Gale Encyclopedia Of American Law 3Rd Edition Volume 7 P34 docx

Joachim von Ribbentrop, Germany’s foreign
minister during World War II, was convicted on
all four counts and sentenced to death. When he
took the
WITNESS STAND, the prosecution asked
him if he considered Germany’s invasions of
Poland, Denmark, Norway, Greece, France, and
the Soviet Union “acts of aggression.” In each
case Ribbentrop answered in the negative,
arguing that such invasions were more properly
described as acts of war. Confronted with
evidence that he had urged the German regent
of Hungary to exterminate the Jews in that
country, Ribbentrop responded only by saying
that he did not use those words exactly.
Ernst Kaltenbrunner was the head of the
Reich Central Security Office, the Nazi organi-
zation in charge of the Gestapo and the SD
(Sicherheitsdienst, Security Service, the German
intelligence agency) and was second in command
to Himmler at the SS. Kaltenbrunner faced a
mountain of evidence demonstrating that he
visited a number of concentration camps and
had personally witnessed prisoners being gassed
and incinerated. One letter signed by Kalten-
brunner authorized the execution of Allied
prisoners of war, and another letter authorized
the conscription and deportation of foreign
laborers. Laborers who were too weak to contrib-
ute, Kaltenbrunner wrote, should be executed,
regardless of their age or gender. Kaltenbrunner

received a death sentence after being convicted
under counts III and IV.
Alfred Rosenberg was the Nazi minister for
the occupied Eastern European territories.
Rosenberg told Axis troops that the accepted
rules of land warfare could be disregarded in
areas under his control. He ordered the
SEGREGA-
TION
of Jews into ghettos where his subordinates
murdered them. His signature was found at the
bottom of a directive approving the deportation
of 45,000 youths to German labor camps.
Cross-examined about his role in the unlawful
confiscation of Jewish property, Rosenberg
claimed that all such property was seized to
protect it from Allied bombing raids. Rosenberg
was found guilty on all four counts and sentenced
to death by hanging.
Hans Frank, the governor-general of Poland
during German occupation, was sentenced to
hang after being convicted on counts III and IV.
Frank described his administration ’s policy by
stating that Poland was “treated like a colony”
in which the Polish people became “the slaves of
the Greater German World Empire.” The tribunal
found that this policy entailed the destruction of
Poland as a national entity, the evisceration of all
political opposition, and the ruthless exploitation
of human resources to promote Hitler’sreign

of terror. While on the witness stand, Frank
confessed to participating in the Nazis’ systematic
attempt to annihilate the Jewish race.
Wilhelm Frick, the German minister of
interior, was found guilty on counts I, II, and III
and sentenced to be hanged. Frick had signed
decrees sanctioning the execution of Jews and
other persons held in so-called
PROTECTIVE
CUSTODY
at the concentration camps and had
given Himmler a blank check to take any so-
called security measures necessary to ensure the
German foothold in the occupied territories.
The tribunal also determined that Frick exer-
cised supreme authority over Bohemia and
Moravia and was responsible for implementing
Hitler’s policies of enslavement, deportation,
torture, and extermination in these territories.
Wilhelm Keitel, field marshall for the High
Command of the armed forces, was sentenced
to die after being found guilty on every count.
On
DIRECT EXAMINATION Keitel admitted that
there were “a large numb er of or ders” bearing
his signature that “contained deviations from
existing international law.” He also conceded
that a number of atrocities had been committed
under his command during Germany’s invasion
of the Soviet Union. As a defense to these

charges, Keitel asserted that he had been
following the orders of his superiors when
committing these crimes. Yet some witnesses
testifying on behalf of the defense tended to
undermine this assertion.
Alfred Jodl, chief of the operations staff
for the armed forces, also received the death
sentence after being convicted on every count.
During the early stages of World War II, Jodl
had been asked to review an order drafted by
Hitler authorizing German troops to execute
all Soviet military commissars captured during
the Nazi invasion of Russia. Aware that this
order was a violation of the customs, practices,
and laws governing the treatment of prisoners
during times of war, Jod l made no attempt to
dissuade Hitler from issuing it. Jodl was also
found responsible for distributing an order that
authorized the execution of Allied commandos
caught by the Axis powers and for mobilizing
the German army against its European foes.
GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION
318 NUREMBERG TRIALS
Julius Streicher, an anti-Semitic propagan-
dist, was found guilty of count IV and sentenced
to death. Author, editor, and publisher of Der
Stuermer, a privately owned Jew-baiting news-
paper, Streicher held no meaningful govern-
ment position with the Axis powers during
World War II. Yet the tribunal determined that

