Book Review

The author is a major figure in German-speaking countries on aspects of the history of public law, constitutional law, and juridico-political theory. His work in these fields is very well known. Save for Michael Stolleis's multi-volume work Geschichte des öffentlichen Rechts in Deutschland (History of Public Law in Germany), which is not yet complete (vol. 1, Staatsrechtslehre und Verwaltungswissenschaft, 1800-1914, 1992), there is nothing in the field comparable to Friedrich's new book, which deals with the interplay between public law and political history over a period of four hundred years.	1
In the beginning of his book, Friedrich is concerned with the great European controversies between papal and secular authorities since the High Middle Ages. He takes a close look at the intellectual and political situation round about 1600—a time that saw the emergence of the literature and science of public law in Germany (ius publicum imperii Romano-Germanici sive territoriale). Even though the focus of the book is on the development of precisely this new and for a long time particularly German juridico-political discipline known as Staatsrecht since the late eighteenth century, neighboring and auxiliary disciplines, too, are considered at least to some extent. The German term Staatsrecht is almost impossible to translate into most other languages; in English the term closest to it would be constitutional law. While Stolleis's comprehensive book not only covers the ius publicum but also modern politics, natural law, and the special German forerunners of political economy: Policeywissenschaft and Kameralistik, Friedrich's study is confined to the fields of Allgemeines Staatsrecht (general constitutional law), which evolved out of the modern natural law, and the Teutsche Reichshistorie (history of the German Empire)—a precursor of the Verfassungsgeschichte (constitutional history)—as well as the Allgemeines Staatsrecht, and the Verwaltungsrecht (administrative law). The account of the latter and the detailed description of its incubation period do not interfere with the design of a stringent reconstruction of the academic history of constitutional law. Quite rightly, Friedrich refers to the fact that the Verwaltungsrecht had not become effective until the last decades of the nineteenth century. Moreover, the new methodologically sound Staatsrechtslehre (scientific field of constitutional law) established after 1871 was essential for the emergence of the Verwaltungsrechtslehre as a scientific field in its own right. Closely connected as they are, the latter provides an obvious standard for the evaluation of the achievements of the former.	2
About one third of the book is dedicated to the description of the more ancient German Staatsrecht (constitutional law) in its two forms--Reichsrecht (imperial law) and Territorialrecht (territorial law)—that had not completely gone down in the wake of the upheavals of the Napoleonic Era. Even though it is this part of the book in which Friedrich can rest on quite a number of solid and well-founded new pieces of research in the special subject fields under consideration, he presents new insights and better ways of understanding, as for instance when he acknowledges the outstanding achievements of Johann Jakob Moser and Johann Stephan Pütter or in his representation of the beginnings of a Territorialstaatsrecht (territorial law) in the late eighteenth century. However, it is only when he discusses the developments in the nineteenth century and in the Weimar Republic that Friedrich comes to his primary field of interest. Highlights are the convincing reconstruction of the history of the gemeine deutsche Staatsrecht (general German constitutional law [178 and following, 210 and following]). According to Friedrich, this pragmatic and rather eclectic theory served as some kind of surrogate for the missing national unity. Friedrich is impressively successful in shedding light upon the way it took to Carl Friedrich Gerber's systematic restructuring of the Staatsrecht at the beginning of the last third of the nineteenth century. Deservedly, a whole chapter is left to the acknowledgment of Gerber's key achievement. Friedrich's main contribution in this book, however, appears to be the subsequent account of the positivistische Staatsrechtslehre (positivist theory constitutional law) of the Kaiserreich (German Empire) and the Staatsrechtslehre of the Weimar Republic as marked by the attempts of the scholars of that time to come to terms with their field's positivist tradition. Understandably, it is not possible to list any isolated findings in this review. In his book Friedrich does not go beyond the time of the NS Regime. This period is dealt with rather briefly. Thus, it is this part of the book, if any, in which Friedrich's findings and views may provoke criticism.	3
Friedrich does not write a history of dogmas; he writes a history of science. This means that he is primarily interested in the consequences of ideas and theories for the actual work on the Staatsrecht (constitutional law) and the function of the scientific community in a changing environment, rather than specific theoretical developments. The idea is to make the history of this scientific field under varying circumstances and its varying interrelationships with political science and other sciences more transparent—this, of course, cannot be more than a regulative idea because any attempt to accomplish the task would certainly be doomed to fail. Still, Friedrich deserves credit for taking into consideration many of those connected aspects that have been largely neglected by others so far, such as the reflections on the changing importance of the literary genres. Therefore, his work can expect to find its readers not only among those interested in the specific questions of the discipline but those generally interested in the history of science as well.	4
Uwe Jun Harvard University

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