Benjamin Nathan Cardozo, unarguably one of the most outstanding judges of the twentieth century, is a man whose name remains prominent and whose contributions to the law remain relevant. This first complete biography of the longtime member and chief judge of the New York Court of Appeals and Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States during the turbulent years of the New Deal is a monumental achievement by a distinguished interpreter of constitutional law.

Cardozo was a progressive judge who understood and defended the proposition that judge-made law must be adapted to modern conditions. He also preached and practiced the doctrine that respect for precedent, history, and all branches of government limited what a judge could and should do. Thus, he did not modernize law at every opportunity.

In this book, Kaufman interweaves the personal and professional lives of this remarkable man to yield a multidimensional whole. Cardozo's family ties to the Jewish community were a particularly significant factor in shaping his life, as was his father's scandalous career--and ultimate disgrace--as a lawyer and judge. Kaufman concentrates, however, on Cardozo's own distinguished career, including twenty-three years in private practice as a tough-minded and skillful lawyer and his classic lectures and writings on the judicial process. From this biography emerges an estimable figure holding to concepts of duty and responsibility, but a person not without frailties and prejudice.

Kaufman recounts all of this, effectively combining legal analysis with biography. Cardozo's father was a judge tarnished with scandal, and it has long been theorized that Cardozo's life was an attempt to retrieve that lost honor. He would, for example, turn down even the simplest gifts that other judges routinely accepted. Kaufman arguably overplays the honor theme when it comes to his legal analysis, most notably in his analysis of Meinhard v. Salmon, in which the judge declared that, in matters of fiduciary obligations, "[a] trustee is held to something stricter than the morals of the marketplace." Kaufman, perhaps stretching Cardozo's opinion too far to reach the desired conclusion, views this decision as "a culmination of Cardozo's efforts to implant a sense of honorable conduct into law."

The only potential downside to the book, other than the occasional desire to see Kaufman address more frequently the thoughts and analysis of other biographers and commentators on Cardozo's life and work, is that Cardozo's virtue risks becoming the biography's failing: his life was his work. He was celibately monkish in his private life, and other than the politicking behind each of his successive appointments to higher courts, Cardozo's political life was for the most part equally quiet. Fortunately, Cardozo's legal output is so varied and important that the biography's necessary focus on his judicial career is not wasted effort for the author or the reader. --Ted Frank