ABSTRACT
The body of precedents available for consideration in any legal setting represents, at its best, an accumulation of wisdom from the past. Authoritative precedents are prior decisions that for some reason one ought to use as governing models for later decisions. Legal systems differ markedly over the question how, and how far, they require or expect judges and others to observe precedents as governing models for decision. In any event, for the student of practical reason in human affairs, the study of lawyers' use of precedent has a magnetic fascination. There are indeed vital and deep differences between the legal systems of codified law and the legal systems of common law, and some of the deeper differences do relate to the way in which precedents are viewed and used. But the fact remains that also in the systems of codified law precedent has played a great and, it must be said with emphasis, a growing part.
