Text b. Customs

Task: read the text, find the answers to the questions given below.

Customs are social habits, patterns of behaviour, which all societies evolve without express formulation or conscious creation. Custom is one of the principal sources of law; originally law was based upon it. Moreover, custom is not important only as a source of law, for even today some customary rules are still observed and they have almost the same power as rules of law. The only difference is that their observance is not enforced by the organs of the State. Thus, many of the fundamental rules of the Constitution are "conventional" (i. e. customary) rather than legal, rules.

But in modern times most general customs (i. e. customs universally observed throughout the realm) either do not exist or have become absorbed in rules of law. For example many of the early rules of the common law were general customs which the courts adopted, and they have become laws.

On the other hand customs of particular groups of people living in particular localities, are sometimes still capable of creating a special "law" for the locality in question which is different from the general law of the land.

But such variants will only be recognized if certain conditions are satisfied. The following are among the more important of those conditions. The custom must (1) not be unreasonable, (2) the right must be claimed by or on behalf of a defined group of people, (3) must have existed since "time immemorial". This means that it must go back to 1189 (by historical accident the terminal date of "legal memory").

1. What is one of the principle sources of law?

2. Is custom important only as a source of law?

3. What is the difference between customary rules and rules of law?

4. Do customs still create new laws?

5. What conditions must such customs satisfy?

Text c. Common and continental law

Task: read the text, get ready to render its contents in Russian.

Each country in the world has its own system of law. There are two main traditions of law in the world. One is based on English Common law¹. The other tradition is known as Continental, or Roman law.

Common law, or case law system, differs from Continental law as it has developed gradually throughout history. It is not the result of government attempts to codify every legal relation. Customs and court rulings have been as important as statutes (government legislation). Judges do not merely apply the law, in some cases they make law, and their, interpretations may become precendents² for other courts.

Before William of Normandy invaded England in 1066 no law was common to the whole kingdom. The Norman Kings sent travelling judges around the country and gradually a "common law" developed. Uniform application of the law throughout the country was promoted by the gradual development of the doctrine of precedent.

The doctrine of precedent is still a central feature of modern common law systems.

Even when governments make new laws - statutes, they are interpreted by the courts in order to fit particular cases, and these interpretations become new precedents.

Continental systems, codified legal systems, have resulted from attempts by governments to produce a set of codes so that the state could govern every legal aspect of a citizen's life.

When the lawmakers were codifying their legal systems, they looked to the example of Revolutionary and Napoleonic France, whose legislators wanted to break with previous case law.

The lawmakers were also influenced by the model of the Canon law of the Roman Catholic Church, but the most important models were the codes produced in the seventh century under the direction of the Roman Emperor Justinian.

Versions of Roman law had long influenced many parts of Europe but had little impact on English law.

Notes:

¹ Common law - общее право, обычное право, некодифицированное право

² precedent - прецедент