circulation of Streicher’s racist newspaper had
fueled the Nazis’ maniacal hatred of Jews and
fomented an atmosphere in which genocide was
acceptable and desirable. The prosecution
introduced an article Streicher had published
during 1942 in which he described Jewish
procreation as a curse of God that could only
be lifted through a proce ss of political and
ethnic emasculation.
Albert Speer, Nazi minister of armaments,
received a prison term of 20 years after being
convicted on counts III and IV. Speer had
fascinated Hitler long before the war with his
architectural prowess, designing buildings that
were both immense and imposing. After the war
began, however, Speer’s primary obligation was
to supply the German armed forces with military
supplies, equipment, and weapons. Thus, Speer
became a lynchpi n in the Nazi military empire.
In an effort to maintain this empire, the pro-
secution demonstrated, Speer had repeatedly
cajoled Hitler to procure foreign labor to work
in his weapons factories.
Arthur Seyss-Inquart, an Austrian who was
appointed by Hitler to govern Austria and the
Netherlands during German occupation, was
found guilty on counts II, III, and IV and
sentenced to death for his confessed mistreatment
of racial minorities in those territories, including
the deportation of more than 250,000 Jews to

Germany. Seyss-Inquart also assisted Hitler’s
takeover of Austria, Poland, and Czechoslovakia.
Baron Konstantin von Neurath, Reich
protector of Czechoslovakia, was convicted on
all four counts and sentenced to 15 years in
prison for participating in the Nazi militariza-
tion campaign. Hoping to immunize the Nazi
regime from its obligations under
INTERNATIONAL
LAW
, Neurath had advocated Germany’s with-
drawal from the
LEAGUE OF NATIONS and de-
nounced the Versailles Treaty that had formally
concluded
WORLD WAR I. Neurath was also
implicated in various brutalities committed
against the Czechoslovakian civilian population.
Baldur von Schirach, governor of occupied
Vienna and leader of the Hitler Youth, was
convicted on count IV and sentenced to a
20 year prison term. The IMT determined that
Schirach had provided the visceral foundations
for the militarization of Germany’s youngest
Nazis through psychological and educational
indoctrination and had conspired with Hitler
to deport Viennese Jews to Poland where most
of them met their death. Fritz Sauckel, the
plenipotentiary general for the allocation of
labor, was convicted on counts III and IV and

sentenced to death for his central role in the
Nazi forced labor program that enslaved more
than 11 million Europeans.
Erich Raeder served as Germany’s naval
commander and chief until 1943 when he
resigned due to a disagreement with Hitler,
and he was succeeded by Karl Doenitz. Both
Raeder and Doenitz were indicted under counts
I, II, and III for war crimes committed on the
high seas, and both were convicted based in part
on evidence that they had authorized German
submarines to fire on Allied commercial ships
without warning in contravention of interna-
tional law. Doenitz was sentenced to a ten-year
prison term, and Raeder received a life sentence.
Walther Funk, Nazi minister of economics, also
received a life sentence for financing Germany’s
aggressive warfare and for exploiting foreign
laborers in German industry.
The IMT declared four Nazi organizations
to be criminal: the SS, the SD, the Gestapo, and
the Nazi Party. A team of Allied attorneys,
including American Telford Taylor, subsequently
prosecuted individual members of these organi-
zations. Three Nazi organizations were acquitted:
the SA (Sturmabteilung, the paramilitary orga-
nization also known as the Brownshirts or
Stormtroopers), and the general staff and High
Command of the German armed forces.
The Nuremberg trials made three important

contributions to international law. First, they
established a precedent that all persons, regard-
less of their station or occupation in life, can be
held individually accountable for their behavior
during times of war. Defendants cannot insulate
themselves from personal responsibility by
blaming the country, government, or military
branch for which they committed the particular
war crime.
Second, the Nuremberg trials established
that individuals cannot shield themselves from
liability for war crimes by asserting that they
were simply following orders issued by a superior
GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION
NUREMBERG TRIALS 319
in the chain of command. Subordinates in the
military or government are now bound by their
obligations under international law, obligations
that transcend their duty to obey an order
issued by a superior. Orders to initiate aggres-
sive (as opposed to defensive) warfare, to violate
recognized rules and customs of warfare, or to
persecute civilians and prisoners are considered
illegal under the Nuremberg principles.
Third, the Nuremberg trials clearly estab-
lished three discrete substantive war crimes that
are punishable under international law: crimes
against peace, crimes against humanity, and
crimes in violation of transnational obligations
embodied in treaties and other agreements.

