Why did Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. think judges could be influenced by nonlegal considerations?

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. argued that the life of the law has not been logic, but rather experience. He believed that judicial decisions are shaped by factors beyond formal legal syllogisms, including the felt necessities of the time, prevailing moral and political theories, and intuitions of public policy.1

Holmes recognized that judges are human beings who may be influenced by unconscious or avowed prejudices that they share with their fellow citizens. Because the law embodies a nation's historical development and reflects what is considered convenient at any given time, he maintained that it cannot be treated merely as a collection of mathematical axioms. Consequently, he suggested that to understand the law, one must look past the "small change of legal thought" and consider the broader social, historical, and economic contexts that influence how judges reach their conclusions.12