G. Blaine Baker*

REVIEW ESSAY RECENSION CRITIQUE Interstate Choice of Law and Early-American Constitutional Nationalism. An Essay On Joseph Story and the Comity of Errors:A Case Study in Conflict of Laws G. Blaine Baker* Alan Watson, Joseph Story and the Comity of Errors:A Case Study in Con- flict of Laws. Athens, Ga.: University of Georgia Press, 1992. Pp. x, 136 [$25.00]. In this reiew essay0- Ala Woaso'sJoeph Story and th Comity ofErros Cone recerssiocritique pone r l liem JosephStory aed the Comityof A Core Studyin ConflwstofL-as, the authorpreseots a rcthodologicalpoint. a Eeror.:A CaseStudy in Confliclof L poe Alan Watson.L'awtror soslisv des hotoncal irog-ril. and a hisoriographical ohsersoo. Thosethren kinds of pointsdo rrhrs o r darisel frenmStory's eady-frderahst taiseon Amencairdioice-of- ruenirtodolopique, hioriqe or histotiographiqueon asalys.nt In lisre Commentarie on theCoflicr ofLris. (edt pa Joseph Storyo 1834, emo com. l.w siho. or froa Warsor'scorrpmaoie, historcal stady of that book reontast I'(tide historiquore comparativeque Alan Waloo r fait. TNliauthor's renotthnologcolpoint is thot intllw ttly-osrert .Lgal history Poorer qsi eat de ln rrdthodologre.I'atoter prtend qor I'histoir do droit o=ld aspire to rhengoors of good csltrs hisory. Co larrieiegalhistory dierait (teeauai rui'oe se qn Ihisto .. erscsle. Uric(ude histotiquea com groundedcsnlussely in layers" au. sesereclythe kindsof cathwolconclusions techicol itsource draws materialsfrom those shouldnarow therefore soarees.limt or poetis qsi se smite soirics jaridiqoesprpc nert ditm doit so contentorde coaclusionso"llrstlles birn ndesaon il faat unes ocuoratarionbnoosup plus It dsoo~lespand deasnioally the kinds of r e daryro c reoatrials iche pootiter descooslusionr socialra r tllmctullra plus g6-i-eales. upon hih It rehis i orderto JUstfy sorts! o inrollcual genhralaions. Quant a sonargurrnt historisp,. I'autrreat d'avisqwe Commlentaries on the The asthor's historreal ar-gumritis tha Story's 1834Coouernitote on the Conflit ofLa n'es pas sslrosent u iratiti sor es conflits delois, mai su lisrn Coflsz ofL,"$ is a book abost the eteri.tny of individuals.veatd psivae sur Is suprthatie de I'ndivid. I drois subjentifsot t'impoo cc osenrora rights, andcooscnhosd noriratisity, As stich.that book showldb regarded as n0 hse. Ainsi coon;. cot ovsragn fait pendei aux coatscorotitutionnels de Story. estensionof Story's cooriational scholan p. For ethical, political.and social Poor desraisos morales pohtiq a or socialcs,Story vodlat haonnscr to drot raons. Story was kocr to harnaoniepror at low acrossthe newlyunited Amr- is4 de l1ots omdcoiaqui vcniamitdo s'Cuir. Dans le bt d'uaifonoer In plas can states.As an orinmseasure on the roodto unformity. Story citrphasizod possible n droitptis arncicaio. Story mit I'accentsu I rcgls,gi docorflit de lois cocflct-f.ls doctrineto cnhaoerthe porahiliy of prsately-'cuired nghts, He afin quoIr drois aoquspar tn individo dotarsinsa dond fussnt erapectdspar td the olderEa royan co~t of c lty te,a way of chockingfar th. voluntar- Ir trhrtaux des antos Etst. Par Inbias de In notioncurornn deo oroitasgen. Jnes of Ilnir rirstooary tiopt ion y sbtyosof cho:io-of-lawrides tharitnc ae' tiurm(cortoisic internationale),it parvint Acxpliqe rommrotIra &toisponvairat lly compromisedthir juridcl soseregrty.Story therefore stibsimed the ptmmo- a.cptor desrhglra de conflit quiminnient fur souerainetl. PoorStory. In promo' 1500of harosious relations among states under the imperativesof interstate fion do relationshanonicrss rotr Irm tatsfaissit panic des exicencradu cost. commerceby treotrg eaty aspec of the snorsay ofjrioiarrally.mised m intertatiqo., or 1nnotion do comirs geersornnentait do ptotgr Ira prisate ights ted the consl-rhorod cflhy of statesto rigoiste with tech other does sujrctifs pedel Ira frorhe aiquo tooten rconoaissant au Ean abi tho scopeand sturtre of conflictsrole s possiibili do discutordes rftlt do conflits doloss or do los. nodalits. "[he author's hisoriogrZaphicalpoint is that Story's unpro nted. Anglo- L'obsevrotn histoiographkonquo nots lim l'autr eatqte toate analyse Amrecan w ot on interstate choice-of.lawissues shosildbe consideredin the con. du trit6 do Storydoit s'appn)r roeIr i(tudesqui nt d efftectuiesdu drol corn. test of modrs hitoncal scholarshipthat trcas UnitedStem constittiorl rhoei tittionnl amdricio do la p~iode prctdrt ln gnerede S sion. e pasuniqer- 0i0 in sheacnlisa peod, rather than solely on the basis of North Atlantic rnt sur lI docrtres nord.aoEricaim en martinmde oonfliss de lost. Lorsqun tralioas of o r ereMsionalltw. Beca s Comretasieson the Coofltsl of Story svcriit Consuerateesn the Conflienqttao$o naiosismet onstitution. Lsassow ritronIan Amrorca coib:hle of constinooal outionaliso.fderahst e Ismaitsn plins on, toas-Unis,ta ascts p,6tonisni