sources of contemporary australian law common law

Question 1

what are the two meanings of common law

Answer 1

1. the law made by judges according to the doctrine of precedent
2. the legal system developed in England and evolved into the adversarial system

Question 2

what are the origins of the adversarial system

Answer 2

• england, each village would conduct their own trial with physical fights
• people were hired to fight on others behalf
• then they would verbally fight
• evolved into adversarial system

Question 3

what is the adversarial system

Answer 3

two sides of case try to prove their version and disprove the other side

Question 4

what is hearsay evidence

Answer 4

evidence given by a person about what they heard another person said, NON ADMISSABLE

Question 5

what is opinion evidence

Answer 5

a person can not give his/her opinion in court about another persons unless they are an expert in that field

Question 6

can a judge/magistrate/jury test evidence

Answer 6

no

Question 7

diasvantages of adversarial system

Answer 7

there are claims it creates a legal system where a case is won by the most persuasive argument

Question 8

what is the order of the court hierarchy (low to high)

Answer 8

• local court
• district court
• supreme court
• high court

Question 9

what is appealing

Answer 9

when a court case is decided in a lower court and the outcome is not just then this may be re-trialed in higher courts

Question 10

what is a prescedent

Answer 10

when courts use decisions made in earlier cases to help decide the outcome of a similar case under consideration

Question 11

2 main ways precedent is developed

Answer 11

1. when a single judge arrives at a decisions when there is no existing common law or statute law, the judge must then rely on common sense and principles of the law to make a decisions
2. by the way judges interpret legislation, courts need to interpret law to determine the meaning on certain words

Question 12

rules of precedent

Answer 12

• lower courts are bound to follow precedent (binding precedent)
• superior courts do not have to follow decisions but can use them to assist a decision (persuasive precedent)

Question 13

what are the equity courts

Answer 13

• isolated principles
• valid only to those specifies by the court
• in the event of a very unfair outcome

Question 14

summary and indictable offenses

Answer 14

summary: minor put into local court
indictable: major put into district or above