Learned Hand

Learned Hand (1872-1961) was a prominent judge of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, after serving (at the appointment of President William Howard Taft) as a federal district judge in New York. Judge Hand is known as much for his remarkably clear prose as for his unusual name, and his opinions are widely taught in law schools. He was an intellectual leader in the judiciary.

He was a proponent of balancing tests in the, and used them often. For example, in the contest of absolute immunity for a prosecutor against lawsuits for malicious prosecution, he wrote:

Judge Learned Hand, who wrote of the prosecutor's immunity from actions for malicious prosecution:

As is so often the case, the answer must be found in a balance between the evils inevitable in either alternative. In this instance it has been thought in the end better to leave unredressed the wrongs done by dishonest officers than to subject those who try to do their duty to the constant dread of retaliation.

Gregoire v. Biddle, 177 F. 2d 579, 581 (2d Cir. 1949), cert. denied, 339 U.S. 949 (1950).

Judge Hand was the first to apply economic concepts to legal analysis. His "Hand test" for negligence imposes liability only if if the burden of preventing harm is less than the probability of the harm times its magnitude.