Common law

What is the name of your state? MI

"Common law"

What does this term mean, legally.

Thanks,
afterhrs

afterhrs said:

What is the name of your state? MI

"Common law"

What does this term mean, legally.

Thanks,
afterhrs

Click to expand...

My response:

There are two types of "common law"; the marriage type, and our system of jurisprudence in general, i.e., judge made case law.

Which do you mean?

IAAL

By using the term "case laws", that would mean all laws that required futher interpertation and subsequent rulings?

Thank you,
Afterhrs

afterhrs said:

By using the term "case laws", that would mean all laws that required futher interpertation and subsequent rulings?

Thank you,
Afterhrs

Click to expand...

My response:

Case law is decided at the appellate level; e.g., Court of Appeals, which is a three-judge panel, or the State Supreme Court, on which seven justices sit on the bench; and then there's the United States Supreme court, on which nine justices sit on the bench.

Sometimes, decisions of the lower court (the trial court) are "appealed" to the higher, or appellate, courts. If the decision of the Appellate court is of such a nature that the decision would affect a great number of people (not just the litigants), then that decision may very well be printed in a bound book, for use in future litigation as "precident" for a particular situation - - what we call "case law". Sometimes, the State Supreme Court, or even the U.S. Supreme Court, hears cases from the three-judge appellate courts to determine if a particular determination (decision) is Constitutional.

When a higher court of Appeals, like the State Supreme, or the U.S. Supreme, courts refuse to hear a case, or refuse to change the decision of a lower appellate panel, those higher courts are relying on the doctrine of "Stare Decisis" - - "Let the decision stand".

This process, and system of justice, is called "Common Law", which is derived from English law, going all the way back to the Magna Carta.

IAAL

O.K. students, smoke 'em if you have 'em. We'll break for 10 minutes. And there WILL be a test on tonight's subject

I AM ALWAYS LIABLE....... Thanks!!!

Very best regards,
Afterhrs




Those aren't question marks, thats my brain smoldering

common law
n. the traditional unwritten law of England, based on custom and usage, which began to develop over a thousand years before the founding of the United States. The best of the pre-Saxon compendiums of the common law was reportedly written by a woman, Queen Martia, wife of a king of a small English kingdom. Together with a book on the "law of the monarchy" by a Duke of Cornwall, Queen Martia's work was translated into the emerging English language by King Alfred (849-899 A.D.). When William the Conqueror invaded England in 1066, he combined the best of this Anglo-Saxon law with Norman law, which resulted in the English common law, much of which was by custom and precedent rather than by written code. By the 14th century legal decisions and commentaries on the common law began providing precedents for the courts and lawyers to follow. It did not include the so-called law of equity (chancery), which came from the royal power to order or prohibit specific acts. The common law became the basic law of most states due to the Commentaries on the Laws of England, completed by Sir William Blackstone in 1769, which became every American lawyer's bible. Today almost all common law has been enacted into statutes with modern variations by all the states except Louisiana, which is still influenced by the Napoleonic Code. In some states the principles of Common Law are so basic they are applied without reference to statute.