Louisiana Civil Code

Last updated

The Louisiana Civil Code (LCC) constitutes the core of private law in the State of Louisiana. [1] The Louisiana Civil Code is based on a more diverse set of sources than the laws of the other 49 states of the United States: substantive law between private sector parties has a civil law character, based on French and Spanish codes and ultimately Roman law, with some common law influences. [2]

Contents

First enacted on March 31, 1808, in bilingual version as Louisiana Civil Code Digest (French : Digeste de la loi civile)., [3] it was drafted by the lawyers James Brown, Louis Moreau-Lislet and Edward Livingston. Afterwards it underwent continuous revisions and updates. It is still considered the controlling authority in the state; despite the strong influence of common law tradition, the civil law tradition is still deeply rooted in most aspects of Louisiana private law. Thus property, contractual, business entities structure, much of civil procedure, and family law, as well as some aspects of criminal law, are still based mostly on traditional Roman legal thinking. [4]

In 1825 it served as a source for the Civil Code of Lower Canada. [5]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Common law</span> Law created by judicial precedent

In law, common law is the body of law created by judges and similar quasi-judicial tribunals by virtue of being stated in written opinions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Comparative law</span> Study of relationship between legal systems

Comparative law is the study of differences and similarities between the law of different countries. More specifically, it involves the study of the different legal "systems" in existence in the world, including the common law, the civil law, socialist law, Canon law, Jewish Law, Islamic law, Hindu law, and Chinese law. It includes the description and analysis of foreign legal systems, even where no explicit comparison is undertaken. The importance of comparative law has increased enormously in the present age of internationalism, economic globalization, and democratization.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Napoleonic Code</span> French civil code established in 1804

The Napoleonic Code, officially the Civil Code of the French is the French civil code established during the French Consulate in 1804 and still in force, although frequently amended.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Edward Livingston</span> American politician and jurist (1764–1836)

Edward Livingston was an American jurist and statesman. He was an influential figure in the drafting of the Louisiana Civil Code of 1825, a civil code based largely on the Napoleonic Code. Livingston represented both New York and then Louisiana in Congress and served as the U.S. Secretary of State from 1831 to 1833 and Minister to France from 1833 to 1835 under President Andrew Jackson.

<i>Civil Code of Quebec</i>

The Civil Code of Quebec is the civil code in force in the Canadian province of Quebec, which came into effect on January 1, 1994. It replaced the Civil Code of Lower Canada enacted by the Legislative Assembly of the Province of Canada in 1865, which had been in force since August 1, 1866.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Civil code</span> Private law relating to property, family, and obligations

A civil code is a codification of private law relating to property, family, and obligations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Legal history</span> Study of how law has evolved and why it has changed

Legal history or the history of law is the study of how law has evolved and why it has changed. Legal history is closely connected to the development of civilisations and operates in the wider context of social history. Certain jurists and historians of legal process have seen legal history as the recording of the evolution of laws and the technical explanation of how these laws have evolved with the view of better understanding the origins of various legal concepts; some consider legal history a branch of intellectual history. Twentieth-century historians viewed legal history in a more contextualised manner - more in line with the thinking of social historians. They have looked at legal institutions as complex systems of rules, players and symbols and have seen these elements interact with society to change, adapt, resist or promote certain aspects of civil society. Such legal historians have tended to analyse case histories from the parameters of social-science inquiry, using statistical methods, analysing class distinctions among litigants, petitioners and other players in various legal processes. By analyzing case outcomes, transaction costs, and numbers of settled cases, they have begun an analysis of legal institutions, practices, procedures and briefs that gives a more complex picture of law and society than the study of jurisprudence, case law and civil codes can achieve.

Jus commune or ius commune is Latin for "common law" in certain jurisdictions. It is often used by civil law jurists to refer to those aspects of the civil law system's invariant legal principles, sometimes called "the law of the land" in English law. While the ius commune was a secure point of reference in continental European legal systems, in England it was not a point of reference at all. The phrase "the common law of the civil law systems" means those underlying laws that create a distinct legal system and are common to all its elements.

