Dedication: Senator Roman L. Hruska

Abstract

There is no possibility of adequately capsulating or even suggesting the contributions Senator Roman L. Hruska has made to the nation and its legal system in a long and productive career. It is nevertheless important to understand that his influence upon the law and upon the institutions that nourish and sustain it has been deep and beneficial. That may be too little realized because we tend to think of law as growing through discrete and public events, like the passage of a statute or the announcement of a judicial decision. But that perspective leaves out of account a great deal of what is most important in the life of the law. Senator Hruska has, of course, figured largely in great legal events, as, for example, in his co-sponsorship of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 and in the public hearings of the Senate Judiciary Committee, where he has been a major and influential figure for years. But those matters are of public record and I should prefer to dwell upon services of equal importance that may not be known to those who have not seen the man at close range and thus learned of achievements not recorded in any document.