584
The Green Bag
published in 1815, surely was not a text
LAND ACTIONS IN GEORGIA
desirable to follow. The translator‘s introduction is of
A Practical Treatise on the Law and Prootdm't involved in the Preparation and Trial of Cases}! Ejectment and other Actions at Law resptflml
little value, and throws little light on the
place occupied by the Forum Judicum in the history of European law. The declaration that the Teutons and the Goths were distinct (p. vi) is surprising, and thedescription of the original Goths as typical savages (p. vii) must be taken
with a grain of salt. Sufiicient emphasis is not laid on the extent to which the Visigoths had been Romanized before
their invasion of the Peninsula (p. viii). The total loss of Euric's laws is incor
rectly assumed (p. xxiv).
The Code of
Justinian is wrongly stated to have antedated the Breviary of Alaric (p.
Titles to Land.
Treating particularly of the pled
of ing.the practice principles and evidence, of the substantive and in a general law involvtdll way
such actions. By Arthur Gray Powell. Judge of!“ Court of Appeals of Georgia. The Harrison C0.
Atlanta. (index).
Pp. 553+ 47 (table of mes>+lf1 ($7.50.)
HIS volume, prepared especially with reference to the trial of land titles in the state of Georgia, (18315 largely with the law of ejectment. in Georgia the substantive law is in the main the common law. The local Code practice and pleading are peculiar and technical, but the practitioner still has the option of using the old common law actions to try his title. Many of the
xxiv). It does not appear on what ground the editor makes the broad statement (p. xxiv) that the Forum Judicum was formed from the com pilations of Euric and Alaric‘. It is not clear why he supposes it to have ex erted so much influence on the destinies of Europe. Full recognition of barbarian usage is not given in the assumption
older and intricate technicalities 0f the
that all the antiqua, so called, are de
members ally recognize of thethat Barthe of fictitious this stateform gene"0
rived from Roman sources. The Forum Judicum is interesting to read, as a mingling of debased Roman law with the intolerant spirit of the Spanish Inquisition. Belonging, how ever, to the period of Visigothic deca dence, it does not faithfully portray the great qualities of the nation, and its importance as a forerunner of Conti nental legal systems, in comparison with that of the Breviary of Alaric, seems to have been overrated. Indeed, it is
doubtful whether the title “Visigothic Code" was a desirable one for the Com parative Law Bureau of the American Bar Association to employ. The trans lation, however, seems to have been
action of ejectment have been done away with, and the form of actionnow
used in Georgia, although still basefl 0“ the old procedure, has been modernized
Thus the practitioner has his ch01“ between an action of ejectrnent and an action under the code. Judge Powell says that “while the
ejectment has its advantages, man)’ able practitioners hesitate to use it, became
of the inadequacy of their informal?)n as to how to use it; they generally bnng their action for the recovery of land
under the code procedure, taking ‘he hazards of its technicalities and Offer‘
losing on that account cases wh‘ otherwise might have been Wow" It
is his ambition in writing this book to check the decadence into which ‘E practice of land action is in danger_0 falling by neglecting the opporwmty of the practitioner to avail himself of
proceeding by ejectment.
'
The present volume has traced w‘th
great ability the history and development executed with pains and discernment,
of ejectment proceedings at common in the face of considerable difficulties.