untnr ision f(dinaliste la,)o ng ted market isure.the rich .Nonlary htrratureon states rights.eady. do pay, or toutle mondecroyait an posvoirnagiqts dn nnchir pourcomprendr Aricr canrepubhcaoisrn, and the role of rontebellumlawyers to the consolidation In postndede Story en matitns doconflit d los, i faut dos poiror doansla hlt- of recrotly-arqumredfederal gains offers promising tosichstonesfor "stended catur abondart traiant desdroits des bts. dn ripublicaistoe amridcin nain- esacsinatsonof Story'schotio-of.law thought. sont,or do r6le desavocats dae Ia consolidationdo pouvoir f dml. *Faculty of Law and Institute of Comparative Law, McGill University. Willis Reese, a long- tenured member of the Columbia Law School, taught me most of what I know about conflicts of law. Despite the fact Reese thought that in private international law "a page of history is worth less than a blank sheet", he was eccentrically supportive of the historical curiosity of others.' He intro- duced me to John Gorham Palfrey, whose family had mingled with the Storys for eight or ten gen- erations, and he took me to see the saintly, stained-glass depictions of Joseph Story in the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine, a few blocks from Columbia University. And Reese is one of the few teaching models of whom I think regularly when I'walk into the classroom. He was also a lively postal correspondent and a gracious guest in our Canadian home long after I graduated from law school. I have honoured his memory in my prayers, and am now glad to be able to do so publicly. © McGill Law Journal 1993 Revue de droit de McGill To be cited as: (1993) 38 McGill L.J. 454 Mode de r6fdrence: (1993) 38 R.D. McGill 454 IW.L.M. Reese & M. Rosenberg, Cases and Materials on Conflict of Laws, 7th ed. (Mineola, N.Y.: Foundation Press, 1978) at 4. 1993] REVIEW ESSAY Synopsis Introduction I. Early-Modern Choice-of-Law Doctrine II. Federal Institutions and Conflicts of Law II. Interstate Commerce and Constitutional Centrism IV. New England Legal Culture and Normative Uniformity V. Federalist Values and Choice-of-Law Methodology VI. Choice-of-Interstate-Contract Law Conclusion Introduction Almost fifteen years ago, as a student in Willis Reese's "Advanced Con- flict of Laws" seminar at Columbia Law School, I prepared a term paper on Joseph Story's Commentaries on the Conflict of Laws.2 That paper was a tenta- tive history of a uniquely-influential, one-hundred-and-fifty-year-old book. Reese awarded me a passing grade but, as I should have anticipated from the Chief Reporter of the current Restatement of Conflicts and co-editor of a leading American conflicts casebook, he scrawled across the title page of that essay: "Have you said enough about the logic of Story's choice-of-law rules them- selves?"3 Soon afterwards, I presented that paper to Lea Brilmayer's "Conflicts" class at the University of Chicago Law School. Brilmayer, an emerging Storyes- que presence among contemporary American conflicts scholars, thought I had devoted sufficient attention to the symmetry of Story's black-letter rules but wanted to know much more about the policies that underlay and motivated them.4 Later the same year I delivered that paper again to a University of Wis- 2J. Story, Commentarieson the Conflict of Laws, Foreignand Domestic, in Regard to Contracts, Rights, and Remedies, and Especially in Regard to Marriages,Divorces, Wills, Successions, and Judgments (Boston: Hilliard, Gray and Company, 1834) [hereinafter Commentaries on Conflicts]. A portion of that 1979 term paper was published as G.B. Baker, "Social Planning and Nineteenth- Century American Choice of Law" in H.M. Blake & S.W. Bruchey, eds., Law and American Eco- nomic Development, vol. 3 (New York: Columbia Law School, 1981) at 962. 3 See Restatement (Second)of Conflict of Laws (1969) [hereinafter Restatement (Second) of Con- flicts]; Reese & Rosenberg, supra note 1. For profiles of Reese, see generally H. Smit, "In Memo- riam: Willis Livingston Mesier Reese" (1991) 91 Colum. L. Rev. 1, and the Reese festschrift in (1981) 81 Colum. L. Rev. 933. 4 See generally L. Brilmayer, Conflict of Laws: Foundations and Future Directions(Waltham, Mass.: Little, Brown, 1991) at 145-235. Anglo-American private international law traditionally REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL [Vol. 38 consin Law School workshop, which triggered a pointed intervention by Bob Gordon. Gordon said contextual aspects of Story's treatise-writing project, like antebellum (pre-Civil War) cultures of professionalism, should dominate a his- 5 tory of Commentaries on Conflicts. Those substantially different responses from enthusiastic mentors daunted me. I therefore postponed indefinitely reflection on Joseph Story and early- nineteenth-century

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