Before the Nuremberg trials, these crimes w ere
not well defined, and persons who committed
such crimes had never been punished by a
multinational tribunal. For these reasons the
Nuremberg convictions have sometimes been
criticized as ex post facto justice.
The Nuremberg trials have also been criti-
cized as “victor’sjustice.” Historians have
observed that the Allied nations that tried and
convicted the leading Nazis at Nuremberg did
not come to the table with c lean hands. The
Soviet Union had participated in Germany’s
invasion and occupation of Poland and had been
implicated in the massacre of more than one
thousand Poles in the Katyn forest. Bombing
raids conducted by the United States and Great
Britain during World War II left thousands of
civilians dead in such cities as Dresden, Germany,
and Nagasaki and Hiroshima, Japan. President
Roosevelt had implemented a relocation pro-
gram for more than 100,000 Americans of
Japanese descent that confined them to concen-
tration camps around the United States.
The Nuremberg trials were not typical
partisan trials, though. The defendants were
afforded the
RIGHT TO COUNSEL, plus a panoply of
evidentiary and procedural protections. The
Nuremberg verdicts demonstrate that these
protections were taken seriously by the tribunal.

The IMT completely exonerated thre e defen-
dants of war crimes and acquitted most of the
remaining defendants of at least some charges.
Thus, the Nuremberg trials, while not perfect,
changed the face of international law, both
procedurally and substantively.
The Nuremberg trials had both an immedi-
ate and enduring effect on international law.
In 1950 the United Nations International Law
Commission adopted a document that set out
the Principles of International Law Recognized
in the Charter of the Nuremberg Tribunal
and the Judgment of the Tribunal. These core
principles include the responsibility of indivi-
duals for international crimes, the right of each
accused to a fair trial; and the pronounce-
ment that one’s position as a head of state or
responsible government official does not relieve
the person of criminal responsibility. These
principles have remained at the center of inter-
national
CRIMINAL LAW. The Nuremberg trials
have influenced development of the law of war,
including the Geneva Conventions, and inter-
national
HUMAN RIGHTS law. The establishment
in 1998 of a permanent
INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL
COURT
, located in The Hague, that prosecutes

crimes against humanity and war crimes owed
much to the Nuremberg trials. However, the
United States has declined to sign the statute.
FURTHER READINGS
Annas, George J. 2009. “The Legacy of the Nurembert
Doctors’ Trial to American Bioethics and Human
Rights.” Minnesota Journal of Law, Science, and
Technology. Winter.
Borgwardt, Elizabeth. 2008. “ANewDealfortheNuremberg
Trial: The Limits of Law in Generating Human Rights
Norms.” Law and History Review. Fall.
Conot, Robert. 1983. Justice at Nuremberg. New York:
Carrol & Graf.
Davidson, Eugene. 1997. The Trial of the Germans. Columbia:
Univ. of Missouri Press.
Gilbert, G. M. 1995. Nuremberg Diary. New York: Da Capo
Press.
Green, L. C. 1995. “Command Responsibility in Interna-
tional Humanitarian Law.” Transnational Law and
Contemporary Problems 5.
Lippman, Matthew. 1991. “Nuremberg: Forty-five Years
Later.” Connecticut Journal of International Law 7.
Schiff, Benjamin. 2008. Building the International Criminal
Court. New York: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Taylor, Telford. 1992. The Anatomy of the Nuremberg Trials.
New York: Little, Brown.
CROSS REFERENCE
Tokyo Trial.
GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION
320 NUREMBERG TRIALS

OATH
An individual’s appeal to God or a sacred person
or thing to witness the truth of what he or she is
saying or a pledge to do something enforced by the
individual’s responsibility to answer to God or the
sacred person or thing.
Similarly, an affirmation is a solemn and
formal declaration that a statement is true;
however, an affirmation includes no reference
to God or a sacred person or thing, so it can be
made by someone who does not believe in God
or by an individual who has conscientious
objections against swearing to God or a sacred
person or thing. Provisions in state statutes or
constitutions ordinarily allow affirmations to be
made as alternatives to oaths.
In order for an oath to be leg ally effective, it
must be administered by a public official. The
law creating each public office and describing
the duties of the official ordinarily indicates who
is authorized to administer the oath of office. If
an oath is legally effective, the person making
the oath could be punished through penalties
for
PERJURY if the statement made under oath is
found to be false. A spoken oath is generally
sufficient; however, a written and signed oath
can be required by law.
The most famous oath prescribed by law in
the United States is the oath repeated by the

