Law, Magistracy, and Crime in Old Regime Paris, 1735-1789: Volume 1, The System of Criminal Justice

Law, Magistracy and Crime in Old Regime Paris, 1735-1789 is the first of two volumes centred around the two great courts of Paris, the Chatelet and Parlement, and their criminal defendants in the eighteenth century. Richard Andrews seeks to refute the 'black legend' of revolutionary propaganda and its modern historical successors, which hold that the Old Regime courts were cruel and arbitrary. These courts are shown rather to be thoroughly rule-bound and consisting of strict judicial procedure derived from royal statutes. Rule of and by the law is shown to be the most substantial legacy of the Old Regime. This volume places the courts of Old Regime Paris in the context of French society and the state. The practices and doctrines of punishment are examined, along with the jurisprudence of moral and criminal behaviour. By reconstructing the general system of royal criminal justice, Richard Andrews explores the political system connected to it: the formation, authority and ethos of the magistracy and its relation to the monarchy, the Church, the aristocracy, the bourgeois and the plebeians.