Page:Select Essays in Anglo-American Legal History, Volume 1.djvu/583

 17. BEALE: JURISPRUDENCE 569 direction of liberty, there have been few further steps in that direction. The zeal for emancipation has in fact spent its force, because freedom, quite as great as is consistent with the present state of civilization, has already been obtained. So far as there has been any change of sentiment^ and of law in the last generation, it has been in the direction of disregarding or of limiting rights newly acquired in the earlier period. France, which secured the freedom of Italy, threatens the independence of Siam ; England, which was foremost in the emancipation of the slaves, introduces coolie labor into the mines of South Africa ; America, which clam- ored for an immediate recognition of the independence of Hungary, finds objections to recognizing the independence of Panama and refuses independence to the Philippines. In the criminal law there has been no reform, though there has been much improvement, since 1850. Married women have obtained few further rights, principally because there were few left for them to acquire, and, while we have freed our slaves, we have encouraged trade unionism. In short, the humanitarian movement of two generations ago which pro- foundly affected the law of the civilized world for fifty years has ceased to influence the course of jurisprudence. The most characteristic development of the law during the last fifty years has been in the direction of business com- bination and association. A few great trading companies had existed in the middle ages ; the Hanse merchants, the Italian, Dutch, and English companies wielded great power. They were exceptional organizations, and almost all had ceased to act by 1860. The modern form of business asso- ciation, the private corporation with limited liability, is a, recent invention. Such corporations were created by special action, by sovereign or legislature, in small though increas- ing numbers all through the last century ; but during the last generation every civilized country has provided general laws under which they might be formed by mere agreement of the individuals associated. Now the anonymous societies of the Continent, the joint-stock companies of England and her colonies, and the corporations of the United States, all different forms of the limited liability association for busi-