Stewards of democracy

the long version

"Stewards of Democracy is the celebration of a moral tradition famously observed by Alexis de Tocqueville through the eyes of Francis Lieber, a Prussian emigre, who in antebellum times wrote of political ethics, hermeneutics, and comparative constitutional law as aspects of the moral duties of American lawyers and judges. The profession's duty is to unify this tradition by nurturing and protecting the institutions of self-government that directly affect the stability of our complex social order and the protection of all our legal rights." "Thomas Cooley, perhaps the lawyer most respected by nineteenth-century Americans, is presented as a primary exemplar of the dutiful tradition. Much of the book is an account of his career as judge, scholar, teacher, and founding chair of the Interstate Commerce Commission." "Carrington contends that the dutiful tradition marked by the careers of the five exemplars is threatened by the mutually reinforced tendencies of the Supreme Court and other high courts, of highly respected legal scholars, of the most honored of our law schools, and of noted legal journalists."--Jacket.