Origens of laws?

[Dracula Girl]

Where did diffent coutries get there laws? What did they base them on? How have countries decided what should be law or not? How did they get there legal systems?

[Teallaura]

Where did diffent coutries get there laws? What did they base them on? How have countries decided what should be law or not? How did they get there legal systems?First off, I have to know - is the title of this thread because you were having a 'spelling moment' (I've had lots of those!) or is it supposed to be a play on words that I'm not getting?
Short answer: God said, "See that tree? Don't eat off that tree or you die, got it?"
Adam nodded, "That tree there?"
"That tree."
Adam nodded, "Don't eat off it?"
"Don't eat off it."
Adam nodded, "Or I die?"
"Or you shall surely die."
Adam cocked his head, "Eve too?"
"Eve too. Leave the tree alone."
Adam nodded.
Eve nodded.
Time passed.
Snake showed up. Eve listened to snake. Adam listened to snake. Things went down hill from there....
Snake teaches lawyers....

[Dracula Girl]

Uhm, I'm thinking a little more recent, ok a lot more. I don't mean to ask about the origins of laws (and yes, I was having a spelling moment) as all, but when countries form, how do they decided what laws they should have and stuff like that. Good answer though.

[Teallaura]

Uhm, I'm thinking a little more recent, ok a lot more. I don't mean to ask about the origins of laws (and yes, I was having a spelling moment) as all, but when countries form, how do they decided what laws they should have and stuff like that. Good answer though.
How recent? Code of Hannarabi(sp)? Empire? Monarchal development in WE? Constitutional development?
What form? Modern constitutional government? (I can make a good case for the first constitutional form occuring in the Bible!) Monarchy? Constitutional Monarchy? 'Theocracy'?
Where? Nation states? City states? Regional tendencies?

[{Tim}]

Well, here's one example: when Australia became a nation, its legal code was based on that of Britain. So then one must ask, where did the British law come from? In the end it's basically all based on what came before, IMO.

[BeHereNow]

Isn't the Code of Hammurabi the oldest known written code of law? I'm not that sharp with my ancient history.

Here is a link to the full text of the Code, for your amusement:

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/hamcode.html#text

It's actually an interesting read. It has laws regarding theft, property rights, marital relationships, and business practices, among other things. Although many of the punishments (basically death in most cases) have gone by the wayside, along with some of the restrictions, you can see how it has influenced most of humanity over the past few millenia.

I'd agree with Tim that law is passed down, and governments enacted (the last half of Joan's query) for a managerie of reasons that would be a lot to go into here.

[learning]

That is the oldest law that we have in print, I believe, but there are many laws of the land, in America and British colonies, that are based on something called 'common law' and also on even the Bible. In a high school law class, our teacher showed us that some of the law to do with property and who was responsible for what (the idea of if you have someone's cow and it gets lost or stolen or hurt, and/or if someone's cow or animal hurts someone, how much is the original owner responsible, for what he knew or didn't know about the animal, etc.) I do believe that there is also in law something from ancient British law too. Justin, was known, from Byzantine time, to create a good law too.

[learning]

I just remembered, I believe that they say Iceland had the first parliament in Europe, and so that started there. There are rules for the making of law in Canada (and the U.S.?) that is now connected with parliament (U.S. would be a bit different, but perhaps similar). I've heard in France, and even in some of the U.S. former French colonies that became U.S. states, that the Napoleonic laws (he changed a lot of things in his time) are still very much in use, especially in the education system in France.

[IBreakCellPhone]

Please consider this post disclaimed out the wazoo.

From what I understand, the British law system, upon which British colonies like the US, Australia, and Canada based their law system, is called "common law." In this system, from what I understand, the primary source of law is court decisions. F'rinstance, Alice owns land, Bob squats on it, Alice sues Bob and wins the right to kick him off. Later, Charlie sues Daniel for the same thing, and the judge points back at this decision for precedent. Statutes, written laws made by the Legislature, are viewed as "intrusions" on this.

Civil law is the opposite of common law, from what I understand. There, the statutes are the highest form of law. Optimally, the Legislature codifies every possibility. The courts decide for a situation that isn't there, but even if something has happened before, the courts aren't necessarily bound by precedent. Examples of this are the Napoleonic Code.

Is this what you're talking about?

[Dracula Girl]

Please consider this post disclaimed out the wazoo.

