Reviews of Books A VALUABLE WORK ON DEFAMATION A Code of the Law of Actionable Defamation; with a Continuous Commentory and Appendices. By George Spencer Bower, K. C. Sweet & Max well, Ltd., London. Pp. 1, 259, and appendices and index 348. (30s.) IF the National Commissioners on Uni form State Laws ever turn their atten tion to the task of drafting a standard libel law, they will find Mr. Bower's Code of the Law of Actionable Defamation an admirable foundation upon which to build. If Mr. Bower's work must not be judged by the rigid tests which are applied to documents which are the outcome of years of consulta tion by bodies of experts, and have received that seal of government sanction which im plies infallibility, it would bear such tests uncommonly well. In his clear, concise, and logical statement of the law of England, Mr. Bower has not only accomplished, after a vast amount of labor, all that could reason ably be expected of a preliminary draft, but a great deal more. His orderly arrange ment of principles which are in the main those of our own jurisprudence commends his code to Americans not only because of its scien tific merit, but because of the serviceableness of the plan adopted. His code could there fore be profitably studied by all who desire progress in legislation, such as would come with the general adoption of a uniform statute defining with scientific accuracy the chief features of a subject of great public concern. Precision of language means precision of thought, and the logical merit and conse quent practical usefulness of this treatise is largely secured by the accuracy of its termi nology. The author consistently employs the terms libel and slander to denote the two dis tinct kinds of defamation, written and spoken, or to be more accurate, the two kinds of defamatory matter one of which expresses and records, the other simply expresses with out recording, a defamatory meaning. He is also careful to follow the weight of excellent authority (see p. 358) in abandoning the term privilege in favor of the more intelligible and correct one immunity. In using malice in its common, rather than in its technical sense,
in exchanging the term slander of title for the expressions quasi-defamotion and disparage ment of property, in discountenancing the ob jectionable phrase verbal defamation in the sense of oral defamation, he acts in obedience to the purpose of more clearly defining ideas and securing that lucidity which any one must admit is one of the first essentials of any code. In other respects, also, the author has recog nized the essentials of a code. Such a docu ment should embody established principles rather than the unsettled portion of the law. It should present the permanent and fixed portion of the law. It should not be encum bered with minute details, or particular illus trations, or provisions relating to ephemeral and shifting conditions, but should incorporate the great, leading! universal rules about which courts and commentators may build up the fabric of a system constantly undergoing change in smaller particulars without any weakening in the central structure. The greater part of Mr. Bower's work is based on case law, and this is well, for statute law would be of little service in the drafting of a code, unless it were itself the outcome of those same processes of assimilation and organization which are involved in the preparation of a document calling for such wisdom and skill in its preparation. Because it is founded on the common law, this code has a special interest for American lawyers, as a statement, not only of rights under the British Constitution, but of the sacred rights of freedom of speech and of the press under our own Constitution. Running parallel with the code is a com mentary in small type, reviewing with ex haustive learning and with wonderful care the sources of the code rules. There are twenty-one appendices on topics connected with the main title. In one of them the author compares the civil law of defamation with the criminal law of the same subject, having adopted the plan of confining his main inquiry to the former branch of the topic. In another, he pays his respects to the Scots law of defamation, which he else where speaks of as excelling in masculine good sense and fairness the jurisprudence of every other country in this department, be