president-elect upon taking the office of the
presidency. Other examples of oaths include a
judicial oath, taken during a court proceeding;
an oath in litem, taken by a
PLAINTIFF in
testifying to the value of something; and a
promissory oath, which binds the party to
specific conduct in the future.
v
OBAMA, BARACK HUSSEIN, JR.
In 2008, Barack Obama was elected as the forty-
fourth president of the United States, the first
African American to hold that office. A
Democratic senator from Illinois at the time
of his election in November 2008 , Obama
prevailed in two hard-fought campaigns against
Senator
HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON (D-N.Y.) for
the Democratic nomination and against Re-
publican Senator
JOHN MCCAIN (R-Ariz.) for the
presidency.
Obama was born on August 4, 1961, in
Honolulu, Hawaii. He was named after his
father, a Kenyan exchange student. Obama’s
mother, Ann, was a white American who had
moved to Honolulu from Kansas with her
parents. Obama’s family dissolved when he was
two; his father won a scholarship to Harvard
that was not sufficient to support a family, and

he moved to Massachusetts alone. After finish-
ing his degree, the elder Obama went back to
Kenya and took a job as an economic planner
for the country’s government. He continued to
write letters to his son and visited him once
when the boy was ten, but his marriage to
Obama’s mother ended in 1964. Ann then met
Indonesian oil company executive Lolo Soetoro
in Hawaii, and they were married in 1967. The
O
321
family left Hawaii and moved to Indonesia
when Obama was six. His half-sister, Maya, was
born in Indonesia in 1970.
In 1971, the ten-year-old Obama was sent
back to Hawaii to live with his maternal
grandparents and attend Punahou, an elite
college preparatory school to which he had
attained a scholarship with his grandparents’
help. These adolescent years brought difficulties
for Obama. Although other students appre-
ciated Obama’s winning personality and ability
on the basketball court, he was still teased for
his unusual name and discriminated against by
other black students for having a white family.
Obama himself struggled with his mixed-race
identity and sought to figure out how he fit in
with the rest of the world. As he grew into his
teenage years, his inner conflicts and journey of
self-discovery led him to experiment with

marijuana and cocaine, and his commitment
to bodysurfing and basketball seemed stronger
than his interest in school. Despite his obvious
intelligence, his grades were inconsistent at
times. Nonetheless, Obama graduated with
honors from Punahou in 1979.
After his high school graduation, Obama left
Hawaii for Los Angeles to attend Occidental
College, a small suburban liberal arts school.
Obama felt out of place at Occidental, and by
his sophomore year he decided to transfer to
Columbia University in New York City. He
hoped that the school’s urban location would
provide a more diverse environment. Entering
Columbia in his junior year, Obama enjoyed
New York but found that racial tension infected
even “the stalls of Columbia’s bathrooms,“he
wrote in Dreams from My Father, “where, no
matter how many times the administration tried
to paint them over, the walls remained
scratched with blunt correspondence” between
African American and Jewish students.
After graduating in 1983, Obama moved to
Chicago to spend three years as a community
organizer on the city’s poverty-stricken South
Side. Obama’s intellect, drive, and social
conscience led to his decision to become a
lawyer. He went to Harvard Law School, where
he became the first African American president
of the prestigious Harvard Law Review. Upon

his graduation magna cum laude in 1991,
Obama shunned offers of prominent law firms
and impressive clerkships in order to practice
CIVIL RIGHTS law in Chicago and write a book
about his life. He also took a position teaching
CONSTITUTIONAL LAW at the University of Chicago
Barack Hussein Obama Jr. 1961–
▼▼
▼▼
❖
1961 Born,
Honolulu, Hawaii
2001 September 11 terrorist attacks;
PATRIOT Act signed into law
1961–73
Vietnam War
2000
1975
1960
◆◆
◆ ◆
◆◆
◆◆
◆
1967
Family
moved to
Indonesia
1971 Obama
returned to

Hawaii
1979 Enrolled at
Occidental College,
a liberal arts school
1981 Transferred
to Columbia
University; earned
B.A. in 1983
1991 Graduated magna
cum laude from
Harvard Law School;
first African American
president of the
Harvard Law Review
1995 Published Dreams from My Father, a memoir
1996–2004 Served
in Illinois Senate
2004 Elected to
U.S. Senate
◆ ◆ ◆
2006 The Audacity of
Hope published
2007 Announced intent to run for president
2008 Won Democratic
nomination; elected
44
th
president of the
United States
◆◆

