Uniwersytet Jagielloński

Kraków, Poland

The Class in American Law 2002

The Catholic University of America
Ken Pennington Email: Pennington@cua.edu  and Kenneth.Pennington3@verizon.net  (Click on addresses to send Email)

Origins of the Civil and Common Legal Institutions:  Procedure, Case Law, Jurists, and Codification

Required Readings:

Ken Pennington, "Bartolome de Las Casas and Medieval Legal Tradition"

Ken Pennington, "Roman and Secular Law in the Middle Ages"

Ken Pennington, "Spirit of Legal History"

Ken Pennington, "Due Process, Community, and the Prince in the Evolution of the Ordo iudiciarius"

Ken Pennington, "Innocent Until Proven Guilty: The Origins of a Legal Maxim

 Ken Pennington, "Learned Law, droit savant, gelehrtes Recht:  The Tyranny of a Concept"

Ken Pennington, "Sovereignty and Rights in Medieval and Early Modern Jurisprudence: Law and Norms without a State"

Kenneth Pennington, "A Short History of Canon Law"

Kenneth Pennington, "The Ius commune, Suretyship, and Magna carta"

Kenneth Pennington, "The History of Rights in Western Thought"

Lectures Topics

I. Introduction, Definition of Terms, Conceptions of Comparative Legal History

           Purpose of the Course and a Short Introduction to the Jurisprudence of Law

Readings:     Ken Pennington, "Spirit of Legal History"

II. Revival of Law in the Twelfth Century, Case Law, and the Birth of Procedure in the Ius commune

Gratian, the Founder of the Case Law Method

Gratian, De legibus

The Development of Case Law in Canon Law

Case Law in Canon Law:  Papal Decretals

Decisiones Romanae Rotae:  Thomas Fastolf, Decisiones novae, antiquae et antiquiores  1348

Case Law in the Ius commune: Consilia (Briefs)

Development of the Norms of Procedure in the Ius commune

Key terms:  Cognitio extraordinaria, ordeal, ordo iudiciarius, due process

Ordeals

The evolution of procedure in the Ius commune during the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries

Readings:  Pennington, "Due Process"

III. The Birth of Procedure in English Common Law

        

 England and France 1150-1200

 

 Constitutions of Clarendon 1164

Prologue and Text

 
 Assize of Clarendon 1166

 

 Writs

 
Development of the Jury

 

 Magna Carta

 
Bracton, De legibus

Bracton, Introduction

 Outline of English Law 1200-1800
 

The Relationship of English Common Law to the Ius commune:  Suretyship

 

 

IV. The Work of the Jurists in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe:  "Rights-Based"   Jurisprudence in the Ius commune

 

Rights of Due Process

Rights of Property, Contract, and Marriage

Rights of Non-Christian Peoples:  The Beginnings of International Law

Rights without a State:  Rights in Early Modern Europe
 

Pennington, "Due Process, Community, and the Prince in the Evolution of the Ordo iudiciarius"  

Pennington,  Innocent until Proven Guilty:  Origins of a Maxim

The Rights of Indigenous Peoples in the Ius commune

Ken Pennington, "Sovereignty and Rights in Medieval and Early Modern Jurisprudence: Law and Norms without a State"

Also this review of a book by Tierney will help you to understand the main developments of natural rights in pre-modern legal thought: Review of Tierney

           

V. The Idea of Codification and the History of Case Law

 

Codification of Law in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries

Codification 1500-1900

 

      VI. Final Essay:  A Comparison of the Civil and Common Law Traditions


Final Paper: Compare and contrast Procedure or Case Law or Judges or Jurists or Codification in the Civil and Common Law Traditions (4 pages).

The final paper should be submitted to me by email in either a Word or a WordPerfect attached file.  Be sure that you put your name on the essay and use your name as the file name.  If you use a Mac, then send me the text in the body of the email.  I should receive your essay by November 27, 2002.  If you have questions about the essay, please send me an email.