Symposium: Commentary on Jaeger's Williston: Volume Seven
![handle is hein.journals/potolor1 and id is 29 raw text is: VOLUME SEVEN
Robert J. O'Connell*
In the realm of music, the work of the symphonic synthesist is
similar in many regards to the work of the reviser of a great and
classic treatise in the domain of law. The symphonic synthesist
must attempt to give new life to the work by reforming its principal
themes in the musical idiom of the day while avoiding alteration of
the original thought. In like manner, the reviser of a classic state-
ment of the law essays the task of reorganizing the principal themes
of the master and of adding new strains to these themes to frame a
modem statement of the law. The third edition of WILLIsTON ON
CONTRAcTS is a skillful and artistic handling of the restatement of a
theme, modified and varied where necessary to suit the current
need, completed by invention where a bridge was required but sus-
taining the mode of the original.
Since there have been so few personal revisions of the great trea-
tises of the law, each such effort may be read as a lesson in the ways
of revision. Dr. Walter H. E. Jaeger's work on WILLISTON ON
CONTRAcTs is a lesson from a great master. Throughout the revision
there seems to be one clear and compelling motive, to insure that
the work done under his hand will be a useful and valuable tool for
judges and lawyers. It is this need to know the law of contracts as
it is today that seems to have dictated to Dr. Jaeger that his first
aim should be the modernizing of the work so that its statements,
by the stamp of currency they bear, will remain the acceptable coin
of the realm.
Specifically, Volume Seven undertakes two principal themes:
Contracts of Insurance' and Contracts for the Sale of Land and
Personal Property.' The first chapter examines the various kinds of
insurance contracts' and discusses standard insurance clauses, and
their effects. In two sections the effect of antedating a policy is
* Professor, John Marshall School of Law. J.D., Georgetown Law Center, 1956; LL.M.,
New York University, 1958. Member of D.C. and Wisconsin Bars. Assistant Professor, Mar-
quette University Law School, 1962-67; Professor, Chicago-Kent College of Law, 1967-74.
1. 7 WILLISToN ON CONTRACTS H§ 800-921 (W. Jaeger ed. 1967) (hereinafter cited as
WILLIsTON].
2. Id. §§ 922-946A.
3. See e.g., id., § 927A at 828. See also, Pound, The Progress of the Law, 1918-1919, Equity,
33 HARv. L. Rev. 813 (1920).
4. 7 WILuSTON § 942.
23](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/potolor1&div=11&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
What Is HeinOnline?
Contact us for annual subscription options:
Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?
profiles profiles most
Symposium: Commentary on Jaeger's Williston: Volume Seven
Contact us for annual subscription options:
Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?
profiles profiles most