2009 Signed the
Lilly Ledbetter Fair
Pay Act; received
Nobel Peace Prize
2003 U.S. troops invaded Iraq
2009 Dreams named
Biography of the Year at the
Galaxy British Book Awards
President Barack
Obama takes the
presidential oath of
office during his
inauguration
ceremony in
Washington D.C.
TIM SLOAN/AFP/GETTY
IMAGES
GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3
RD E DITION
322 OBAMA, BARACK HUSSEIN, JR.
Law School. Soon the idealistic young attorney
became involved in politics.
Obama was elected to the Illinois Senate in
1996, representing the Thirteenth District as a
Democrat. His work there included writing
landmark legislation to stop
RACIAL PROFILING and
sponsoring a bill to expand medical coverage for
uninsured children. He also developed a
reputation for an inclusive style that eschewed

mud-slinging and gained the admiration of his
opponents.
In March 2004 Obama took his efforts to
connect with all kinds of people to the
Democratic primary for the U.S. Senate. His
message apparently resounded with voters, as he
won a surprising 53 percent of the vote,
including support from white blue-collar work-
ers. Obama explained his appeal across demo-
graphic lines to Bob Herbert of the New York
Times. While admi tting there are differences
among people, Obama said there is also “a set of
core values that bind us together as Americans.”
His message continued to resonate with voters,
and Obama became only the third African
American U.S. senator since
RECONSTRUCTION.
Obama continued to attract attention while
serving in the Senate, in no part due to his
charisma, drive, and desire to find common
ground with political opposites. From practi-
cally the moment he entered the office, he w as
asked if he would run for president in 2008.
Obama did not commit right away, but served
his constituents and let all voters better
understand him and his philosophy with his
memoir Dreams from My Father (originally
published in 1995, but republished in 2004) and
his 2006 bestseller The Audacity of Hope.
After announcing his candidacy for the

Democratic nomination for president in Febru-
ary 2007, Obama immediately began campaign-
ing in Iowa. Though he was still relativ ely
unknown compared to
HILLARY CLINTON and
John Edwards, Obama made inroads and his
campaign gained momentum throughout the
year and into primary and caucus season.
Obama won the Iowa caucuses, and though he
lost in New Hampshire, he made steady gains
throughout January 2008. By February 2008,
Edwards had drop ped out of the race, and
Obama continued to win key primaries and
caucuses over Clinton. He did well on Super
Tuesday, then won at least ten straight pri-
maries and caucuses held after that date. Obama
succeeded on the fundraising front as well,
averaging one million dollars in donations per
day. Whereas Obama had emerged as the
frontrunner and was beating Clinton in the
delegate count after February 19 primaries in
Wisconsin and Hawaii, he had not yet sewn up
the nomination and continued to campaign
vigorously.
In early June 2008 Obama clinched the
Democratic nomina tion for president by secur-
ing more than the 2,118 delegates needed,
becoming the first African American candidate
to lead a major party ticket. As his running
mate, Obama chose Senator Joe Biden of

Delaware, a leading authority on fo reign policy.
The Obama/Biden team billed themselves as
“Change We Need,” while their Republican
opponents, Senator John McCain and Governor
Sarah Palin of Alaska, presented themselves as
proven “mavericks” who could more effectively
bring change to Washington.
In addition to engaging McCain in a series
of debates, Obama addressed the nation in a
half-hour info mercial on October 29, 2008.
Playing on seven networks, the program had
more than thirty-three millio n viewers, which
was larger than that of the final game of the
World Series. This exposure provided an
opportunity for Obama to lay out his agenda
for change in some detail and allowed voters to
Barack Obama.
COURTESY OF THE
WHITE HOUSE
CHANGE WILL NOT
COME IF WE WAIT FOR
SOME OTHER PERSON
OR SOME OTHER
TIME
.WE ARE THE
ONES WE
’VE BEEN
WAITING FOR
.WE
ARE THE CHANGE

THAT WE SEEK
.
—BARACK OBAMA
GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION
OBAMA, BARACK HUSSEIN, JR. 323
become familiar with a candidate, painted by his
opponents as an inexperienced radical who was
quite possibly dangerous. He made his case
effectively, and on November 4, 2008, Obama
decisively defeated McCain to become the
president of the United States. He was inaugu-
rated on January 20, 2009.
On the campaign trail, Obama supported a
foreign policy based on mutual respect and
understanding, and observers around the world
hoped that the United States would move away
from the unilateral foreign policies of the
GEORGE W. BUSH administration, which many
perceived as riding roughshod over the wishes
of allies and the sovereignty of enemies. At
home, Obama was seen as a personification of
the American dream, in which any child,
regardless of his or her circumstances, can grow
up to become president by means of ability and
hard work.
Though as a candidate Obama capitalized
on having voted against the U.S. invasion of
Iraq, once he took office the national economy
was the most pressing issue. Obama signed a
$787 billion spending plan intended to stimu-

