ABSTRACT
Common law is not a law book, nor is it a system of abstract formulations, nor yet a codification of the prevailing ideas of justice. The earlier decision may be a bad one, and very much offend one's sense of justice; but if no superior authority has annulled it, it becomes historic law and determines the future course of things. In the masses of the people, on the other hand, the natural tendencies are favourable anyhow for developing a lively sense of justice. The public is always willing to endure any hardship rather than to tolerate any maladministration of justice. In the Supreme Court one sees again that the security of national justice rests on the binding force of former decisions. The entire history of the Supreme Court shows that in a conservative spirit it has always done full justice to both the centralizing and particularizing tendencies.
