Justice Holmes: The Measure of His Thought

Written in a lucid style and well illustrated, Justice Holmes: The Measure of His Thought offers a biographical look at the influences that shaped United States Supreme Court Justice Holmes's judicial outlook, chiefly his open-minded refusal to inject his own views into his legal decisions. This presents a timely comparison to the opinions of the late Justice Antonin Scalia.

The book proves erroneous the notion of some who claim that Holmes was a cold intellectual, or that his critical legal views represented a change of mind.

It demonstrates especially through Holmes's 1919 opinions on speech what would be obvious to a veteran of the courtroom, but not always to a biographer or a professor: that there is a big difference between questions of law before an appellate judge and questions of fact determined by a trial judge or jury.

We see how Holmes's childhood and family life specifically his celebrity father and his mother affected his later views. Through an examination of Holmes's Civil War experience we are shown how it shaped his views on natural law and religion.

The authors describe Holmes's intellectual influences and include photos of his book collection now at the Library of Congress. Through a discussion of the letters Holmes wrote at his Beverly Farms, MA, home, where he summered when the Court was not in session, we are given a window into his remarkable wit as well as his philosophical views. The book includes rare photographs of Beverly Farms. Published by Talbot Publishing, an imprint of the Lawbook Exchange, Ltd.