Peter Hoffer's A Nation of Laws: America's Imperfect Pursuit of Justice has just crossed my desk. It's a terrific, short introduction to American legal history. What I think distinguishes this from other one volume introductions is that this focuses around a set of themes -- like democracy, constitutionalism, church and state -- and people -- lawyers, judges, litigants, where lots of people make cameos -- and criminal cases (Salem witchcraft trials, John Brown, Susan B. Anthony, and John Scopes) and critical episodes, like the 1739 Stone Rebellion, 1848 Seneca Falls Conference, Calhoun's 1850 speech to the Senate, FDR's New Deal, then back to Lincoln's inauguration. This is micro and macro history all wrapped into one. I see from the dust jacket that a keen observer of legal history (wink) said of it, that it's "brilliant and electic." Just like Peter.
I'd add at this stage that this ain't your grandma's legal history. At all. There's a lot in here; it's far from encyclopedic. That wasn't Hoffer's aim. Instead, he puts a lot of different ideas and themes together. I pretty sure you'll enjoy reading it. I'm going to be very interested how the field reacts to this book.
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