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| It has become quite common today to identify Justice ], Jr., as the chief precursor of American Legal Realism (other influences were Roscoe Pound, Justice Benjamin Cardozo, and Wesley Hohfeld). The chief inspiration for Scandinavian Legal Realism many consider to be the works of ]. | It has become quite common today to identify Justice ], Jr., as the chief precursor of American Legal Realism (other influences were Roscoe Pound, Justice Benjamin Cardozo, and Wesley Hohfeld). The chief inspiration for Scandinavian Legal Realism many consider to be the works of ]. | ||
| The most famous representatives of American Legal Realism were Karl Llewellyn, Jerome Frank, Robert Lee Hale, Felix Cohen, Thurman Arnold, and Leon Green. The most famous representatives of Scandinavian Legal Realism were Alf Ross and Karl Olivecrona. | The most famous representatives of American Legal Realism were Karl Llewellyn, Jerome Frank, Robert Lee Hale, Felix Cohen, Thurman Arnold, and Leon Green. The most famous representatives of Scandinavian Legal Realism were ] and ]. | ||
| No single set of beliefs was shared by all legal realists, but many of the realists shared some of the following ideas: | No single set of beliefs was shared by all legal realists, but many of the realists shared some of the following ideas: | ||
| * Belief in the indeterminacy of law. Many of the legal realists believed that the law in the books (statutes, cases, etc.) did not determine the results of legal disputes. Jerome Frank is famously credited with the idea that a judicial decision might be determined by what the judge had for breakfast. | * Belief in the indeterminacy of law. Many of the legal realists believed that the law in the books (statutes, cases, etc.) did not determine the results of legal disputes. Jerome Frank is famously credited with the idea that a judicial decision might be determined by what the judge had for breakfast. | ||
Revision as of 22:17, 13 November 2005
Legal realism is a family of theories about the nature of law developed in the first half of the 20th century in the United States (American Legal Realism) and Scandinavia (Scandinavian Legal Realism). It has become quite common today to identify Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., as the chief precursor of American Legal Realism (other influences were Roscoe Pound, Justice Benjamin Cardozo, and Wesley Hohfeld). The chief inspiration for Scandinavian Legal Realism many consider to be the works of Axel Hagerstrom.
The most famous representatives of American Legal Realism were Karl Llewellyn, Jerome Frank, Robert Lee Hale, Felix Cohen, Thurman Arnold, and Leon Green. The most famous representatives of Scandinavian Legal Realism were Alf Ross and Karl Olivecrona. No single set of beliefs was shared by all legal realists, but many of the realists shared some of the following ideas:
- Belief in the indeterminacy of law. Many of the legal realists believed that the law in the books (statutes, cases, etc.) did not determine the results of legal disputes. Jerome Frank is famously credited with the idea that a judicial decision might be determined by what the judge had for breakfast.
- Belief in the importance of interdisciplinary approaches to law. Many of the realists were interested in sociological and anthropolical approaches to the study of law. Karl Llewellyn's book The Cheyenne Way is a famous example of this tendency.
- Belief in legal instrumentalism, the view that the law should be used as a tool to achieve social purposes and to balance competing societal interests.
The legal realist movement was in its heyday in the 1920s through the 1940s, but as its leading figures retired or became less active, it gradually faded. In contemporary legal theory, there are many groups that claim to be heirs to legal realism, including the critical legal studies movement (chief representatives include Duncan Kennedy and Roberto Unger) and the law and economics school that includes a number of law professors at the University of Chicago such as Richard Posner and Richard Epstein.