under the French constitution are not in reality laws, since they are not rules which in the last resort will be enforced by the courts. Their true character is that of maxims of political morality, which derive whatever strength they possess from being formally inscribed in the constitution, and from the resulting support of public opinion. How came we then to adopt this remarkable practice? Mainly as a natural result of our political experience before the War of I ndependence, as being colonists, governed underwritten charters of government proceeding from the English Crown. The terms and limitations of these charters, so many written constitutions, were enforced by various means, by forfeiture of the charters, by A ct of Parliament, by the direct annulling of legislation by the Crown, by judicial proceedings and an ultimate appeal to the This opinion has fallen strangely out of sight. It has much the ablest discussion of the question which I have ever seen, not excepting the judgment of Marshall in Marbury v. Madison, which, as I venture to (Typographical errors above are due to OCR software and don't occur in the book.)
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(Excerpt from John Marshall: An Address Delivered in Sande...)
Excerpt from John Marshall: An Address Delivered in Sanders Theatre, Cambridge, Before the Law School of Harvard University and the Bar Association of the City of Boston, on February 4, 1901 I have now given a short summary of Marshall's life up to the time that he became Chief Justice. It is with great regret that I pass over most of the details of his personal history. A few of them only may be mentioned. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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(Excerpt from Letters of Chauncey Wright: With Some Accoun...)
Excerpt from Letters of Chauncey Wright: With Some Account of His Life When it was first proposed by a few friends of chauncey wright to collect into a volume his principal papers, it was intended to add to them, as a part of the same book, a selec tion from his letters. But afterwards this plan was changed. It seemed best, for the present at least, to respect the privacy of his letters, and to print them only for the reading of his friends. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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(Excerpt from Preliminary Treatise on Evidence: At the Com...)
Excerpt from Preliminary Treatise on Evidence: At the Common Law True character and value of the law of evidence - Needs restate ment - Summary Statement of it. - Its principles few, but its rules many and perplexed - Much of it is really a mistaken expression of doctrines of the substantive law. - Illustrations Of this - Excluding rules. - Relevancy. - Rules of evidence which put forward non-legal standards. Hearsay, and the exceptions to it. Other leading rules. Defects in this part of the law. - The administration of it. - Need of extruding foreign matter from the law of evidence, and of simplifying it. - Need of legislation, and of judicial action, to the end of dealing with evidence by rules of court. Governing principles to be applied in doing this. The jury. Discretion of the judges. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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(Excerpt from Legal Essays I am fully aware how far my wo...)
Excerpt from Legal Essays I am fully aware how far my work, even in merely collecting what has already been published, must fall short of what would have come from my father's hand. And I have also had some painful doubts whether he would approve of publishing some of the articles at all in their present form without his revision. But it has seemed to me on the whole that with an explanation, which I have undertaken in each instance to give, of the date and circumstances under which they were written, their publication is justified. I have made no changes in the articles except in the ease of clerical errors and the like, which Professor Thayer had corrected in his own copy. All notes which I have added are enclosed in square brackets. Most of the matter so added, and all which shows the result of study or research, is taken from memoranda of Professor Thayer's on the margin of his copies or in his collections of cases. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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He was born at Haverhill, Massachusetts, in 1831. He was the second son of Abijah Wyman and Susan (Bradley) Thayer, and a descendant of Thomas Thayer who was an early settler of Braintree. During his boyhood the family moved to Northampton.
Since his father did not greatly prosper, young Thayer, besides going to school, worked in various ways – doing chores, setting type in a printing office, and helping in a physician's office. With the aid of friends he entered Harvard College in 1848, and was graduated with distinction in 1852, being the class orator on Commencement day. After a brief period of teaching, he entered the Harvard Law School in 1854, having made up his mind "after infinite distraction, to study law rather than divinity, toward which I had had a strong inclination".