From what I understand, the British law system, upon which British colonies like the US, Australia, and Canada based their law system, is called "common law." In this system, from what I understand, the primary source of law is court decisions. F'rinstance, Alice owns land, Bob squats on it, Alice sues Bob and wins the right to kick him off. Later, Charlie sues Daniel for the same thing, and the judge points back at this decision for precedent. Statutes, written laws made by the Legislature, are viewed as "intrusions" on this.

Civil law is the opposite of common law, from what I understand. There, the statutes are the highest form of law. Optimally, the Legislature codifies every possibility. The courts decide for a situation that isn't there, but even if something has happened before, the courts aren't necessarily bound by precedent. Examples of this are the Napoleonic Code.

Is this what you're talking about?
I am asking about where new nations have gotten their frameworks for their laws when they are just beginning to exist as a nation and where to congress and whoever else is involved in what ever country it is decided that a law should be made about something. It seems simple, but reading the posts here, yours included, does help me understand it better.

[learning]

I've got a quote I'll put on here that says that the Iroquois nation had a system of discussion that they say was used as an example of democracy. Quite interesting, the Iroquois nation is said to be made up of five nations that used to fight together, but then a 'man?' of peace came and helped them set up peaceful means of getting along with each other.

page 40 of "A New History of Canada" by R. Howard, J Lacoursiere, C. Bouchard

"The government among them is this: the old men of the town or the village gather in council with the chief, where they decide all the affairs of their community by a majority, which they collect with little rush straws...

Now when they want to hold a council, it is normally in the captain's lodge. When the cry and proclamation of the council has been given, the cabin is the scene of a great fire, around which all the councillors are seated on mats, in the first row. Women, girls and young people do not attend, unless it is a general council at which young men from 25-30 may be present.

If it is a secret council, whether for working out some act of treachery or surprise action in war, they hold it only at night among the principle councillors, and reveal nothing as long as the affair planned has not been put into effect.

Being thus assembled and the lodge closed shut, they all stay silent for a long time before speaking, so as not to be precipitate, always holding their pipes in their mouths; then the chief begins his harangue, in terms both high-flown and clear, and lasting some time. When he has finished his discourse, one after another, without interruption and in few words, they give their opinions and state their reasons, which are afterwards polled with straws, and by this is concluded what it to be judged the best course."

"Iroquois government was used as an example of democracy by French and English philosophers of the 18th century. The origins of the Iroquois confederacy itself are wrapped in legend. Dekanahouideh, the 'celestial messenger' was held to be the founder of the confederacy of the Five Nations. He lived at an indetermined time, born of a virgin mother. Despite strong opposition, Dekanahouideh managed to convince the representatives of the Five Iroquois Nations to join together for the purpose of establishing an eternal peace among them.

Representatives of each of the five, called sachems, met together at least once every year. If decisions were taken at that time which affected the whole Iroquois confederacy, each separate member nation still maintained a large measure of independence. Any one of them could, for example, sign a peace with other Indian groups or with the French, without the treaty being binding on any other member of the Five Nations confederacy.

Among the Algonkians, the chiefs were called sagamos. Their authority was also limited. According to the lawyer and writer Marc Lescarbot, who visited them in the Atlantic region at the beginning of the 17th Century, 'all these people govern themselves through captains whom they call sagamos, a word which has the same meaning in the West Indies.' The sagamos' authoriy was particularly felt in initiating and leading expeditions to hunt, fish, or to make war."

[kofh2u]

Law must be studied in accord with the culture to which it pertains. For instance, Islamic Law, I think it is called "Shari," is said to be based upon interpretatiin of their Koran.

But, Law in Western Culture evolved. There are twelve different sets of codes that have gradually meshed together to formwhat we now have. This final product also carries a variety of slightly different "flavors."

French Law, British Law, and American Law are all the same and yet slightly different at the same time. Nevertheless, here is a list of the roots to them all in ascending order of their influence and incorporations:

1) Hammurabi
2) Solon
3) Star Chamber
4) Lycurgus
5) Trial by Combat
6) Plato
7) The 12 Roman Tables

(Canon Law of the 1000 year reign of Christianity)

8) Justinian Code
9) Inns of Court
10) Feudalism
11) Draco
12) Code of Napoleon

[learning]

What were *Inns of Court* and *Draco* and the *Twelve Roman Tables*

[kofh2u]

What were *Inns of Court* and *Draco* and the *Twelve Roman Tables*


Each term of the twelve incremental expansion of our western law concepts repressnts a codification pertaining to a particular moment in our history.

A book on the History of Law, even a good dictionary ought give a few insights into specifics.

