Select American cases on the law of self-defence

Front matter

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Preface

The title of this volame and the analysis on the following page will sufBcientlj suggest its contents. Although it is entitled American Cases, a few modem English cases have been given, either in the text or in the notes. This is not a collection of leading cases in any sense of that term. We have, on the contrary, endeavored to collect 'aZ2 the American cases of any considerable importance, bearing upon the comprehensive subject of Self-Defence. This plan we have carried out at the expense of swelling the book to a thousand pages. We may have made a mistake in doing so; but we have gone upon the conviction that the lawyers want the cases themselves, and not our conclusions as to the result of the cases. We have, therefore, at the expense of impairing the artistic appearance of this volume, drawn into the notes many cases at full length, or fully abstracted them so far as they relate to the subject under discussion. It is thought, however, that the notes will not be found lacking in independent discussions and brief summaries, showing the results of the adjudications. The cases which relate to those questions growing out of the law of self-defence which are still in a state of uncertainty or dispute — such as "retreating to the wall," threats, and character for violence of the prosecutor or pers«»v slain — ^have been

IV FUKFAOB.

^ven as principal cases, or drawn into the notes without anj attempt at abbreviation. In these instances we have, for the most part, preferred to allow the judges And counsel to conduct the discussion rather than attempt it ourselves. With reference to the questions of •evidence indicated by the title of Part IV, our limit as to space has prevented us from doing more than to give four recent cases, two of which, it is believed, have a tendency greatly to modify previously existing notions upon the questions which they discuss.

Some attempt has been made to reduce the cases to a consistent arrangement, but this has been only partially successful. The difficulty of doing so wiU be obvious, when it is considered that many of the cases treat upon several diflTerent branches of the law of self-defence, and hence that in placing such a case under one head it is necessarily omitted under another. The inconvenience resulting from this difficulty has been overcome by a system of cross references in the head-notes of the principal cases, so that wherever the searcher finds a point of doctrine stated, he is referred to every other case in the book where the same point is under discussion.

ANALYSIS.