Common law Origins: 1.

The origins of the Common Law Tradition can be traced to 1066 from the time of the Norman conquest of England, and its roots are ultimately from the pre-conquest world of Anglo-Saxon England. It began as a customary law used in the courts of the king to decide those cases which were thought to concern the monarch. At the time, the king had jurisdiction only if the case was concerned with the disturbance of the kings peace and property. Although there were other smaller courts that settled disputes among the people based on their native laws or traditional customs, many came to prefer the kings justice so they formulated their complaints so that they fell within the jurisdiction of the royal courts. The kings jurisdiction was extended because he assumed control of admin of justice thru the judges n justices who travelled throughout the kingdom on his authority leading to the development of a centralised system of courts and a decline of local courts n jurisdictions. Thus emerged the common law courts like EXCHEQUER, COMMON PLEAS, KB( principl courts)- the Church, by virtue of its position as the leader of civilisation, had literate clerics who were employed by the king as deputies in the administration of justice. These clerics, with time, came to be specialised in legal business. Common law thus evolved from mass of local custom in2 1 system of law applied uniformly throughout the

country. Early com law was therefore not an entirely new set of legal rules developed by judges, but a unification n development of many customs used n applyd by loc courts, whose practices, essentially preserved as an oral tradition formed the Common Law of England. One of the important features of the Common Law tradition in its early form is the writ system. In this system, ryts only existed if der was a procedure 2 en4s it. The principle was firmly established that no one could bring an action in the Kings courts without a writ. Naicha of ryts sought 2 b en4sd, naicha of procedure determined which court wld deal wiv it. Unfortunately, this became a rigid system cos of the limited number of writs and the fact that these writs were framed to govern specific kinds of wrongs. Each writ had its own procedure and its own substantive law- had 2 fit ur complaint in2 a writ odawys u cld not have any remedy for the complaint. These writs were later abolished by common law proc acts. The Court of Chancery was created for the purpose of Equity which was devpd 2 fill gaps left by Common Law. Equity-correct deficiencies of com law- where the law created injustice cos of rigidity of writ system. Another important feature was the trial by jury. This was based on the concept that a man could be tried by his peers. This also led to the problem whereby the accused could bring people to testify on his behalf, and possibly skew the evidence in that persons favour. This is known as licenced perjury. definitions

According to David & Brierley- CL may be defined as a public law issuing from procedure, which is the law of England and those modelled on the English Law. Thus, the CL seeks to provide solution to a trial, rather than laid- down, prescribed rules of conduct for the future. This means that rather than solely using statutes to resolve an issue, the CL judge also luks at how similar cases were resolved in the past and the principles applied therein. This is in direct contrast to the Civil Law judge who is guided solely by the statutes in deciding cases. Raymond Michaloski defines CL as consisting of the rules and other doctrines devpd gradually by the judges of the English royal court as the foundations of their decisions and added to by judges of those various jurisdictions recognising the authority of this accumulated doctrine law of common jurisdictions applied by these laws. Webb: CL = used to describe all those rules of law that have evolved from the court cases as opposed to those which have emerged from the legislature over the past 800 yrs. Simpson: the law which takes its origin from tradition expressed in action (trad here refs to cases decided a long time ago being revisited) Common Features from these writers: 1. case based- all the writers above agree that CL judges apply principles from earlier decisions- thus

the foundation of CL is the case as opposed to statutes in the Civil Law 2. decisions originally based on native laws of England. 3. not limited only to England but other jurisdictions within the CL also incorporated. 4. Jury system still pertains in sum areas of law for example criminal law 5. Although writ systems no longer in existence, traits of it are still seen ex in tort law, an acshn may be trespass 2 d person, an acshn on the case, etc. 6. Although equity is not the area for only one court ie chancery, common law countries still apply principles of equity, unlike the civil law.