vice was not meant to be taken literally, but it indicates that a judge's reasons are not laws. There is only one common rule of law, common to all the centuries and to all the States. That rule is that human justice shall be done by the courts, in individual cases as they arise, in the light of the wisdom of the time. The common law is not a body of rules; it is a method. It is the creation of law by the inductive process. England and her colonies and all of our States have this method in common, though in using it they may all arrive at different results. From an increasingly large number of states of fact and individual decisions, we are constantly striving to arrive at a general doctrine, a uni

versal rule. But we never arrive. It is

folly to announce that we have already arrived at a body of universal rules. A universal rule is within the power of infinity and omniscience alone. The whole of life is inductive experience, and the possibilities are without limit and without end. It is the privilege and duty of the courts to correct the conclusions of the past by the light of the facts and experience of the future. This is just what the courts always have done, though oftentimes pretending the contrary.

The common law, therefore, is the

science of human justice. The lawyer and the judge must find what justice is, must learn the wisdom of his time. This is no mere feat of memory, no mere holiday task. Woe to that judge who, finding himself freed from the fiction of a system of cut and dried rules, proceeds to decide cases guided only by his own. inner consciousness; who sees as the light of wisdom only the feeble light

within himself; who seeks justice only within his own heart. The fact that human justice and human wisdom vary with the time makes it all the harder to determine what justice is. It is a great glory of the common law that it possesses so rich and complete a record of the experience of the past in the multitude of recorded precedents. Many of these precedents are erroneous, no one of them is the law, none of them is binding except as to the litigating parties and the exact issue between them. But without knowing those precedents no one can approximate justice. What a rich field of human experience those precedents are! It is to the lawyer and the judge what the whole field of history is

to the economist and the statesman.

Great industry is necessary in cultivating this field, and great powers of analysis and comparison. But how great is the reward! It gives the confidence and accuracy and sureness of touch that one delights to see in the trained pianist or the practiced surgeon. Without it, the pianist murders harmony, the surgeon murders his patient, and the lawyer murders justice.

Justice was once determined by single combat or by the test of boiling oil. It is so determined no longer. How it will be determined in the future is largely for the judges of the future. They will add to the wisdom of the past and create a new human justice. In so doing they must know and be guided by the long experience of the past, as they mould the law to suit not the dry bones of the past, but the living flesh and blood of their time.

ON

N THE title pages of the various publications of the West Publishing Co. there appears the legend "Edited by the Editorial Staff of the National Reporter System" or "Compiled by the Editorial Staff of the American Digest System."

What is the personality, the system, the theory of work, which stands behind the noncommittal words "Editorial Staff"? To those who know, these words mean a great deal. In the belief that the legal profession will be interested in learning something about this greatest of legal-editorial bodies, this brief account of its organization and development is given.

And first, a brief historical review of the work of law reporting. The publication of the decisions of our courts has been effected, in times past, in three somewhat different ways. In the early days, in the absence of any public provision for the purpose, individual lawyers undertook, from time to time, to supply the needed reports. These voluntary reports were casual, sometimes incomplete, generally unremunerative, and there were gaps, both of time and of jurisdiction, where there were no reports at all.

The next plan was to put reporting upon a basis of public support by providing for the appointment of a regular reporter and defraying the expenses from the public treasury, either partially or in full. This plan secured a permanency, which had previously been lacking, but it did not cure one of the

most serious faults of the voluntary system of reporting, namely the diversity of editorial method which would inevitably characterize reports edited by many men of many minds working independently of each other.

The personal factor continued to be a large one. Ever change in the office of the reporter resulted in a change of methods, and even obvious improvements were of questionable advantage to the public, when they resulted in increasing the uncertainty of the lawyer as to where he should look for a given line of cases. The different methods shown in the early reports of the Supreme Court of the United States furnish a conspicuous example of these variations.

In England similar conditions, of even longer continuance, resulted in the adoption in 1865 of a new plan, namely, a uniform system of reporting for all the courts. This immediately displaced the several series of reports then being published, and has since continued successfully and satisfactorily.

In this country the problem was not so simple. Instead of a single jurisdiction, every state is, in effect, an independent jurisdiction, while, at the same time, the decisions of each state are recognized by every other state, and the reports and digests of all the states are consulted throughout the Union. This situation plainly called for some plan of reporting, indexing and digesting which should make the entire mass of decisions equally and readily accessible to all.

The committee on Law Reporting of

the American Bar Association in 1898 clearly pointed out the necessity of uniformity in reporting, indexing and digesting the decisions of the entire country, adding that "effort should be directed toward the adoption not only of the best methods of making reports and digests, but also of uniform methods in all of the states."

* * *

"In view of the fact that the whole country is interested in the decisions of each state it is important that the reports of each state should be summarized and indexed under a common plan, so as to be readily accessible to all."

"Such a common plan has been adopted by the publishers who have undertaken to publish the reports of the whole country in a single system."

"In the uniform system of reporting thus adopted, we are furnished with the means of becoming acquainted with the decisions of all of the courts of all of the states alike, and we have a uniform system of reporting and digesting common to all, and a basis, at least, for a common system which shall be satisfactory to all."

The committee further reported that there was no practical means of securing the adoption of a uniform plan by governmental authority, or by the combined action of the official reporters, but that it would be better for the Bar to avail themselves of the labors of private publishers, who make it their business to ascertain the needs of the profession, than to have the work done through voluntary associations or official authority. For ten years previous to this report of the Bar Association, the private publishers referred to in the report had been developing a plan for uniform reporting and digesting, the plan which has revolutionized legal reporting and

digesting in this country, and which the present-day lawyer accepts as a matter of course the plan, in a word, which has evolved "The Editorial Staff of the National Reporter and American Digest Systems."

