Karl Theodor von Inama-Sternegg · 1875
In this scholarly review, Inama-Sternegg assesses F. L. Wirschinger’s 1874 commentary on the German industrial code and its amendments, with particular attention to their implementation in Bavaria. His central criterion is that legal commentary should unite scientific interpretation with practical guidance. For industrial legislation, this requires economic understanding as well as legal expertise: exhaustive treatment of enactments and administrative practice cannot by itself explain the law’s purposes.
The review first situates Wirschinger’s work within the Bavarian commentary series established through Maximilian II’s patronage and subsequently directed by the constitutional jurist Pözl. Inama credits the series with linking Bavarian legal development to the formation of a common German law. Its extension to imperial legislation thus continues an existing intellectual project, while its attention to Bavarian implementation remains justified by its original remit.
He then distinguishes this series from Kortkampf’s editions of imperial laws. The latter prioritize rapid orientation and ready access to statutory texts, interpretive aids, and implementation provisions; the Bavarian commentaries aim at deeper study of legal principles and related disciplines.
Es sind also keine Concurrenzunternehmungen; sie ergänzen sich, sie schliessen sich nicht aus.
English translation: They are therefore not competing enterprises; they complement one another, they do not exclude one another.
This complementarity rests on a distinction between breadth of documentary coverage and depth of interpretation. Kortkampf supplies extensive material on the particular laws of the German states; the Bavarian series offers sustained analysis intended to guide judgment in difficult applications. Inama treats scholarly depth as a practical resource, not as an alternative to usefulness.
Applying this distinction to Wirschinger and L. Jacobi’s commentary on German industrial legislation, he qualifies the general comparison. Jacobi is more scholarly than the typical Kortkampf commentary, while Wirschinger sometimes gives Bavarian particular law undue prominence over general scientific questions. The decisive shortcoming is Wirschinger’s insufficient engagement with political economy, despite the industrial code’s bearing on vital economic interests.
Denn das Gesetz wird nur derjenige zu handhaben vermögen, der auch den Geist desselben erfasst; hiefür aber ist das Verständniss der volkswirthschaftlichen Verhältnisse unerlässliche Voraussetzung und, an der Beförderung desselben zu arbeiten, ist deshalb auch in der eigentlichsten Aufgabe des Commentators gelegen.
English translation: For only he will be able to handle the law who also grasps its spirit; for this, however, an understanding of economic conditions is an indispensable precondition, and to work at promoting that understanding therefore lies within the commentator's most proper task.
This passage makes economic knowledge constitutive of competent legal interpretation. A commentator must help jurists and administrators understand the conditions to which legislation responds, thereby revealing the significance of modern legal change. Inama’s criticism is methodological rather than a detailed objection to any individual provision of the code.
His final assessment nevertheless recognizes substantial achievements:
Im Uebrigen ist die Arbeit Wirschinger's recht verdienstvoll und zeichnet sich ebenso sehr durch grosse Sorgfalt in der Behandlung der einzelnen Materien, wie durch die klare und sicher urtheilende Darlegung der Begriffe und Rechtsinstitute aus, wenngleich die Sprache nicht frei von den Angewöhnungen des Bureaustyls ist.
English translation: For the rest, Wirschinger's work is quite meritorious and distinguishes itself as much by great care in the treatment of the individual subject matters as by the clear and confidently judging exposition of the concepts and legal institutions, even though its language is not free from the habits of bureaucratic style.
The praise becomes concrete in his discussion of arrangement. Whereas Jacobi appends complete laws and regulations for convenient consultation, Wirschinger places relevant excerpts beside individual sections of the code. This exposes their connections and supplementary functions, turning statutory sequence into a systematic account of industrial law. Extensive use of judicial and administrative practice, together with Wirschinger’s experience in a regional government’s industrial affairs senate, further strengthens the work. Inama closes by recommending it to theorists and practitioners alike, especially those preparing reform of Austrian industrial law. The review’s broader significance lies in its demand that systematic legal scholarship explain both the architecture of regulation and the economic life it governs.
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