General Principles of Criminal Law. Second Edition.

The Most Important Treatise on Criminal Law Produced by American Legal ScholarshipFirst published to great acclaim in 1947 Hall's General Principles of Criminal Law is one of the undisputed classics in its field. It provides more than a broad overview. Drawing on his expertise in jurisprudence and the work of the legal realists it analyzes the principles that comprise criminal activity with an emphasis on its creation and definition by officials. This process is explored in the chapters on criminology criminal theory and penal theory and in more specific terms the chapters on legality mens rea harm causation punishment strict liability ignorance and mistake necessity and coercion mental disease intoxication and criminal attempt. For many years our standard work on criminal law has been Bishop's. First published in 1856 Bishop's is the only American book in the field that has conspicuously influenced our criminal law. (...) When Jerome Hall's General Principles of Criminal Law (1947) appeared it represented the first significant effort to articulate the principles of criminal law since Bishop's era. Hall's work may in fact represent the most important treatise on criminal law produced by American legal scholarship. --Fred Cohen Journal of Legal Education 16 (1963-64) 260.