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290 290 HARVARD LAW REVIEW. Ought the Judiciary of Massachusetts to be Elective? By James W. Stillman. Boston: published by the author. 1S98. pp. 17. This pamphlet urges that the present system of appointing the Massa- chusetts judges for life be discontinued, and that the judicial office be made elective. The general argument is an application of the reasons which favor the popular election of legislative and executive officers to this totally different case. The position taken, if indeed it is destined to ob- tain any following, is to be regretted. Its fallacy is in the failure to realize that, however our system may succeed in the case of legislators, the peo- ple in general are not competent to decide upon the fitness of judges. In the appointment of judges, as in many other matters, the people must act through their delegates who are better qualified than they to appoint. The author ignores the danger of having a judge's tenure dependent upon political issues. He also ignores the necessity to a judge of a life of careful training, and the probable incompetence of an elected judge taken for a short term from active practice, who has had no opportunity to fit himself for the necessary general work. Massachusetts, surely, finds little induce- ment to follow the system which in Michigan resulted in the defeat of the late Judge Cooley and which in New York City has just resulted in the political victory of Richard Croker over one of the ablest New York judges, Judge Daly. j. g. p. BOOKS RECEIVED. [Entry under this head does not preclude further notice of a book in this or in a later number of the Review^ A Trustee's Handbook. By Augus- tus Peabody Loring. Boston : Little, Brown, & Co. 1898. Cases on Contracts. Vols. I. & II. By William A. Keener. New York : Baker, Voorhis, & Co. 1898. Civil Liberty as the Basis of Pri- vate International Law. By Manuel Azpiroz. Mexico, 1898. Forms of Pleading. Vol. I. By Austin Abbott. New York : Baker, Voorhis, & Co. 1898. Principles of Constitutional Law. By Thomas M. Cooley. Boston : Little, Brown, & Co. 1898. Selected Cases on the Law of Property in Land. Edited by William A. Finch. New York : Baker, Voorhis, & Co. 1898. The Commerce Clause of the Fed- eral Constitution. By E. Parmalee Prentice and John G. Egan. Chicago: Callaghan & Co. 1898. The Law of Mines in Canada. By Wm. David McPherson and John Murray Clark. Toronto : The Carswell Com- pany. 1898.