Lawyering for the Railroad provides the first full account of railroad monopoly power, tracing its sources and effects in the southern political economy. Issues touching on railroad development were major components of politics in the days of both Populism and Progressivism, and railroad attorneys -- often in their role as lobbyists -- were always in the middle of the action. They distributed free passes to legislators, retained the best counsel for their clients, laid out the legal agreements to form monopolies, and instituted practices to ensure quick and favorable settlements for the railroads. In this intriguing work, William G. Thomas introduces the southern attorneys who represented railroads between 1880 and 1916, closely examining their role in the political economy of the South during the Gilded Age and the Progressive Era, a period in which the region experienced sharp change, explosive growth, and heated political contests. Thomas tells his fascinating story with legal department records from some of the largest interstate railroad companies in the South. With the help of these records, he demonstrates how the railroads tried to use the law and the legal process to mold the southern political economy to their ends and what kind of opposition they faced. Standing at the crossroads of business, law, and politics, Lawyering for the Railroad gives context, depth, and specificity to what have been cursory glimpses into the shady world of corporate power in the Gilded Age. From small-town lawyers to big-city firms, the story of the railroad attorneys brings into focus the many ways the interstate railroad transformed the South.

The untold story of how one sensational trial propelled a self-taught lawyer and a future president into the national spotlight. In May of 1856, the steamboat Effie Afton barreled into a pillar of the Rock Island Bridge, unalterably changing the course of American transportation history. Within a year, long-simmering tensions between powerful steamboat interests and burgeoning railroads exploded, and the nation’s attention, absorbed by the Dred Scott case, was riveted by a new civil trial. Dramatically reenacting the Effie Afton case—from its unlikely inception, complete with a young Abraham Lincoln’s soaring oratory, to the controversial finale—this “masterful” (Christian Science Monitor) account gives us the previously untold story of how one sensational trial propelled a self-taught lawyer and a future president into the national spotlight.

Law and English Railway Capitalism, 1825-1875 is the first large scale historical treatment of the relationship between English law and the rise of a leading sector of 19th century industrial enterprise. The book examines the impact of English common law and lawyers on the early steam railwayindustry. Grounded in a wide variety of legal and industrial source materials, the studys eight analytical narrative chapters examine a range of interactions between early railway capitalism and the evolving culture, doctrine, and procedures of Victorian lawyers. Subjects considered in depth includethe legal ramifications of the great railway manias. law and the infiltration of the English countryside, railway accidents, corporate monopolism, and the organization of Englands first corporate legal departments. Each chapter contributes to the books ambitious general interpretation of theprofound but ambiguous engagement of an antiquated but powerful legal system with a dynamic new industry.

Why do some lawyers devote themselves to a given social movement or political cause? How are such deeds of individual commitment and personal belief justly executed, given the ideals of disinterested professional service to which lawyers are (in theory, at least) supposed to adhere? What can we learn from such lawyers about the relationship between law and politics? Cause Lawyering is a wise and varied collection of responses to these questions, featuring a number of distinguished legal scholars concerned with anti-poverty lawyers, lawyers who work against capital punishment, immigration lawyers, and other lawyers working to end oppression. Editors Austin Sarat and Stuart Scheingold have assembled here a valuable cross-national portrait of lawyers compelled to sacrifice financial gain so as to use their legal skills in the promotion of a more just society. These telling and important essays fully explore the relationship between cause lawyering and the organized legal professions of many different countries--the US, England, South Africa, Israel, Cuba, and so forth. They describe the utility of law as a resource in political struggles and, conversely, highlight the constraints under which lawyers necessarily operate when they turn to politics. Some provide broad theoretical overviews; others present rich case studies. Advancing a fundamental argument about the very nature of the legal profession, this book explains the strategies that cause lawyers deploy, as well as the challenges they face in trying to be legally astute and effective while remaining politically devoted and aware. Although it is a controversial way of practicing law, cause lawyering, as explicated in the essays in this volume, is indeed indispensable to the legitimization of professional authority.