late the U.S. economy, and he announced a
$500,000 salary limit on top executives from
companies that had requested federal bailouts.
He also introduced a $75 billion plan that he
said would help as many as 9 million Americans
with mortgage problems. Automakers General
Motors and Chrysler spiraled into
BANKRUPTCY.
Obama forced the resignation of GM chief
executive Rick Wagoner as part of the federal
government’s auto bailout.
Obama also placed high priority on passing
a health reform initiative. During the summer
2009, he pressed Congress to pass a massive bill
that would overhaul the health care system in
the United States. Although Congress did not
act during the summer, Obama continued to
advocate for the bill, which included an option
to allow for public health insurance. Conserva-
tives rallied against the bill, leading Obama in
September 2009 to speak before a joint session
of Congress to address concerns over the
proposal.
In other domestic matters, Obama signed
his first bill, the equal-pay Lilly Ledbetter Fair
Pay Act. He also signed a measure intended to
curb excessive fees by credit-card companies.
He made news with his commencement address
at the University of Notre Dame, amid
protesters at the Catholic school who opposed

his pro-abortion stance. In addition, he ex-
tended health insuran ce benefits to low-income
children. Elsewhere, his book, Dreams from My
Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance won the
Biography of the Year prize at the Galaxy British
Book Awards.
On the international front, Obama pledged
to end combat in Iraq by August 31, 2010.
However, he announced an increase in troops
in Afghanistan in an effort to provide stability to
that region. The Obama administration was also
faced with the continued nuclear threat posed
by Iran.
In March 2009 Obama made his first judicial
appointment, nominating U.S. District Judge
David F. Hamilton to the U.S. Court of Appeals
for the 7th Circuit. Two months later, he made his
first Supreme Court choice, nominating federal
appellate Judge
SONIA SOTOMAYOR, 54, who in
August 2009 became first Hispanic U.S. Supreme
Court justice and the third woman to serve on
the high court. Obama, in a statement quoted on
the CNN.com Web site, called Sotomayor “an
inspiring woman who I believe will make a great
justice.”
Obama is the author of two books: Dreams
from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance
and The Audacity of Hope. He has won
numerous awards, the most prestigious of

which was the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009.
Obama is the fourth U.S. president to receive
this award.
Obama married Michelle LeVaughn Robin-
son in October 1992. The couple have two
daughters: Malia Ann (born 1998) and Natasha
(called Sasha, born 2001).
FURTHER READINGS
Manheim, James M. 2005. Contemporary Black Biographies.
Farmington Hills, Mich.: Thomson Gale.
Obama, Barack H., Jr. 1995. Dreams from My Father: A Story
of Race and Inheritance. New York: Times Books.
Olive, David, ed. An American Story: The Speeches of Barack
Obama Toronto, Ontario: ECW Press.
Wolffe, Richard. 2008. “Inside Obama’s Dream Machine.”
Newsweek. January 14, 30.
OBITER DICTUM
[Latin, By the way.] Words of an opinion entirely
unnecessary for the decision of the case. A remark
made or opinion expressed by a judge in a decision
upon a cause, “by the way,” that is, incidentally or
collaterally, and not directly upon the question
GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION
324 OBITER DICTUM
before the court or upon a point not necessarily
involved in the determination of the cause, or
introduced by way of illustration, or analogy or
argument. Such are not binding as precedent.
CROSS REFERENCE
Court Opinion.

OBJECT
As a verb, to take exception to something; to
declare or express the belief that something is
improper or illegal.
As a noun, the thing sought to be accom-
plished or attained; aim; purpose; intention.
One might, for example, object to the
admission of particular evidence at a trial.
The object of a civil suit, for example, might
be to be compensated in the form of damages
for an injury incurred.
OBJECTION
A formal attestation or declaration of disapproval
concerning a specific point of law or procedure
during the course of a trial; a statement indicating
disagreement with a judge’s ruling.
Some laws provide that an appeal to a
higher tribunal can be based only upon errors
objected to during the course of a trial
conducted in a lower court. An error that
initially slips by without any objection by the
party’s counsel cannot subsequently be set forth
as a reason for the appeals court to overturn
the original decision in a particular case. The
making of objections in
OPEN COURT during the
course of a proceeding is important so that on
appeal, the appellate court can evaluate the
record of the lower court action.
The

FEDERAL RULES OF EVIDENCE, the Federal
Rules of CIVIL PROCEDURE, and the Federa l Rules
of Criminal Procedure govern the making of
objections in federal actions. Comparable state
provisions apply to state proceedings.
When an attorney makes a court objection,
the judge then makes a ruling of either sustained
or overruled. If the objection is sustained, the
judge agrees with the objection and disallows
the question, testimony, or evidence. If an
objection is overruled, the judge disagrees with
the objection and allows the question, testi-
mony, or evidence. An attorney may choose to
rephrase a question that has been objected to, as
long as the judge permits it. There are several
reasons a judge may object, including ambiguity
(not phrasing a clear question),
HEARSAY (the
answer would be what someone told the witness
rather than what he/she knew first-hand),
leading (putting words in the mouth of one’s
own witness), and calls for a conclusion (asking
for one’s opinion, not facts). An objection may
also be raised against a judge’s ruling, in order to
preserve the right to appeal the ruling.
CROSS REFERENCE
Civil Procedure; Evidence.
OBJECTIVE THEORY OF CONTRACT
A principle in U.S. law that the existence of a
contract is determined by the legal significance of the