In December 1856 he was admitted to the Boston bar. For the next thirteen years he made his home in Milton. In 1865 he became a partner of Peleg W. Chandler and George O. Shattuck, leading Boston lawyers of the time. During the following years he contributed to Bouvier's Dictionary of Law and to the American Law Review, and in 1870 was chosen editor of the twelfth edition (1873) of Kent's Commentaries. He secured for the last-named work the aid of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. , and eventually Thayer's part in the undertaking was limited to some revision. He kept up his interest in Greek and Latin, and published elaborate reviews of a number of Greek and Latin translations. Somewhat later he also printed privately Letters of Chauncey Wright (1878); A Western Journey with Mr. Emerson (1884), recounting the events of a trip to California of a small party in which Thayer was included; and Rev. Samuel Ripley of Waltham (1897), a short biography of his father-in-law. In all his writings his mastery of a style exact, flexible, and distinguished is noticeable.
In 1874, having previously refused a Harvard professorship of English, he accepted the professorship in the Harvard Law School which he held for the remainder of his life. This period witnessed great changes in the school resulting from Dean Langdell's introduction of the case system of study and teaching. Langdell, Thayer, John C. Gray, and James Barr Ames, together laid the foundation for the future success of the method, and of the school. Aside from this contribution, Thayer's reputation rests on his work in constitutional law and in the law of evidence. On both subjects he became recognized as the leading scholar in the United States. He set himself first to find the causes of the disorderly and unreasoned condition of the law of evidence, as a preliminary step to rationalizing and restating the subject.
In A Preliminary Treatise on Evidence at the Comman Law (1898), a portion of which, in substance, had been issued in 1896, under the title, "Development of Trial by Jury, " he was the first to show the various steps in the early development of the English trial by jury, and the dependency of the rules of evidence on this development. The elaborate treatise on the modern law of evidence, to which the Preliminary Treatise was intended as an introduction, was never written, although materials for it were assiduously collected for more than twenty years. It was left for Thayer's pupil, J. H. Wigmore, to erect the superstructure (Wigmore, A Treatise on the System of Evidence in Trials at Common Law, 4 vols. , 1904-05).
In regard to constitutional law, to which Thayer also devoted himself, he early adopted and always upheld the view that no legislative act should be held unconstitutional unless it was so beyond a reasonable doubt; and further, that the function of a constitution is to lay down in general terms broad fundamental principles. As early as 1859 he wrote a vigorous criticism of a provision in the Kansas constitution prohibiting the manufacture and sale of intoxicants. Constitutions, he said, "were not made to be codes of laws, or to embody the opinion of a momentary majority". During his professorship, besides the Preliminary Treatise on Evidence, he published Select Cases on Evidence at the Common Law (1892, 1900); Cases on Constitutional Law (2 vols. , 1895; , and John Marshall (1901), a brief biography. After his death his son edited a volume of his shorter papers under the title Legal Essays (1908).
As a citizen and neighbor Thayer neglected no duties. He urged reforms of the tariff and of the methods of granting corporate franchises. The treatment of the Indians by the national government engaged his interest, and with others he was instrumental in securing the passage of the Dawes Bill of 1887 to provide for allotment of lands to the Indians in severalty. Before enactment of the law, and afterwards to insure its proper administration, he wrote articles and delivered addresses. On questions of local as well as of national politics, his tongue and pen were always at the service of what he deemed a righteous cause.
He died at his home in Cambridge, after an illness of a single day, survived by his widow, two daughters, and two sons, Dr. William Sydney Thayer and Ezra Ripley Thayer.
(Excerpt from John Marshall: An Address Delivered in Sande...)
(Excerpt from Letters of Chauncey Wright: With Some Accoun...)
(Excerpt from Legal Essays I am fully aware how far my wo...)
(Excerpt from Preliminary Treatise on Evidence: At the Com...)
(Excerpt from A Western Journey With Mr. Emerson AS we cr...)
(State to the contrary notwithstanding. So far as the grou...)
His early inclination towards divinity furnishes a correct indication of his subsequent devotion to the Unitarian church. In 1900 President McKinley offered him a position on the Philippine Commission, but his age compelled him to decline.
Thayer was of distinguished appearance and fine manners, receiving a ready welcome in any society in which he found himself.
On April 24, 1861, married Sophia Bradford Ripley.
