December 1887: Pre-Search-Engine Legal Research “There is a very annoying defect in the new digest of the New Jersey reports in the absence of an index,” the Law Journal editors remarked. “You have no index but the alphabetical arrangement of the digest itself. … If a subject has two names you may miss it if you guess the wrong one. You look in vain … for recoupment and cannot find it unless you happen to think it may be found under the compound title of set-off and recoupment.”
100 Years Ago
December 1912: A commentator from the Midwest, Arthur Eddy, said that in many states, election of judges tended to “make moral cowards of many,” since they feared the “unseen forces” that could oust them from office. The Law Journal editors observed, “In New Jersey, the trouble of which Mr. Eddy complains does not exist, simply because our judges are appointed for long terms, and, if they are of the right stamp, they are pretty sure to remain on the bench until they can and ought to retire.”
