Civil Law

Napoleon's commission distilled revolutionary ideals, equality before the law, property, secular civil status, and contract freedo...

Drafted over two decades by pandectist scholars, the BGB took effect in 1900 as an abstract, five book architecture from general r...

The civil law family, heir to Justinian's compilation as filtered through Napoleon and the German pandectists, organizes law into ...

In the inquisitorial tradition descending from canon law, the court, often through an investigating judge, assembles the dossier, ...

Proclaimed in August 1789 at the heart of the French Revolution, the declaration announced that men are born and remain free and e...

Nullum crimen sine lege, nulla poena sine lege, forbids retroactive crimes and punishments, requiring clear prior statutes interpr...

German constitutional doctrine built proportionality into a three step test, legitimate aim, suitability of means, necessity as le...

Drafted largely by the jurist Eugen Huber and adopted in 1907, the Swiss Civil Code took effect in 1912 together with a revised Co...