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The Epic Interactive Encyclopedia 1998
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Epic Interactive Encyclopedia, The - 1998 Edition (1998)(Epic Marketing).iso
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English_law
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INFOTEXT
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1992-09-02
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One of the major European legal systems,
Roman law being the other. English law has
spread to many other countries, particularly
former English colonies such as the USA,
Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. English
law has a continuous history dating from the
local customs of the Anglo-Saxons, traces of
which survived until 1925. After the Norman
Conquest there grew up, side by side with the
Saxon shire courts, the feudal courts of the
barons and the ecclesiastical courts. From
the king's council developed the royal
courts, presided over by professional judges,
which gradually absorbed the jurisdictions of
the baronial and ecclesiastical courts. By
1250 the royal judges had amalgamated the
various local customs into the system of
common law - that is, law common to the whole
country. A second system known as equity
developed in the Court of Chancery, in which
the Lord Chancellor considered petitions. In
the 17th-18th centuries, common law absorbed
the Law Merchant, the international code of
mercantile customs. During the 19th century
virtually the whole of English law was
reformed by legislation; for example, the
number of capital offences was greatly
reduced. A unique feature of English law is
the doctrine of judicial precedents, whereby
the reported decisions of the courts form a
binding source of law for future decisions. A
judge is bound by decisions of courts of
superior jurisdiction but not necessarily by
those of inferior courts. The Judicature Acts
1873-75 abolished a multiplicity of courts,
and in their place established the Supreme
Court of Judicature, organized in the Court
of Appeal and the High Court of Justice; the
latter has three divisions - the Queen's
Bench, Chancery, and Family Divisions. All
Supreme Court judges may apply both common
law and equity in deciding cases. From the
Court of Appeal there may be a further appeal
to the House of Lords.