Public law is the part of law that governs relations between legal persons and a government, between different institutions within a state, between different branches of governments, as well as relationships between persons that are of direct concern to society. Public law comprises constitutional law, administrative law, tax law and criminal law, as well as all procedural law. Laws concerning relationships between individuals belong to private law.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Law of Canada</span> Overview of the law of Canada

The legal system of Canada is pluralist: its foundations lie in the English common law system, the French civil law system, and Indigenous law systems developed by the various Indigenous Nations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jean-Jacques-Régis de Cambacérès</span> French nobleman, lawyer and statesman

Jean-Jacques-Régis de Cambacérès, Duke of Parma, was a French nobleman, lawyer, freemason and statesman during the French Revolution and the First Empire. He is best remembered as one of the authors of the Napoleonic Code, which still forms the basis of French civil law and French-inspired civil law in many countries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Civil law (legal system)</span> Legal system originating in continental Europe

Civil law is a legal system originating in mainland Europe and adopted in much of the world. The civil law system is intellectualized within the framework of Roman law, and with core principles codified into a referable system, which serves as the primary source of law. The civil law system is often contrasted with the common law system, which originated in medieval England. Whereas the civil law takes the form of legal codes, the law in common law systems historically came from uncodified case law that arose as a result of judicial decisions, recognising prior court decisions as legally-binding precedent.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">David Dudley Field II</span> American lawyer and politician (1805–1894)

David Dudley Field II was an American lawyer and law reformer who made major contributions to the development of American civil procedure. His greatest accomplishment was engineering the move away from common law pleading towards code pleading, which culminated in the enactment of the Field Code in 1850 by the state of New York.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stephan Kinsella</span> American lawyer

Norman Stephan Kinsella is an American intellectual property lawyer, author, and deontological anarcho-capitalist. His legal works have been published by Oxford University Press, Oceana Publications, Mises Institute, Quid Pro Books and others.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Francois Xavier Martin</span> American judge (1762–1846)

François Xavier Martin, was a Franco-American lawyer and author, the first Attorney General of State of Louisiana, and longtime Justice of the Louisiana Supreme Court. Born in Marseille, he moved to Martinique in 1780, and then immigrated to North Carolina just before the end American Revolutionary War. He was appointed as Attorney General of the Territory of Orleans after the Louisiana Purchase; he also helped untangle layers of French and Spanish colonial law in the territory and subsequent state of Louisiana. His legal writing and reviews of cases was important to codification of Louisiana law in the 1820s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Quebec law</span> Overview of the law of Quebec

Quebec law is unique in Canada because Quebec is the only province in Canada to have a juridical legal system under which civil matters are regulated by French-heritage civil law. Public law, criminal law and federal law operate according to Canadian common law.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Law of Louisiana</span> State law based on French and Spanish legal codes, as well as American/British common law

Law in the state of Louisiana is based on a more diverse set of sources than the laws of the other 49 states of the United States. Private law—that is, substantive law between private sector parties, principally contracts and torts—has a civil law character, based on French and Spanish codes and ultimately Roman law, with some common law influences. Louisiana's criminal law largely rests on American common law. Louisiana's administrative law is generally similar to the administrative law of the federal government and other states. Louisiana's procedural law is generally in line with that of other U.S. states, which in turn is generally based on the U.S. Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

A reception statute is a statutory law adopted as a former British colony becomes independent by which the new nation adopts, or receives, the English common law before its independence to the extent not explicitly rejected by the legislative body or constitution of the new nation. Reception statutes generally consider the English common law dating prior to independence, as well as the precedents originating from it, as the default law because of the importance of using an extensive and predictable body of law to govern the conduct of citizens and businesses in a new state.

Vernon Palmer is an American-born legal scholar, the Thomas Pickles Professor of Law at Tulane University Law School and the co-director of its Eason Weinmann Center of Comparative Law. He is a specialist in civil law and mixed jurisdiction legal studies, with a primary focus on the study of comparative international law.

References

  1. Parise, Agustín (2014). "Private Law in Louisiana: An Account of Civil Codes, Heritage, and Law Reform". In César Rivera, Julio (ed.). The Scope and Structure of Civil Codes. Ius Gentium: Comparative Perspectives on Law and Justice. Vol. 32. Springer. p. 453. doi:10.1007/978-94-007-7942-6. ISBN   978-94-007-7942-6. LCCN   2014930754.
  2. "How the Code Napoleon makes Louisiana law different". LA-Legal . Retrieved 2006-10-26.
  3. Official English title:: Digest of the Civil Laws now in Force in the Territory of Orleans, with Alterations and Amendments Adapted to its Present System of Government.
  4. Kinsella, Norman (1997). "A Civil Law to Common Law Dictionary" (PDF). KinsellaLaw.com. Archived from the original (PDF) on December 25, 2010. Retrieved December 7, 2010.
  5. E. Fabre-Surveyer (1939). "The Civil Law in Quebec and Louisiana". Louisiana Law Review. Paul M. Hebert Law Center. 1 (4): 652–654. Retrieved 1 April 2013.

Further reading