THE LAW OF INTERSTATE COMMERCE AND ITS FEDERAL REGULATION. BY FREDERICK N. JUDSON of the St. Louis Bar. One volume, pp. xix+509. Chicago: T. H. FLOOD & Co. 1905.

The importance of commerce considered in its legal aspect is such that it cannot well be overestimated. When, under the Articles of Confederation the lack of control or supervision over commerce on the part of Congress produced almost intolerable difficulties, the importance of the subject was such as to make it one of the primary reasons for the call of the constitutional convention, and since that time, the subject has increased rather than diminished in importance. The present volume is, therefore, at once timely and practical in spite of the fact that it is doubtful just what the term commerce" includes, and of the rather uncertain status of the Interstate Commerce Commission. Its purpose is "to present in a compact form the law of interstate commerce as declared by the courts since the adoption of the constitution, and also as enacted by Congress, and applied by the Interstate Commerce Commission in the exercise of its power of federal regulation. The book has been written under the conviction that the direct federal regulation of interstate commerce, though it dates only from the close of the Civil War, has come to stay.

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"The rules declared by the Interstate Commerce Commission in the eighteen years of its existence,.. have made a body of administrative railroad law which seems properly included in a treatise of this character. Every phase of the complex adjustment of railway rates has been considered by the Commission, and their rulings in an infinite variety of cases have a permanent value in the solution of the transportation problems of the future."

A short analysis of the contents of the book may be helpful to a comprehension of its scope. It is divided into two parts. Part I contains five chapters, as follows:-(1) Interstate Commerce under the Federal Constitution. (2) The Concurrent and Exclusive Powers. (3) The Federal Regulation of Interstate Commerce. (4) Business and Labor Combinations in Interstate Commerce. (5) The Federal Control of State Regulation. Part II takes up the Interstate Commerce Act by sections, and adds thereto the amendment of 1903, the Anti-Trust Act of 1890 by sections, the Expedition Act, the Department of Commerce and Labor, the Safety Act of 1893, the Accident Law of 1901, Federal Labor Statutes, National Arbitration Act, and Procedure before the Interstate Commerce Commission."

It remains only to say that the book appears to have been written with great care and accuracy. The importance of the subject is apparent, and this book seems destined to rank as a most authoritative treatise on the subject.

F. H. S.

THE TRUTH ABOUT THE TRUTHS. BY JOHN MOODY. Pp. 514+ xxii. New York: Moody Publishing Company.

1904.

As one should judge from the title, the book is not one for the legal profession, except when we include its members in the general mass of the reading public. But the work of Mr. Moody is of especial interest to everyone, and is arranged in such a manner that one finds enjoyment in its reading, though it is mainly a book of statistics.

Every corporation, great and small, from the Standard Oil down to the Caramel Trust, receives Mr. Moody's most minute attention from the moment of its incorporation up to the present time. The book is exceedingly absorbing to all of us in that we all in some manner come under the dominating influence of one or more of the great industrial trusts, of which there are four hundred and forty, representing capital invested of over twenty billions of dollars, so we can imagine the magnitude of the subject.

The author cleverly shows the interdependence of most of the larger trusts, and how practically all the railroads, though nominally independent, are in reality owned and dominated by the same group of capitalists, and what in many cases is seeming competition is nothing more than pre-arranged rates. The book is well worth reading. M. B. S.

EXEMPTION LAWS AND PUBLIC POLICY

In the history of the law of the English peoples the varying extent to which a creditor may subject the person and property of his debtor to execution in satisfaction of his claim has reflected prevailing principles of public policy. The relation of debtor and creditor creates a liability on the part of the person and estate of the debtor for the satisfaction of the demands of the creditor, exemption from which is procured not by reason of any special merit in the debtor personally or in his position as debtor, or by reason of any especial unworthiness of the creditor, but in spite of the merits of his position and for reasons which concern the well-being of the body politic. The interests of the state or of society, as a whole, in maintaining the individual as an efficient unit, are in conflict with the narrow interests of the creditor seeking satisfaction from the person or estate of his debtor.

Upon the degree to which the peculiar interests of the creditor or commercial class predominate in moulding public policy and legislation, depends, in great part, the scope of execution. When England was a military or feudal

state, whose interests were best subserved by the prevention of the impairment of the efficiency of any of its individual members, there was wide exemption of person and estate from execution. As England developed from a feudal into a commercial state, the creditor class was given greater security, in the increasing objects of execution, until there was virtually no limitation whatever upon the liability of both the person and estate of the debtor to the satisfaction of the creditor's claim. With the modern evolution of benevolent and altruistic principles insisting that the well-being of the state will not admit of the impairment of the efficiency of the individual, by his imprisonment or complete impoverishment, to meet the demands of a creditor, the scope of execution was limited. The exemption laws were the means by which, pursuant to the predominant principles of public policy, the person of the debtor was almost entirely, and his estate partially, relieved from liability for his debts.

In the early stages of the common law, when the institutions of feudalism were at their height, execution was restricted to personal property, with some rare exceptions in favor of the crown, which could, under certain circumstances, scize the person or lands of its debtors. The militarism of the feudal state, subordinating all other interests to those dictated by the necessity of defence against foes, preserved the persons and lands of the great majority of debtors from execution. The personal duties owed by the vassal to the lord, and the paramount obligation to hold himself ever ready to attend his iord in his military enterprises or assist him in his defence, procured for the person of the vassal immunity from imprisonment for debt. Similarly the old feudal system of land tenures, under which the lord parcelled out his estate to his military retainers, who held only at the will of the lord, was incompatible with an execution against land, by virtue of which possession of land might be transferred from a loyal and soldierly tenant to one physically unfit to perform military services or lacking in loyal fealty to his lord.

The so called common-law writs of execution were the

fieri facias and the levari facias, the former against the debtor's goods, the latter against the present profits of his lands in addition to his goods. It was only with the decline of feudalism and the growth of the towns and of commerce that creditors were accorded increased rights against their debtors' persons and estates. When the lord found it cheaper and more advantageous to depend upon hired soldiers, rather than upon feudatories, perhaps incapable of bearing the burdens of war or else engaged in necessary farming, and as the money for their hire came to be advanced by the increasingly influential money-lending and commercial classes of the rising towns, and as the restrictions on the alienation of land wore away, so, too, did the restrictions upon the availability of land and of the person of the debtor for execution in satisfaction of debt wear away; and the demands of the creditor class for increased security were met by a number of statutes bringing the debtor's persen and lands within the grasp of the creditor.

The capias ad satisfaciendum was first allowed in civil actions for torts producing a breach of the peace. It was then extended to cases of frauds, and by Statutes 52 Henry III and 13 Edw. I to actions of account. By Statute 25 Edward III it was granted in actions of debt and detinue; and finally by Statute 19 Hen. VII, allowing it to issue in actions on the case, the remedy became a general one in enforcing the collection of debts.

Execution against land, entitling the creditor to take possession of his debtor's real estate was secured only by a number of statutes passed at intervals during a long period of time. The Statute of Westminster 2, 13 Edw. I. c. 18, gave to the creditor the choice of a fieri facias or of a new writ, known as an elegit, so called from the choice accorded the plaintiff, under which writ if the defendant's goods were insufficient to satisfy the judgment, the plaintiff was put in possession of one-half the debtor's freehold lands, to be held by him until out of the rents and profits thereof, the debt was paid. A broader remedy was provided for traders by the Statute of Acton Burnel de Mer