Most of the things we do, we do for no better reason than that our fathers have done them or our neighbors do them, and the same is true of a larger part than what we suspect of what we think.

It would be strange if it could not call upon those who already sap the strength of the State for these lesser sacrifices often not felt to be such by those concerned to prevent our being swamped with incompetence. He is remembered for prescient opinions on topics as widely separated as copyright the law of contempt the antitrust status of professional baseball and the oath required for citizenship. In 1870 Holmes became an editor of the American Law Review edited a new edition of Kent's Commentaries on American Law in 1873 and publiOliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.d numerous articles on the common law.

Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. His jurisprudence influenced much subsequent American legal thinking including judicial consensus supporting New Deal regulatory law pragmatism critical legal studies and law and economics. " During his tenure on the Supreme Court to which he was appointed by President Theodore Roosevelt he supported efforts for economic regulation and advocated broad freedom of speech under the First Amendment.