The Southern Judicial Tradition
State Judges and Sectional Distinctiveness, 1790–1890

Timothy S. Huebner

Examines the lives and work of 19th century southern judges and how regional attitudes effected legal development

Reviews

"A must-read for legal scholars and historians of the nineteenth-century American South."
—Arkansas Historical Quarterly

"A fine work of scholarship, well researched and cogently argued."
—Journal of the Early Republic


More / Hide

Description
This first book to examine the lives and work of nineteenth-century southern judges explores the emergence of a southern judiciary and the effects of regional peculiarities and attitudes on legal development. Drawing on the judicial opinions and private correspondence of six chief justices whose careers span both the region and the century, Timothy S. Huebner analyzes their conceptions of their roles and the substance of their opinions related to cases involving homicide, economic development, federalism, and race. Examining judges both on and off the bench—as formulators of law and as citizens whose lives were intertwined with southern values—Huebner reveals the tensions that sometimes arose out of loyalties to sectional principles and national professional consciousness. He exposes the myth of southern leniency in appellate homicide decisions and also shows how the southern judiciary contributed to and reflected larger trends in American legal development. This book adds to our understanding of both southern distinctiveness and American legal culture.
Series/imprint:
Studies in the Legal History of the South

Page count: 280 pp.
Trim size: 6 x 9

 

TAX-EXEMPT CUSTOMERS:
Please call 800-266-5842
to purchase books.

Cloth
List price:
978-0-8203-2101-1
8/1/1999
View Shopping Cart
Paper
List price:
978-0-8203-3236-9
10/15/2008
View Shopping Cart
Ebook
List price: $22.95
978-0-8203-4228-3
7/1/2011
Check ebook availability


Timothy S. Huebner, L. Palmer Brown Professor of Interdisciplinary Humanities and Chair of the Department of History at Rhodes College, is author of The Taney Court: Justices, Rulings, and Legacy and coeditor, with Kermit L. Hall, of Major Problems in American Constitutional History, second edition. He and Paul Finkelman edit the series Studies in the Legal History of the South.