Cardozo Society

The Cardozo Society strengthens relationships among Jewish attorneys, judges and law students in Memphis through education and leadership, while working together to enhance the quality of Jewish life in Memphis and throughout the world. The Cardozo Society programming will integrate legal and religious concerns to demonstrate the unique contributions the legal profession can make to improve the Jewish community at large.

Throughout the year, the Cardozo Society offers both educational programming and campaign events targeted specifically to legal professionals.

History

The Cardozo Society is named after the renowned Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Benjamin Cardozo (1870-1938). Appointed to the Supreme Court in 1932 by President Herbert Hoover as a successor to Oliver Wendell Holmes, Cardozo was one of the foremost spokesmen on sociological jurisprudence. His views on the relationship of law to social change made him one of the most influential of U.S. judges. With Justices Louis D. Brandeis and Harlan F. Stone, he voted to uphold much early New Deal legislation, often dissenting from the majority opinion. Cardozo's legacy includes an expansion of the legal duty owed in tort law, expressed in the landmark New York case of MacPherson v. Buick, a seminal case for products liability. He also worked to undergird contract law with principles of fairness, changing a presumption of purely competitive behavior to one of mutually cooperative behavior, and making contract law more reasonable and practical.

For more information, contact Elyssa Pfeffer at epfeffer@jcpmemphis.org or call 901-767-2525.