The Gazette 1967/71

BOOK REVIEWS

ternational agreements arising under the Treaty of Rome.

Compensation for Road Accidents, ALEXANDER SZAKATS, pp. 173. Sweet & Maxwell, 1968, 30/-. is a very useful study on the position of absolute liability and social insurance, following Mr. Terence G. Ison's interesting The Forensic Lottery (1967) which was described as a critique on tort liability as a system of personal injury compensation. In New Zealand, a committee on Absolute Liability has presented its report as long ago as 1963. Some of the opinions expressed by the author may stir up considerable controversies and arguments, but the time is ripe for discussion. The author describes systematically first the com mon lav/ system based on proof of negligence, followed by a brief comparative study of the pro blem in foreign law countries, followed by a con sideration of the Saskatchewan scheme. The last chapter suggests an organised research project. This most readable book is strongly recom mended. This is the text of three lectures delivered by Judge Donner, of the Court of Justice of the European Community, at the North Western University, Chicago, under the auspices of the Julius Rosen- thal Foundation in 1966. In the first lecture on "The Legal Nature of the European Communi ties", Judge Donner shows the theory of "Supra- nationality" as a middle way between Sovereignty and International Organisations and between the interpretation of the Treaty of Rome as an inter national treaty or as internal constitutional law. In the second lecture on "Community Law and the Legal Tower of Babel", Judge Donner sym pathises with his brethren who have to consider such concepts as "detournement de pouvoir" (much wider in its German and Italian context) and "faute de service" so specifically favoured in French jurisprudence. There is no doubt but that national traditional customs and conceptions must be abandoned if Community Law is, under the Treaty, to be uniformly interpreted and applied. In the third lecture in "The Law as a Factor of Integration", it is stressed that the European Court has clearly indicated in specific judgments that municipal law must give way to community law in the national courts. In other words, the narrow construction of the Supreme Court in the Lawless case (1957) will inevitably have to bs reversed as regards the application of futher in­ This The Role of the Lawyer in the European Com munities, ANDRE M. DONNER, 8vo., pp. xvii, 91. Edinburgh University Press, 1968, 21/-.

Uniform Laws on International Sales Act 1967, PROFESSOR R. H. CRAVESON and PROFESSOR E. J. GOHN, pp. xii, 195. Buttcrworths, 1968, 72/-. The price of this slim volume indicates that it deals with a very specialised subject. The Presi dent of the High Court, Mr. Justice O'Keeffe, represented Ireland when the Hague Conventions on the Unification of Law Governing the Inter national Sales of Goods and the Formation of Contracts relating thereto were signed in 1964. The British Government ratified the convention, provided that each party to the contract has his place ofbusiness, or, if none, by habitual residence in the territory of a different contracting state, and provided the parties concerned have chosen the Uniform Law as the law of the contract. The 1967 Act was passed in Britain to implement the Hague Convention, but it is not yet in force, as the number of countries who have ratified the convention is not yet sufficient. It is important to note that the convention relating to a Uniform Law on the International Sale of Goods contains no less than 101 articles, and that it will become increasingly important in the future. This annota ted volume is invaluable for the detailed com ments it gives on each of the intricate problems that may arise. delightful way about the sayings, wise and other wise, of Sergeant Arabin, who was the third Judge in the Old Bailey. William St. Julien Arabin, born in 1775, was educated at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and called to the Bar in 1801. In 1824 he became a Sergeant-at-Law, and Deputy Judge-Advocate in the British Army. He was a Commissioner of the Central Criminal Court from 1834 until 1841, when he died at 66 years of age. Sergeant Arabin was an eccentric in his ideas as in his logic, and he gave short shrift to prisoners appearing before him. Why these ideas, first pub lished in 1843 under the title Arabiniana should ever have seen the light of day is difficult to imagine but Mr. Justice Megarry in his own inimitable learned way has turned some dull say ings into a sparkling narrative. The booklet is dedicated without permission to the redoubtable Rayner Goddard, and the profits go to the English Barrister's Benevolent Association. : 61 Arabinesquc at Law, HON. SIR ROBERT MEGARRY, 8vo., pp. xiv, 37. Wildy, 1969, 12/6. Mr. Justice Megarry has written in his own