The system has brought about many desirable results, such as promptness of publication unknown before, economy in cost, regularity and symmetry in the mechanical features of the reports, etc.

But by far the most important advantage which has been gained is to be found in the uniformity of editorial work. This is of much importance, particularly in the writing of the syllabi and the construction of indexes and digests. This most essential feature can be secured only by eliminating the peculiarities and supplying the deficiencies of individual reporters and digesters, and combining and co-ordinating the scientific and practical knowledge and ability of all in their joint work.

The reporting must be done in accordance with uniform rules as to the subjects, contents, and form of the headnotes and their catchwords, the statements of fact, etc. The indexing and digesting must be uniform and accurate in classification, division, and arrangement. The rules and instructions for these ends can be derived only from knowledge and study of the best previous works, and from experience.

Manifestly the framing of such rules and instructions and schemes of headings and cross-references, which are the very foundation of the System, and, even more, the application and use and development of them, in the minute detail adapted to the immense quantity of material to be dealt with from day to day, require the services of a large body of men specially equipped for the purpose by qualifications and training.

Writing a proper headnote involves more than reproducing the language of the opinion; it calls for the knowledge of the state of the law on the subject, careful study to see, in that light, the point decided and the facts involved, and ability to express the result in an in dependent proposition, correctly, clearly, and concisely.

For the instruction of the new member of the staff, a book of 125 pages on Headnote Writing has been prepared, containing rules and instructions derived from long experience and the study of the best previous works, and incorporating the scientific and practical knowledge and ability of a large body of editors who have been engaged continuously for nearly a quarter of a century in this work. With these settled rules, no individual editor is allowed to take liberties.

The extent of the accumulated experience of this editorial body is truly impressive. The cases included in the National Reporter System are now about a half million, and far exceed the total of the cases contained in all American Reports previously published. It is of the utmost significance to the legal profession that this immense body of decisions (the most recent and important), as well as the largest portion of our Case Law, should have been reported and digested by uniform methods, not only under the same system, but, to a great extent, under the direction and supervision of the same minds.

For example, the syllabi and other features of the reporting of cases during the past twenty years have been prepared under the direction of the same editor, who is now at the head of that branch of the work, and have been actually revised by him personally and by an assistant under his direct supervision.

The editorial staff, at the present time, consists of about forty editors, constituting several groups of specialists. There are, first, the specialists who edit the opinions in the current Reporters, and prepare the headnotes, statement of facts, and index paragraphs.

There is then a second group of editors, who classify each headnote and index paragraph to the American Digest Classification. These are the Key-Number specialists.

Still another group consists of the experts on the compilation of indexes. Others have supervision of the preparation of the various tables.

A large and important branch of the editorial staff is composed of the experts who specialize in the compilation of digests. This group of editors is made up of members of the editorial staff who have previously had long experience in the editing of cases, in classification, and in the compilation of indexes.

Still other editors specialize in the compilation and revision of the Statutes of the various states and of the United States. Each of these groups of editors is under the direct supervision of a chief or reviser.

Important changes are rare on the editorial staff. Of the lawyers making up the staff at the present time, 24 have been members thereof for 12 years or more. Of these, two have served for 24 years; one for 23 years; two for 22 years; one for 21 years; one for 17 years; two for 16 years; one for 15 years; six for 14 years; three for 13 years; and five for 12 years.

The editorial staff of the West Publishing Company is thus a continuous body. Editors come and editors go, but the fundamental principles involved in the work of reporting decisions and of digesting these reports remain.

The

personal element gives way to the established system; yet this perpetuation of a definite system has been no obstacle to improvements.

Those who have known the methods of the system longest, know best how constant has been the improvement. All that experience has taught (and no other editorial body has ever had so extended and varied an experience) has been worked up into the new features which have increased, year by year and month

by month, the value of the National Reporter System and the American Digest System and which have incidentally increased the cost to the publisher, but not to the "ultimate consumer," the lawyer.

The system is an organic whole, reaching back into the past and looking forward into the future. It has done the unique work which it has accomplished in the field of legal reporting and digesting because it is a unit, and because it is alive.

7HATEVER system may be used

W

in "running down" the law, textbook, encyclopedia, digest, or report, the ultimate aim, if possible, is to find that case, or those cases, where, upon facts similar to the immediate question involved, some court has applied the law.

If an automobile is the subject-matter of litigation, let the eye catch the word "automobile" in a text-book illustration, or digest paragraph, or syllabus in a report, and the searcher intuitively stops to examine the facts of that particular

Very few lawyers correctly state the principles when asked. They confuse with principles legal topics based upon facts and adopted by authors, when in reality these legal topics simply represent conditions and facts to which legal principles have been applied. This search for facts to which legal principles have been applied gave rise to "catchwords," emphasized by black-letter lines used in text-books, legal periodicals, and digests, for no other purpose and with no other point in view than to call the attention of the reader to some fact of special prominence in the specific statement contained. There was no definite line or rule that controlled the selection of these catchwords or lines, and therefore they were not collected upon any rules approaching a system or plan, and the lawyer was always uncertain where to look for his law.

Every proposition of law is based upon a statement of facts. Law in the ab