I remember in the ‘90s, “the common law” was a conservative movement applause-light line you’d see in direct mail fundraising letters, what was that about?

Was it opposed to Warren Court-type rulings? But it very literally was “judge-made law”, which is what they were complaining about. Or was that “judge-made” as a good thing, “local control” back when the judge and the banker and the doctor controlled each small town together as Republicans?

The actual common law, before it was rationalized as statute and then standardized over the 20th century, was a bonkers collection of several eras worth of obscure doctrines and motions with fake French names, actions that involved inventing fake parties and having them pursue a fake lawsuit as a way to accomplish something completely different (soo much English common law was about rigging a way to sell land under a feudal system where Land May Not Be Sold), and books and books of precedent. You know why law offices use shelves of books as status decor? Cause back in the day you could find some random obscure judgement from 100 years ago no one had heard of and win a hopeless case with it if you had enough books, and this was all indistinguishable or maybe philosophically indistinct from the judge and his lawyer buddies just making things up on the spot.