Black's Law Dictionary
Black's Law Dictionary is the definitive law dictionary for the law of the United States. It was founded by Henry Campbell Black. It has been cited as legal authority in many Supreme Court cases (see Secondary authority). The latest edition, including abridged and pocket versions, are a useful starting points for the layman or student when faced with a completely unfamiliar legal word. It is the reference of choice for definitions in legal briefs and court opinions.
Black, Henry Campbell, 1860-1927.
Henry Campbell Black, best known as the author of Black's Law Dictionary, was also a constitutional scholar. He helped to found the National Association for Constitutional Government, "organized in 1914 'to expound and defend the principles of Constitutional Government' against proposals from Progressive politicians such as Theodore Roosevelt to limit the powers of the judiciary" (Grossman). He was also the editor of the group's journal, The Constitutional Review, for the first ten years of its existence, from 1917 until his death in 1927. Bryan A. Garner, himself an accomplished lexicographer and the editor-in-chief of the 7th and 8th editions of Black's Law Dictionary, observed, "There can be little doubt that, perhaps apart from John Cowell, Black was the most erudite lawyer ever to write a dictionary."
The first edition of Black's Law Dictionary was published in 1891. While other law dictionaries continued to be important after the first edition of Black's appeared, Black's work would soon rise to dominate the legal dictionary field. "Black, in a single volume, had the best slimmed-down alternative to Bouvier's dictionary" (Grossman). In his preface, Black wrote that his aim was to publish the first comprehensive law dictionary. He acknowledged his reliance on other law dictionaries and treatises in preparing his work. However, he also noted that his dictionary contained many entries for "which the definition had to be written entirely de novo."
See: George S. Grossman, "Early American Lexicographers", in Language and the Law: Proceedings of a Conference (2003); Bryan A. Garner, "Legal Lexicography: A View from the Front Lines", in Language and the Law: Proceedings of a Conference (2003).
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