in the city of New York have thus far formed the barrier against general codification; and although a good deal of their hostility is due to personal dislike of Mr. Field and his code, yet radically they are opposed to the prin ciple of general codification of the common law. Meantime the prophet is honored abroad. In addition to the action of California and Dakota above mentioned, the Code of Civil Procedure has been adopted to a greater or less extent in Missouri, Ohio, Kentucky, In diana, Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, Kansas, Nebraska, Nevada, California, Oregon, Mis sissippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Arkansas, Connecticut, Washington, Arizona, Utah, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, and Da kota; the Code of Criminal Procedure by Indiana, Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, Kan sas, Nebraska, Nevada, California, Oregon, Kentucky, Arkansas, Washington, Arizona, Utah, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, and Da kota; and his system of practice is prevail ing in England, in India, at Hong Kong, and at Singapore. That was a daring and magni ficent boast which I heard Mr. Field once make in a public discussion at Albany, but it was true : " The laws which this brain con ceived, and this hand wrote, are the rule of most of the English-speaking communities of the world." Mr. Field has substantially rewritten the Civil Code eight times, some parts of it as many as eighteen times. This enormous labor he has accomplished in the intervals of his vast practice, while the opponent mem bers of the City Bar Association — those who were then born and of age — were sleeping, or eating, or travelling, or enjoying them selves. And for all his labors as a codifier, he has never had nor asked a penny from the State, except that during the first two years he received a salary at the rate of $2,000 a year. He has spent thousands of dollars of his own money in endeavoring to promote his favorite object. Mr. Field had able associates and assist ants in this work, but he himself wrought
and produced more upon it than all of them together; and his associates having been lon«j dead, and their work having been so much changed, it has become substantially his own, and is so regarded by the public. Mr. Field's efforts at legal reform have not been confined to his own country, but he has been an ardent and leading worker in the cause of international law reform; and his labors in this cause and for the promotion of international arbitration and the disarma ment of nations and the abolition of war have rendered his name celebrated and hon ored in every European country and all over the civilized world. In the year 1890, at the age of eighty-five, he presided at a great Peace Convention in London, and uttered a noble and trenchant appeal for the promotion of inter national peace. His voice has been listened to with deference by the greatest and wisest of the lawyers and statesmen of England; and his addresses, essays, and projects are re garded with admiration by the learned and famous jurists of the Continent. His pro posed International Code has met with great acceptance, and has been translated into French and Italian. At a meeting of the Liberty and Property Defence League, in London, on the 10th of November, 1890, Mr. Field was president, and made an address, for which the Earl of Wemyss moved a vote of thanks, remarking that " in the course of its work the League had been called upon to resist, not only State interference, but municipal, interference, and they had been called, for so doing, the ene mies of liberty. It was therefore a great thing for the League to have had as president at an annual meeting so eminent a lawyer and so distinguished a man as Mr. Dudley Field. Mr. Field was the commissioner ap pointed by the State to codify the laws of New York; he was one of the commissioners appointed to endeavor to avert the great American civil war; he had been for many years a leader of the United States bar; and he was a recognized authority on interna tional law; " and Lord Bramwell, in second-
