William S. Stevens, 60, Dies; Wrote Infield Fly Note

New York Times ^ | 12/11/08 | William Grimes

[T-Bird45]

William S. Stevens, whose slyly humorous law-review note on the relationship between baseball’s infield fly rule and Anglo-American common law became one of the most celebrated and imitated analyses in American legal history, died Monday in Anchorage, where he was working. He was 60 and lived in Narberth, Pa.

"The Common Law Origins of the Infield Fly Rule," 1975 The cause was a heart attack, said T. Dennis Sullivan, his brother-in-law.

Mr. Stevens was a law student at the University of Pennsylvania in 1975 when he wrote an anonymous note for the university’s law review that drew an ingenious analogy between the infield fly rule and development of common law.

[T-Bird45]

It may be the NYT but the article is definitely worth the click-thru, especially for non-lawyers and those not familiar with the infield fly rule. The law review note written by Mr. Stevens seems to have taken on a unique life of its own within the world of law.

RIP, Mr. Stevens, your humor, insight, and analytical mind will be missed.

[vladimir998]

I suppose what Stevens did for Common Law, John T. Noonan did for canon law with “Gratian slept here: the changing identity of the father of the systematic study of canon law,” Traditio 35 (1979): 145-172.

[Larry Lucido]

Somehow this eluded me. I’ll have to read it now. RIP. He was way too young.

[fieldmarshaldj]

RIP.