CHAMBERLAIN, JOSEPH P., NOEL T. DOW- LING, and PAUL R. HAYS. The Judicial Function in Federal Administrative Agencies. Pp. xii, 258. New York: The Commonwealth Fund, 1942. $3.00

• Author: W. Reed West
• DOI: 10.1177/000271624222400154
• Date: 01 November 1942
• Published date: 01 November 1942
• Subject Matter: Articles

215

from

an

obligation

to

work

to

pay

his

debts

and

put

under

one

to

work

whether

he

was

in

debt

or

not&dquo;;

and

two

articles,

&dquo;Sar-

miento

and

New

England&dquo;

and

&dquo;American

Marines

in

Nicaragua&dquo;

(by

P.

A.

Martin

and

R.

R.

Hill,

respectively),

which

by

their

juxtaposition

suggest

the

changing

position

of

the

United

States

in

relation

to

Latin

America

between

the

mid-nineteenth

century

and

the

first

quarter

of

the

present

century.

Lack

of

space

forbids

individual

mention

of

the

other

articles,

but

all

of

them

make

useful

contributions,

each

in

its

own

way,

and

the

whole

volume

compares

favorably

with

others

of

its

kind.

ARTHUR

P.

WHITAKER

University

of

Pennsylvania

TWISS,

BENJAMIN

R.

Lawyers

and

the

Constitution.

Pp.

xii,

271.

Princeton:

Princeton

University

Press,

1942.

$2.50.

It

is

no

secret

that

during

the

last

thirty

years

of

the

nineteenth

century

the

Su-

preme

Court

set

itself

against

the

surge

of

regulatory

legislation

emanating

from

state

and

national

legislatures.

It

did

not,

of

course,

declare

all

such

acts

to

be

unconsti-

tutional,

but

it

did

set

aside

many

statutes,

and

its

interpretation

of

others

helped

to

make

clear

the

judicial

animus

against

de-

partures

from

the

faith

of

Ricardo,

Mill,

and

Spencer.

The

principal

vehicle

by

which

the

conception

of

government

as a

neutral

spectator

in

the

struggle

between

various

economic

interests

was

transported

into

the

law

of

the

Constitution

was

the

Fourteenth

Amendment.

That

product

of

Reconstruction

zeal

for

the

rights

of

the

newly

freed

Negroes

became

the

great

bul-

wark

against

&dquo;arbitrary,&dquo;

&dquo;unreasonable,&dquo;

and

therefore

unconstitutional

interferences

with

the

rights

of

property.

But

the

inter-

pretation

of

the

commerce

clause

was

also

powerfully

affected

by

the

same

movement,

and

no

single

case

more

clearly

indicates

its

strength

than

the

income

tax

case

of

1895.

There

the

Court,

by

a

bare

majority

vote,

set

aside

a

series

of

its

own

interpretations,

the

first

of

which

was

written

by

men

who

had

helped

to

write

the

Constitution,

and

attempted

to

stop

&dquo;the

communist

march&dquo;

on

the

vested

interests

of

the

propertied

class.

Dr.

Twiss’s

book

makes

a

real

contribu-

tion

to

our

understanding

of

the

way

in

which

the

doctrines

of

individualism

came

to the

Supreme

Court.

Unlike

the

recent

biographical

studies

of

the

justices,

he

deals

not

with

the

formative

years

of

the

men

who

wrote

the

opinions,

nor

with

their

non-

judicial

writings,

but

rather

with

the

ideas

expressed

by

the

lawyers

who

argued

before

the

Court.

Campbell,

Choate,

Evarts,

Carter,

Dillon,

Parsons,

Johnson,

Guthrie,

and

Beck

are

his

principal

subjects.

All

were

powerful

advocates

for

the

rights

of

property,

and

all

urged

upon

the

Court

a

conception

of

the

Constitution

as

embody-

ing

the

principles

of

laissez

faire

economics.

Dr.

Twiss

also

describes

the

writings

of

Cooley

and

gives

full

credit

to

the

influence

of

his

Constitutional

Limitation,

as

well

as

the

commentaries,

less

widely

known

to-

day

but

highly

influential

in

their

time,

of

Christopher

G.

Tiedman.

The

ideas

and

work

of

these

lawyers

and

authors

are

well

discussed.

I

find

less

satisfactory

the

discussion

of

the

times

in

which

they

labored,

of

the

climate

of

opin-

ion

out

of

which

their

own

ideas

came.

The

book

is,

that

is

to

say,

an

account

of

the

ideas

expressed

by

those

members

of

the

bar

who

embraced

the

philosophy

of

laissez

faire;

it

is

not

a

comprehensive

study

of

economic

or

intellectual

history

in

an

era

in

which

this

particular

doctrine

rose,

flourished,

and

declined.

The

mate-

rial

here

presented

will,

however,

be

of

very

real

assistance

to

anyone

who

seeks

to

understand

or

to

write

about

that

im-

portant

process

in

our

national

develop-

ment.

BENJAMIN

F.

WRIGHT

Harvard

University

CHAMBERLAIN,

JOSEPH

P.,

NOEL

T.

DOW-

LING,

and

PAUL

R.

HAYS.

The

Judicial

Function

in

Federal

Administrative

Agencies.

Pp.

xii,

258.

New

York:

The

Commonwealth

Fund,

1942.

$3.00.

No

student

of

governmental

processes

can

afford

to

ignore

this

painstaking

analy-

sis

of

one

of

the

most

challenging

aspects

of

our

growing

system

of

government

through

administrative

agencies.

The

au-

thors

have

based

their

study

primarily

on

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