Corbin on Contracts, He Doesn’t Know What Consideration Is Either

Posted by lukegilman

March 16, 2007

On July 17, 1965, the great mind of contracts, Yale Professor Arthur Corbin, then 91 and in failing health in West Boothbay Harbor Maine, replied to a letter from a 1st year law student at the University of Kansas and included the following line, which I find both hilarious and comforting:

Corbin: Do you know what a “consideration” is—one that is operative to make a promise enforceable? If you do, you know more than I and some others know. And yet, in Vols I and IA I have written many chapters about it.

Though I’m not sure if that should make me feel any better about it or not.

From Donald Bostwick and M.H. Hoeflich, Arthur Corbin and the University of Kansas School of Law: Four Letters, 54 Kan. L. Rev. 1115, May 2006.

Bookmark this Page: These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.