What is Civil Law?
Answer
It means different things in different contexts.
- Civil Law v. Criminal Law - It's the law of civil or private parties (contracts, torts, family law, and property), as opposed to criminal law or administrative law (government actions).
- Civil Law (based on Roman Law) v. Common Law (based on English Law) - It's one of the two prominent legal systems in the Western world, originally administered in the Roman Empire. Civil Law is still influential in continental Europe, Latin America, and Louisiana.
- Louisiana Civil Law - Louisiana is the only Civil Law jurisdiction in the US. It may be better to think of Louisiana's legal system as a hybrid consisting of both Civil and Common Law influences. Louisiana gets the Civil Law portion from its colonial past as a possession of two Civil Law countries, Spain and France.