external acts of the parties to a purported agreement,
rather than by the actual intent of the parties.
According to the subjective theory of con-
tracts, a binding legal agreement is formed by two
parties only when both parties understand the
agreement to embody the same thing. Under
this theory, then, if one party agrees to sell the
other party a black horse for $1,000, but upon
delivery of the horse, the buyer tells the seller that
he thought he was buying a white horse, the
contract would not be enforceable. Under the
objective theory of contracts, the express terms of
the parties’ agreement, whether written or oral,
would determine the enforceability of the con-
tract, and thus if the seller expressed in words or
in print an offer to sell a white horse for $1,000,
and the buyer manifested acceptance of that offer,
then the parties entered a legally binding contract
that would be enforceable by the courts.
The nineteenth century began with most
American courts applying a subjective theory of
contract law, but ended with most American
courts applying an objective theory of contract
law. Two men were largely responsible for this
transformation of the
COMMON LAW, CHR ISTOPHER
COLUMBUS LANGDELL
and Oliver Wendell Holmes.
Langdell, a respected legal schola r and law
professor at Harvard Law School, began advo-

cating for the development of an objective
theory of contracts in the 1870s, while Holmes
expanded on Langdell ’s insights in Holmes’
groundbreaking 1881 book, The Common Law.
Businesses expect contract law to be reliable
and predictable, Langdell and Holmes observed,
and yet there is nothing reliable or predictable
about making contracts enforceable only when
the undisclosed intentions of two parties are
GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION
OBJECTIVE THEORY OF CONTRACT 325
proven to be the same. Instead, Langdell and
Holmes argued, contracting parties must be
held to their observable behavior and their
formally expressed words. If two parties reach
agreement on the terms of a business deal, then
courts should not expend resources attempting
to discern their private intentions. By the early
twentieth century, the objective theory of
contracts had been widely accepted in the
United States.
SAMUEL WILLISTON incorporated
the objective theory of contacts in his popular
treatise The Law of Contracts. In 1911 Judge
Learned Hand of New York summ arized the
objective theory of contracts as follows (Hotch-
kiss v. National City Bank, 200 F. 287 [S.D.N.Y.
1911]):
A contract has, strictly speaking, nothing to
do with the personal, or individual, intent of

the parties. A contract is an obligation
attached by the mere force of law to certain
acts of the parties, usually words, which
ordinarily accompany and represent a known
intent. If, however, it were proved by twenty
bishops that either party when he used the
words intended something else than the
usual meaning which the law imposes on
them, he would still be held [liable].
In applying the object ive theory of con-
tracts, American courts often review the con-
tract from the perspective of an ordinary,
reasonable person. For example, party A owns
an automobile valued at $20,000. His neighbor,
party B, asks party A for a price at which party A
would be willing to sell the car. Party A, who
has no intention of selling the car, and who
knows that party B cannot afford to pay
$20,000, says “I’d sell it to you for $1,000.”
Party B replies, “OK, it’s a deal.” Party A states
that his offer was not serious, and that he never
intended to sell the car for that amount of
money. Nevertheless, a court could find that
parties A and B had entered into a binding
agreement—selling the car for $1,000—if a
reasonable person in party B’s position would
have believed that party A intended to enter into
such an agreement. However, if party A were to
tell party B that he would sell the car for $5,
then a court may be more likely to find that a

reasonable person would not have believed that
party A intended to be bound. Under a
subjective theory of contract, party A could
dispute the formation of a contract by intro-
ducing evidence that he did not actually intend
to be bound by his statement (of either the
$1,000 or the $5 sales price).
Although the objective theory of contracts
applies in virtually all jurisdictions in the United
States, some aspects of subjectivity are never-
theless present in American law. For instance,
many of the grounds by which a party or parties
may avoid a contract, such as
FRAUD or duress,
are based upon the subjective beliefs or
intentions of the parties. Likewise, if the two
parties testify that they did not agree to be
bound by an agreement due to
MUTUAL MISTAKE,
then a court will not recognize the agreement as
enforceable. The court would similarly refuse to
find the existence of a contract if one party did
not intend to be bound, and the other party
knew, or should have known, that the first party
did not intend to enter into a binding
agreement.
Courts may also review the subjective or
actual behavior of parties when the manner of
communicating acceptance of an offer is
ambiguous. For example, in 2002 a court ruled