Try the web, history of Law, I wonder what comes up!

[learning]

I did look up 'Inns of court' something known in Dicken's day, like law libary? Now more like country clubs, though important in getting into the Bar in Britain still.

'Draco', between the constellation and some mean ruler who may have made some laws, not much that I could find.

I wondered if the 'Twelve Roman Tables' was something like King Arthur and the Knights of the Round table! :)

[kofh2u]

I did look up 'Inns of court' something known in Dicken's day, like law libary? Now more like country clubs, though important in getting into the Bar in Britain still.

'Draco', between the constellation and some mean ruler who may have made some laws, not much that I could find.

I wondered if the 'Twelve Roman Tables' was something like King Arthur and the Knights of the Round table! :)


Hahaaa... king arthur,... maybe you are right, too.

The thing about Law is that it seems grounded in our feelings that are sourced in man's collective Self. The idea of right and wrong.

Jurisprudence is divided into seven "courts of Law."

This is interedting also, in that there are seven "spirits" of man.

1. Criminal Law
2. Torts
3. Contracts
4. Common Pleas (Like the story of Solomon and cuttinb the baby in half)
5. Oroperty Law
6. Constitutional Law
7. Ethics

As you read the list you can see that as man has matured in his social relationship, the law also has necessarily evolved in order to adjudicate some semblance of order.
Ethics and Constitutional Law would have ben ananachronism in the days of King Arthur for instance.

[Archon]

But, Law in Western Culture evolved. There are twelve different sets of codes that have gradually meshed together to formwhat we now have. This final product also carries a variety of slightly different "flavors."


kofh2u, you have condensed a lot in your list. I'll try to give learning a more historical synopsis.

Essentially, the Romans were the first to develop law as a body of rules and precedents that could be applied systematically to individual cases. After the fall of Rome, the emperor Justinian's lawyers codified Roman law into a series of "digests" which were the first law books, where you could look up how Roman courts had decided or acted in the various branches of law that kofh2u mentions in a later post. These digests were lost to the world during the Dark Ages, when "law" was dispensed chiefly in periodic tribal assemblies (eg, among the Germans, the Celts and the Saxons), but were rediscovered by the Roman Catholic Church in the 11th and 12th centuries, and became the basis for "canon law", or the law applied by the Church. (Pope Gregory VII had humbled the emperor Henry IV at Canossa in 1077, and he and subsequent popes asked their church lawyers to develop a legal basis for the assertion of power by the Church over the Holy Roman Empire and its emperors.) Once the usefulness of canon law became apparent, the emperors, and lesser rulers of other countries, had lawyers draw up codes of law to establish their authority as well. (The first "law school" was established at the University of Bologna in Italy in the early twelfth century, and it taught Roman law based on the books of Justinian.)

From its beginnings under the auspices of the Church, law in Europe developed and branched out as different rulers and traditions in different countries stamped their own particularities on their legal system. English law developed with the Magna Carta as a background, while there was no counterpart of that document in French or German law, for example.

Eventually, in the early 1800's Napoleon had lawyers draw up codes to reduce all French law to supposedly predictable rules, so there would be no guessing about outcomes in the courts. (Because the first code prepared was the Code Civil, this system of codified law became known as "civil law" to distinguish it from the "common law" of England, which I'll discuss in a minute.) Napoleon's victorious troops carried these codes into almost every European country except, of course, England.

Although Parliament passed laws in England, there was a new set of laws nearly every year, with many of them conflicting with laws passed earlier, and there was no attempt to codify them all. Instead, there had developed in that country a parallel system of "common law" as declared by the courts, and written down in reports of individual cases. These reports then became the precedents which later courts would apply to subsequent cases having similar facts. So in a "civil law" state you go first to see what the code says, while in a "common law" state you go to the law reports and try to find an earlier decided case which is closest to your own, to serve as a precedent.

The law that came to America came mostly from England, via the 13 original colonies. However, Louisiana was first settled by the French (before it was purchased in Jefferson's presidency), and it adopted a Napoleonic code system which it still has today.

So as you can see, your question has no simple answer. The best solace I can offer is a quote from a famous American jurist, Oliver Wendell Holmes: "On this point a page of history is worth a volume of logic." If you are interested in the full history of how law has gone from being originally wholly religious to the point where today it tries to be wholly secular and deny its religious origins, there is no better book than Harold Berman's Law and Revolution, which now has expanded into two volumes, with a third projected (may he live to finish it!---he's nearly 90 and still teaching at Emory).