The Modern Development of American Comparative Law: 1904-1945

Abstract

Sustained scholarly comparative law activity in the United States began in the early 20th century. Together with organized networks of communication, it developed along with the successful effort to establish scientific teaching and research at mostly university law schools. This article traces that development from the founding in 1907 of the Comparative Law Bureau, which published an Annual Bulletin, through the establishment of the American Foreign Law Association in 1925, to the Bureau's merger with the American Bar Association's International Law Section. From 1933, the American Bar Association referred to this new entity as the Section of International and Comparative Law. In the lean years of the 1930s and the war years in the 1940s, Tulane University College of Law took a leading role in keeping the comparative law flame alive, although professors at other law schools also made major contributions during a difficult period.