Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 32.djvu/409

373 MILITARY LAW — A STUDY IN COMPARATIVE LAW 373 so as to secure a comprehensive and symmetrical development like that of the Roman law and at the same time so as to pre- serve the life and vigor of an industrial democracy? Are co- ordination and cooperation between the legislative power and the judicial power inconsistent with free government? Is it possible to secure a centralization of administration which will give us a symmetrical development of our law, and at the same time to avoid such a centralization as will result in autocracy? Democracy is entitled to the best of law. It needs it. Does a comparison of Roman law and of military law tend to show that after all we must elect between that which is most nearly ideal in its method of development and that which can develop in harmony with democratic institutions? It is to be hoped that we do not have to make this election. If possible, let us choose the advantages of both. To those of us who have been striving for a means of seeking a simpler, freer development of our law, these questions, however, present new complications. If we cannot secure a coordination between the legislative and the judicial, together with a comprehensive and symmetrical develop- ment of our law, and at the same time preserve our free govern- ment and our democracy, shall we not prefer our unwieldy jumble of judicial precedent and legislation to any other system of law however symmetrical, uniform and comprehensive it may be? Many of us have for the last year and a half been teaching military law as a patriotic duty. May we not also learn from it a valuable lesson in comparative law? Wm. Herbert Page. University or Wisconsin.