The Modern Turn Of And The United States Tort Law

American Law belongs to the Common Law legal system which mainly origins from case law.In course of its development,the Judges,especially those of Federal Super Court and the superior state courts ,played a very important role.In order to retain the continuity and the stability of legal system,they made an effort to find the social demands and embedded them into the lively cases.In this way,they constantly reforged the case law legal system of America,making it permanent and fresh.Using historical method to study the relationship between Benjamin Cardozo and the turnaround of American Tort Law,the author of this paper tried to display the dynamic process of the development of legal system,to explore the mutual relation between the evolution of legal system and social progress,and demonstrate the important role of the judges.The turnaround of American Tort Law from traditional to modern embodied the trend from restricting tortuous liability to expanding.The basic reason of the trend was the transformation of economy and society in the advent of 20th century.At that time,the appeal court of New York became the pioneer in the innovation of American Tort Law by its eminent economic status and relatively exoteric judicial tradition.On the basis of refuting the formalism legal thought,Cardozo carried on and develop the realistic legal thought of Holmes and Pound.Meanwhile,he took full advantage of this practical legal thought in the field of American Tort Law.In the advent of 20th century,with the transformation of economy and society,America realized industrialization and urbanization.So the old legal system could not adapt these new changes and need relevant adjustment.In 1916,New York Appeal Court overruled the traditional Privity of Contract principle in the case of Macpherson v. Buick Motor Co.,a landmark case. This rulling established the principle of fault product liability and became the symbol of generation of modern product liability system.Macpherson v. Buick Motor Co. is one of the famous cases which Cardozo drafted by himself ,but it didn't embody his persitent judicial style.In his judgement,he updated the traditional rules progressively in according to the demands of social reality.The judgement of Hynes v. New York Central Railroad Co.showed that the value of human being was respected more and more, and indicated an obvious trend of realism.While in this case,Cardozo had no intend to overthrow the principle that the owner of land only had limited liability to the invader of land but a fine adjustment. Cardozo attached great important to deal with disputes case by...