Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 11.pdf/115

 Rh

96

building of the first ironclad for the United States navy, the administration of Mr. Tyler, the suppres sion of the African slave trade in Brazil, the struggle of democracy against aristocracy in Virginia, the ma terial, social and political condition of the Virginia people from 1830 to 1860, and reminiscences of pub lic men. Three Studies in Literature, by Lewis Edwards Gates, Assistant Professor of English in Harvard University, is the title of a book just published by the Macmillan Company. The three essays treat of three prose writers of the present century, Francis Jeffrey, Cardinal Newman, and Matthew Arnold. The essays are supplementary to one another, in so far as each considers an important aspect of the ro mantic movement in English literature.

to the administration of the internal revenue laws. By Mark Ash and W1ll1am Ash, of the New York bar. Baker, Voorhis & Co., New York. 1899. Law sheep. $5.00 net.

new law-books.

This treatise may be truly said to be a very timely one, as the enactment of the war revenue law ol 1898 has required added consideration of the subject on the part of the legal profession, federal officials and business men generally. The work contains very full notes of the judicial decisions of the United States Supreme Court and the lower Federal courts from the earliest times; also, the decis1ons of the treasury department and the Commissioners of Internal Rev enue. The cognate authorities in the state courts have also been collated, particularly upon the now important subject of the stamp tax on instruments. A special feature is the grouping of the conflicting authorities in the various jurisdictions upon the mooted points of the invalidity of unstamped instru ments, and their admissibility in evidence depending upon the forum in which the question has been raised, viz., the Federal or the state courts. In addition to very full annotations of the judicial decisions, especial attention has been given to the regulations issued by the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, and the de cisions of this official, as also those of the bureaus of the Secretary of the Treasury and the AttorneyGeneral. These official rulings, although not con trolling upon the courts, have been repeatedly de clared by the Supreme Court of the United States to be entitled to weight in construction, as the con temporaneous and uniform interpretation by execu tive officers charged with the duty of acting under a statute, and " in a case of doubt ought to turn the scale." They are, therefore, of manifest value to all examining the subject, particularly to discover the exemptions from taxes under the internal revenue system, as these cannot be found in the books of reports. The decisions of the Commissioner of In ternal Revenue are further valuable in determining the possible liability for taxes, fines, penalties or forfeitures, as under the law no suit for their recovery can be instituted without the sanction of the commis sioner. The authors have done their work thor oughly and exhaustively, and the treatise is in every respect all that could be desired.

The United States Internal Revenue Laws now in force. With notes indicating the derivatory statutes, and references to judicial decisions, regulations, rules and circulars of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue and other executive departments relating thereto. With an appendix containing laws of a general nature and miscellaneous provisions applicable

The Amer1can State Reports, Vol. LXIII. Containing the cases of general value and au thority decided in the courts of last resort of the several States. Selected, reported, and annotated by A. C. Freeman. BancroftWhitney Co., San Francisco. 1898. Law sheep. $4.00.

One of the most notable members of the Massa chusetts Bar was the late Samuel E. Sewall. Honest, upright, fearless in the defense of right, and unweary ing in his opposition to injustice in every form, an able lawyer and a model citizen, he won not only the esteem and admiration of his brother lawyers, but also the love and affection of all who knew him. To the present generation, the story of his life should be an inspiration and an example worthy of imitation. We know of no book from which more pleasure and profit may be derived than the Memoir ' of this noble man recently published by Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin & Co. Sir Frederick Pollock, Corpus Professor of Jurispru dence in the University of Oxford, will publish shortly through the MacMillan Company his Life ami Philoso phy of Spinoza. His purpose is to put before Eng lish and American readers an account fairly complete in itself and on a fairly adequate scale, of the life, correspondence, and philosophy of Spinoza. He aims, in the first instance, at being understood by those who have not made a special study of the subject; but his hope is that it may also be of some use to those who already know Spinoza at first hand, and to critical students of philosophy. 1 Samuel E. Sewall. A Memoir by Miss Moore Tiffany. Houghton, Mifflin & Co. Boston and New York. 1S98. Cloth. $1. 25.