Law & Judicial Process Flashcards
What are the rules that people live by? (3)
Moral Precepts
Customs
Law
- Rules of behavior based on ideas of right
and wrong - People obey them because they believe it
is good to do so, not because they fear
some kind of earthly retribution from other
people.
Moral Precepts
- Rules of behavior based on long-established and
widespread ways in which most people actually
behave. - The most powerful regulators of all in
most primitive societies and even in industrialized
nations they play an important role
Customs
Body of rules emanating from government and
enforceable by courts.
Laws
What are the types of laws classified by source
- Constitutional Law
- Statutory Law
- Administrative Law
- Common Law
- Roman and Civil Law
What are the types of laws classified by subject matter
- Civil Law
- Criminal Law
A body of fundamental rules, written and
unwritten, by which its government
operates.
Regarded as the most fundamental of all
types of laws
Constitutional Law
It consists of all the rules enacted by the
legislature that command or prohibit some
form of behavior.
Statutory Law
The total body of rules made by executive and administrative agencies within certain specified limits, authorized by the constitutions and the legislatures.
Administrative Law
Judge-declared law. Law which exists and
applies to a group on the basis of customs
and legal precedents developed over
hundreds of years in Britain .
Common Law
The rules developed by the Court of Chancery outside the common law.
Equity Law
It consists of a body of rules and procedures that, though differing somewhat from nation to nation is based upon the jus civile of ancient Rome, which was rediscovered and adopted by European judges in the early Middles Ages.
Roman and Civil Law
Law that deals with crimes.
Criminal Law
A wrong committed against the whole
community
“An act done in violation of those duties which an
individual owes to the community and for the breach of which the law has provided that the offender shall make satisfaction to the public.”
Crime
More serious crimes
Felonies
less serious crimes
Misdemeanors
It deals with wrongs committed by one private individual against another but not considered to be damaging to the whole community.
Civil Law
What are the three special judicial functions?
Law enforcement
Dispute settlement
Judicial review
Involves:
Ascertaining the facts
Interpreting and Applying the Law
Punishing the offender
Law enforcement
Essence of any case at law is a dispute over the merits of the plaintiff’s complaint against the defendant
Dispute Settlement
One who makes a complaint against the
other party
Plaintiff
One who is sued or accused in a
court of law
Defendant
The power of a court to render a legislative or executive act null and void on grounds of unconstitutionality.
Judicial Review
What are the two basic systems of justice?
Adversarial
Inquisitorial
A system in which a neutral court hears the
arguments and evidence presented by the
plaintiff and the defendant and makes its
decision on the basis of what it has heard.
Adversarial
A system in which the court takes an active
role in obtaining evidence and questioning
witnesses as the basis for its decisions.
Inquisitorial
What is the general structure of hierarchies of appeal?
Preliminary courts
General trial courts
Intermediate courts of appeal
Supreme courts
Lower courts on the judicial ladder
Tribunals have the power try only small civil cases and misdemeanors, and most refer major cases to the next level of courts.
Preliminary courts
Courts authorized to try most civil and criminal cases.
General trial courts
Mainly hear appeals from the trial courts and rarely
or never act as trial courts.
Intermediate courts of appeal
In each nation, this tribunal acts as the final
court of appeal.
In some nations, the tribunal also acts as a trial
court in a few special cases.
Supreme courts
In Great Britain, lawyers are separated into two
categories. What are they?
Solicitors
Barristers
“office lawyers”; give advice and prepare
documents but can appear only in certain lower
courts.
Solicitors
“trial lawyers”; can appear before all
courts, do the actual pleading before the higher
courts, and from whose ranks all higher court judges
are appointed
Barristers
In France, there are three classes of lawyers:
Avouets
Avocats
Notaires
(french) comparable to British solicitors.
Avouets
(french) analogous to British barristers
Avocats
