Civil Law – The Common Law Legal System

Civil law is the most dominant legal tradition today in most parts of the world. It is that branch of law which deals with individuals, and/or organizations in which compensation is rewarded to the victim. E.g. in a car accident, victim can claim damages against the driver for the loss or injury sustained in the accident. Going back to the history of civil law, common law follows an adversarial model while civil law is more inquisitorial. Civil law is code-based. It provides a forum or predefined set of rules for deciding disputes involving torts, probate of wills, property, administrative law, commercial law and private matters including government departments. The civil judge does not interpret the law but simply follow predetermined legal rules.

The objectives are different in civil law. There is an attempt to right a wrong, honor an agreement or settle a dispute. The victim gets compensation from the person who does the wrong. Every common law country has its own set of legal system that depicts on the rich history of civil law.

Understanding civil law, one needs to know the history of its origin. As they say, “All roads lead to Rome”, civil law has also originated from the legal institutions of Rome. Its name derives from jus civile, the civil law of the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire. The jurists were people from upper classes of the Roman society who offered their legal knowledge as a public service. They advised parties to litigation, lay judiciary who presided over the trials and judged the facts of the case.
There were two types of civil judges: the magistrate and the judge for the trial. The jurists in Rome were nonprofessional and were not the government officers, hence they did not charged for their services. Thus, Roman law had an important influence on history of the world.

Civil law is usually referred to both the common law and law of equity which have historically operated to different doctrines.

Despite of the universal recognition of the distinction between the private law and public law in the civil law world, there is still no agreement among the civil law attorneys on its theoretical basis and no uniformity as to the scope of private and public law. Private law is that area of the law in which the sole function of government was the recognition and enforcement of private rights. Contrarily, public law is the effectuation of public interest by state action. Private law includes civil and commercial codes, while public includes constitutional law, administrative law and criminal law.

In a civil lawsuit, the plaintiff is responsible for the cost of litigation. Most civil law attorneys handle victim cases on a contingency basis which means the attorney fees is deducted from the final award.