The jubilee of the Journal happens to coincide with the centenary of Head v. Tattersall, the well-known but troublesome case in which the buyer of a horse was allowed to exercise a contractual right to return it (for failure to answer a warranty that it “had been hunted with the Bicester hounds”), despite the fact that it had been accidentally injured in the meantime and could be restored to the seller only in a damaged state. Most contract textbooks cite this as the classic instance of the condition subsequent, by virtue of which a contract or obligation, although initially effective, ceases to operate on the occurence of a specified event. It is apparent, however, on closer analysis that it was not the contract or any aspect of it which was terminated because the horse failed to meet the warranty, but the buyer's title: in other words, the property in the horse passed to the buyer immediately, but defeasibly, so that when he rejected the horse he divested himself of the title and revested it in the seller. Even this explanation leaves on one side the question of the damage sustained by the horse. In the language of the law of sale, it would be most natural to regard this issue as one of risk, and to say that the court held in effect, and indeed perhaps expressly, that the horse was at the seller's risk during the period allowed for its return.

FREEDOM of contract is a fundamental principle of English law, but it is of course qualified by numerous protective regimes, some common law, most statutory nowadays, which protect vulnerable parties from untrammelled, unequal free bargaining. It is, quite rightly, exceptional for an experienced commercial party, negotiating at arm's length and with the benefit of specialist professional advice, to succeed in invoking such a regime to escape being bound by what he freely agreed. Yet, in Cavendish Square Holdings BV v Makdessi [2013] EWCA Civ 1539, this was precisely the controversial result.

ON 16 May 2017, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) delivered its Opinion 2/15 concerning the competence of the EU to conclude the Free Trade Agreement with Singapore (EUSFTA) (ECLI:EU:C:2017:376). The Opinion was requested by the Commission which argued, with the support of the European Parliament (EP), that the EU had exclusive competence to conclude the EUSFTA. The Council and 25 of the Member States countered that the EUSFTA should be concluded as a mixed agreement – that is, by the EU and each of its members – because some of its provisions fell under the shared competence of the organisation or the competence of the Member States alone.

Despite the absence of fraud on the part of the beneficiary of a letter of credit, is the issuing or confirming bank entitled to refuse to pay the beneficiary on the ground that a tendered document is a “nullity” in the sense that it was forged by a third party or has been executed without the authority of the person by whom it purports to be issued?

The title of this article is not felicitous, but the author has not been able to think of one which would be palpably less infelicitous.

The word “transnational” is used simply to indicate that the article is not concerned with inter-state or inter-Provincial situations of the sort liable to arise in federal or composite constitutional structures.

The following judgment was delivered:—

The facts of the cases now before us, which have been consolidated for the purpose of this hearing, fall within a narrow, perhaps too narrow, compass.

The concern of this article is twofold. In the first place it seeks to question the weight and value of the authority upon which the House of Lords in Selvey v. Director of Public Prosecutions purported to found the existence of a judicial discretion to exclude, in a criminal trial, evidence which is both relevant and admissible, on the ground that it is prejudicial to the accused. Secondly, it seeks to evaluate the contribution which such a discretion has made and is likely to make to the theory and practice of the law of evidence.

The series to which the four volumes that are the subject of this article belong began in 1928, and appeared regularly until their production was held up by the recent war. The publication of the 1940 volume was delayed until 1943. Within the last year, activities have been renewed with such success that the volumes for 1942, 1943, 1944 and 1945 have been forwarded to us. The Foreword of Dean Arthur T. Vanderbilt gives impressive imformation about the magnitude of the task. He tells us that in 1942 American reported decisions filled seventy-four books totalling 76,362 pages, and that, although the sittings of most of the legislatures were suspended in that year, enactments nevertheless occupied 8,939 pages. Thus, great as is the burden on the editors of our Annual Survey of English Law (which Dean Vanderbilt courteously mentions as the source of inspiration of the American Annual Survey), it is light compared with that upon the shoulders of those who have to deal with legislation and judicial decisions in over fifty jurisdictions. The aim of each volume of the American Survey is modestly described as merely to present in orderly fashion the significant trends in the more important branches of the law through the year.' This underrates the scope of the work, for it is gratifying to both practitioners and teachers of law to find included in it chapters on ‘Jurisprudence,’ ‘Legal Education, Bar Organization and Economics,’ and ‘Administration of Justice—The Courts and Law Reform.’ Moreover, account is also taken of outstanding literature in the shape of textbooks and articles in law journals.