that the plaintiffs had not entered into an
agreement to arbitrate simply by clicking “Yes”
to download the defendant’s software from the
Internet, despite the fact that the license
agreement that accompanied the “Yes” click
provided for mandatory
ARBITRATION. Specht v.
Netscape Communications Corp., 306 F.3d 17
(2d Cir. 2002). The plaintiffs could not have
reasonably been expected to read the license
agreement, the court reasoned, and merely
clicking “Yes” to download the software did
not signify
ASSENT to the terms of the license
agreement. Under California’s objective theory
of assent, the court emphasized, apparent assent
to an offer will not operate as assent to
inconspicuous contractual terms.
FURTHER READINGS
Barnes, Wayne. 2008. “The Objective Theory of Contracts.”
University of Cincinnati Law Review 76 (Summer).
Farnsworth, E. Allan. 1999. Contracts. New York: Aspen Law
& Business.
Perillo, Joseph M. 2000. “The Origins of the Objective
Theory of Contract Formation and Interpretation.”
Fordham Law Review 69 (November).
CROSS REFERENCES
Contracts; Common Law; Hand, Learned; Holmes, Oliver
Wendell; Langdell, Christopher Columbus.
OBLIGATION

A generic term for any type of legal duty or
liability.
GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION
326 OBLIGATION
In its original sense, the term obligation was
very technical in nature and applied to the
responsibility to pay money owed on certain
written documents that were executed under
seal. Currently obligation is used in reference to
anything that an individual is required to do
because of a promise, vow, oath, contract, or
law. It refers to a legal or moral duty that an
individual can be forced to perform or penal-
ized for neglecting to perform.
An absolute obligation is one for which no
legal alternative exists since it is an uncondi-
tional duty.
A contractual obligation arises as a result of
an enforceable promise, agreement, or contract.
An express obligation is spelled out in direct
and actual terms of a document, while an
implied obligation is inferred indirectly from the
surrounding circumstances or from the actions
of the individuals involved.
A joint obligation is one that binds two or
more people to fulfill whatever is required, and
a several obligat ion requires each of two or more
individuals to fulfill the obligation in its entirety
by himself or herself.
A moral obligation is binding upon the

conscience and is fair but is not necessarily
enforceable in law.
A primary obligation is one that must be
performed, since it is the main purpose of the
contract that contains it, whereas a secondary
obligation is only incidental to another principal
duty or arises only in the event that the main
obligation cannot be fulfilled.
A penal obligation is a penalty, such as the
obligation to pay extra mo ney if t he terms
or conditions of an agreement cannot be
satisfied.
OBLIGEE
The individual to whom a particular duty or
obligation is owed.
The obligation might be to pay a debt or
involve the performance or nonperformance of
a particular act.
The term obligee is often used synonymously
with creditor.
OBLIGOR
The individual who owes another person a certain
debt or duty.
The term obligor is often used interchange-
ably with debtor.
OBLITERATION
A destruction; an eradication of written words.
Obliteration is a method of revoking a will
or a clause therein. Lines drawn through the
signatures of witnesses to a will constitute an

obliteration of the will even if the names are still
decipherable. The testator’s act must clearly
indicate an intention to obliterate the word,
clause, paragraph, or section so that it no longer
constitutes a part of the will.
Notwithstanding the fact that a will is
written in ink, it may be effectively canceled
or obliterated in pencil. Consequently, the
testator’s act in drawing a line or lines in pencil
through a particular word or clause or operative
portion of a will constitutes a cancellation of
the will. Running a line through a testator’s
signature at the end of a will is an act of
obliteration that justifies the conclusion that the
testator intended to revoke the will in its
entirety and it will be so treated.
OBSCENE
Offensive to recognized standards of decency.
The term ob scene is applied to written,
verbal, or vis ual works or conduct that treat
sex in an objectionable or lewd or lascivious
manner. Although the
FIRST AMENDMENT guaran-
tees fr eedom of expression, such constitutional
protection is not extended to obscene works.
To determine whether a work is obscene,
the trier of fact applies the three-pronged guide-
lines established by the U.S. Supreme Court in
MILLER V. CALIFORNIA, 413 U.S. 15, 93 S. Ct. 2607,
37 L. Ed. 2d 419 (1973):

(a) whether the “average person, applying
contemporary community standards” would
find that the work depicting or describing
sexual conduct when taken as a whole,
appeals to the prurient interest , (b)
whether the work depicts or describes, in a
patently offensive way, sexual conduct spe-
cifically defined by the applicable state law;
and (c) whether the work, taken as a whole,
lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or
scientific value.
CROSS REFERENCES
Freedom of Speech; Pornography.
GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION
OBSCENE 327