Paul Laband

Paul Laband (24 May 1838 – 23 March 1918) was a German jurist and the German Empire's leading scholar of constitutional law.

[1] Laband was born into a Jewish family and converted to Christianity in 1857.

He was called to teach at Königsberg in 1864, and at Strasbourg in 1872, where he taught until his retirement.

[1] He was a signatory of the Manifesto of the Ninety-Three that supported Germany's entry into World War I. Laband's writings on constitutional law are characterized by a formalist approach focused on terminology and logic, disregarding other rules of statutory interpretation such as historical, philosophical, political or teleological considerations.

[1] Laband was also influential as the editor of several leading law reviews and as the author of the textbook Staatsrecht des deutschen Reiches, which appeared in five editions until 1914.