Of Democrats and Dictators: The Development of Law

From Elizabethan England to the Modern AgeLinked to world history standardsUnit 1: Sir Edward Coke and the Common Law explores the development of the common law by focusing on one of its great proponents, Sir Edward Coke.Unit 2: The Enlightenment Philosophers looks at four philosophers’ views on government and natural law—Hobbes, Locke, Montesquieu, and Rousseau.Unit 3: The Code Napoleon explores the first modern code of laws, which became the model for legal systems in most other nations in the world.Unit 4: The Dreyfus Affair examines the trials of the innocent man Alfred Dreyfus and the role the press played in his convictions and ultimate vindication.Unit 5: The Totalitarians looks at the perversion of law under Hitler’s Nazi Germany and Stalin’s Soviet Union.Unit 6: War Crimes focuses on the development of rules of war and the Nuremberg and Yamashita trials following World War II.Unit 7: Gandhi and Civil Disobedience looks at Gandhi and the question of when it proper to disobey the law.Unit 8: International Law traces the emergence of international law in the modern age and looks at its value and limitations. An extensive teacher’s guide is available directly from the publisher Constitutional Rights Foundation. It containing more than 20 lesson plans. The plans include focus activities, discussion questions with suggested answers, step-by-step instructions for interactive activities, and debriefing questions and suggestions.