American Law Institute
At the 1920 and 1921 meetings of the Association of American Law Schools, proposals which Lewis encouraged urged the creation of an "institute of law" to elucidate the progress of the common law. In 1923, the American Law Institute became a reality. Lewis, as its first director, shaped its agenda of preparing "restatements" of the law, serving until 1947, a year before his death.
Though the ALI’s restatements met with complaints that they undermined the fluidity of the common law and echoed the codification of European civil law, it is fair to say Lewis’s work as director rank him as the single most influential figure in the pragmatic development of 20th-century American law.
Read more about this topic: William Draper Lewis
Famous quotes containing the words american, law and/or institute:
“My favorite figure of the American author is that of a man who breeds a favorite dog, which he throws into the Mississippi River for the pleasure of making a splash. The river does not splash, but it drowns the dog.”
—Henry Brooks Adams (1838–1918)
“No great idea in its beginning can ever be within the law. How can it be within the law? The law is stationary. The law is fixed. The law is a chariot wheel which binds us all regardless of conditions or place or time.”
—Emma Goldman (1869–1940)
“Whenever any form of government shall become destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, & to institute new government, laying it’s foundation on such principles & organising it’s powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety & happiness.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)