Law and Revolution, the Formation of the Western Legal Tradition

Front Cover
Harvard University Press, Jul 1, 2009 - Law - 672 pages
The roots of modern Western legal institutions and concepts go back nine centuries to the Papal Revolution, when the Western church established its political and legal unity and its independence from emperors, kings, and feudal lords. Out of this upheaval came the Western idea of integrated legal systems consciously developed over generations and centuries. Harold J. Berman describes the main features of these systems of law, including the canon law of the church, the royal law of the major kingdoms, the urban law of the newly emerging cities, feudal law, manorial law, and mercantile law. In the coexistence and competition of these systems he finds an important source of the Western belief in the supremacy of law. Written simply and dramatically, carrying a wealth of detail for the scholar but also a fascinating story for the layman, the book grapples with wideranging questions of our heritage and our future. One of its main themes is the interaction between the Western belief in legal evolution and the periodic outbreak of apocalyptic revolutionary upheavals. Berman challenges conventional nationalist approaches to legal history, which have neglected the common foundations of all Western legal systems. He also questions conventional social theory, which has paid insufficient attention to the origin of modem Western legal systems and has therefore misjudged the nature of the crisis of the legal tradition in the twentieth century.

From inside the book

Contents

The Background of the Western Legal Tradition The Folklaw
49
Tribal Law
52
Christianity and Kingship
62
Penitential Law and Its Relation to the Folklaw
68
The Origin of the Western Legal Tradition in the Papal Revolution
85
The Cluniac Reform
88
The Dictates of the Pope
94
The Revolutionary Character of the Papal Revolution
99
Objectivity and Universality
321
Reciprocity of Rights of Lords and Peasants
322
Participatory Adjudication
324
Integration and Growth
328
Mercantile Law
333
Religion and the Rise of Capitalism
336
The New System of Commercial Law
339
Urban Law
357

SocialPsychological Causes and Consequences of the Papal Revolution
107
The Rise of the Modern State
113
The Rise of Modern Legal Systems
115
The Origin of Western Legal Science in the European Universities
120
The Law School at Bologna
123
The Curriculum and Teaching Method
127
The Scholastic Method of Analysis and Synthesis
131
The Relation of Scholasticism to Greek Philosophy and Roman Law
132
The Application of the Scholastic Dialectic to Legal Science
143
Law as a Prototype of Western Science
151
Theological Sources of the Western Legal Tradition
165
Last Judgment and Purgatory
166
The Sacrament of Penance
172
The Sacrament of the Eucharist
173
St Anselms Doctrine of Atonement
174
The Legal Implications of the Doctrine of the Atonement
179
Theological Sources of Western Criminal Law
181
The Canon Law of Crimes
185
Canon Law The First Modern Western Legal System
199
The Relation of Canon Law to Roman Law
204
Constitutional Foundations of the Canon Law System
205
Corporation Law as the Constitutional Law of the Church
215
Limitations on Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction
221
Structural Elements of the System of Canon Law
225
The Canon Law of Marriage
226
The Canon Law of Inheritance
230
The Canon Law of Property
237
The Canon Law of Contracts
245
Procedure
250
The Systematic Character of Canon Law
253
Beckct versus Henry II The Competition of Concurrent Jurisdictions
255
The Constitutions of Clarendon
256
Benefit of Clergy and Double Jeopardy
259
Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction in England
260
Writs of Prohibition
264
THE FORMATION OF SECULAR LEGAL SYSTEMS
271
The Concept of Secular Law
273
The Emergence of New Theories of Secular Government and Secular Law
275
John of Salisbury Founder of Western Political Science
276
Theories of the Roman and Canon Lawyers
288
The Rule of Law
292
Feudal Law
295
Feudal Custom in the West Prior to the Eleventh Century
297
The Emergence of a System of Feudal Law
303
Manorial Law
316
Causes of the Rise of the Modern City
359
The Origins of the Cities and Towns of Western Europe
363
Cambrai Beauvais Laon
364
Lorris Montauban
368
Verneuil
369
SaintOmer Bruges Ghent
370
Cologne Freiburg Lubeck Magdeburg
371
London Ipswich
380
The Italian Cities
386
Guilds and Guild Law
390
The Main Characteristics of Urban Law
392
The City as a Historical Community
399
Royal Law Sicily England Normandy France
404
The Norman Kingdom of Sicily
409
The Norman State
414
The Personality of Roger II
417
The Norman Legal System
419
The Growth of Royal Law in Norman Italy
424
England
434
The Personality of Henry II
438
The English State
440
English Royal Law The Common Law
445
The Science of the English Common Law
457
Normandy
459
France
461
The Personality of Philip Augustus
463
The French State
464
The French System of Royal Justice
467
French Royal Civil and Criminal Law
473
French and English Royal Law Compared
477
Royal Law Germany Spain Flanders Hungary Denmark
482
The personality and vision of Frederick Barbarossa
488
The imperial peace statutes Landfrieden
493
The Mirror of Saxon Law Sachsenspiegefy
503
The Law of the Principalities
505
Spain Flanders Hungary Denmark
510
Royal Law and Canon Law
516
Conclusion
520
Beyond Marx beyond Weber
538
Abbreviations
560
Notes
561
Acknowledgments
636
Index
637
Copyright

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About the author (2009)

Harold J. Berman was Woodruff Professor of Law, Emory University, and Ames Professor of Law, Emeritus, Harvard University.

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