Oliver Wendell Holmes
A Willing Servant to an Unknown God

Challenges much of the conventional wisdom about Holmes, exploring his identity through his nineteenth-century social and intellectual context.

Catharine Pierce Wells (Author)

9781108469302, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 10 December 2020

223 pages
23 x 15 x 1.3 cm, 0.35 kg

'Professor Wells skillfully and knowledgeably portrays Holmes, his life, and the influences upon him, in their complex entirety. She takes us through Civil War combat into science, religion, philosophy, and law. Weaving them together, Holmes is renewed as a compelling standard for the continuing challenge to our national intelligence and purpose.' Frederick Kellogg, George Washington University

Oliver Wendell Holmes was one of the most influential figures in American law. As a Supreme Court Justice, he wrote foundational opinions about such important constitutional issues as freedom of speech and the limits of state regulatory power. As a scholar and Massachusetts High Court judge, he helped to reshape the common law for the modern industrial era. And yet, despite the many accounts of his career, Holmes himself remains an enigma. This book is the first to explore the nineteenth-century New England influences so crucial to the formation of his character. Inspired by Ralph Waldo Emerson's transcendentalism, Holmes belonged to a group of men who formulated a philosophy known as American pragmatism that stood as an alternative to English empiricism and German rationalism. This innovative study places Holmes within the transcendentalist, pragmatist tradition and thereby unlocks his unique identity and contribution to American law. Wells' nuanced analysis will appeal to legal scholars, historians, philosophers, and general readers alike.

Acknowledgments
Introduction
Part I. The Soldier's Faith: Prologue: Memorial Day, 1884
1. Our comfortable routine
2. War is horrible and dull
3. The great chorus of life and joy begins again
4. For the Puritan still lives in New England, Thank God!
Part II. The Journey to the Pole: Commencement speech: Brown University, 1897
5. A black and frozen night
6. The loneliness of original work
7. The master of himself
Epilogue: the consummation.

Subject Areas: Legal history [LAZ], Legal profession: general [LAT], History of the Americas [HBJK]