national or federal courts administer the common law as they find it to exist in the states respectively. The law of Louisiana, however, is not the common law, but is based upon the principles of the civil law which came to Louisiana from France. The law of most of the other states finds its source in the common law as it was established and administered in England and her colonies and such statutes as were applicable thereto at the time of the separation, and in the judicial precedents and established customs of the state.

§ 19. Historical and legal sources of the law.— The sources of the law supply the substance of the rules and principles which the courts lay down in the performance of their judicial functions. These sources are either legal or historical. Legal sources are those recognized by the rules of law and which it is the solemn duty of the courts scrupulously to observe. Thus statutes are legal sources, for it is a rule of law that in the determination of judicial controversies the courts must have resort to any legislation that is applicable to the pending controversy. Historical sources are those from which the ideas originate which later become embodied in the law through the legal sources. For instance, a statute prohibits murder. The legal source of that portion of the law is the statute, while the historical source may be the Biblical commandment, "Thou shalt not kill," or any other source from which the framers of the statute received the idea of prohibiting such an act. It is important to carefully distinguish between the legal and historical sources of the law, since it is only through the legal sources that principles find entrance into the law of the state. The legal sources

2-Elem. Law.

of the law are statutes, custom and precedent, which will be discussed in succeeding chapters.

§ 20. Historical sources of the common law.The historical sources of the common law have been said to be undiscoverable. It is the sum of innumerable accretions from ancient customs and usages which began among the people of England, which customs are sometimes designated as the "ancient Saxon privileges," or the body of laws framed by Alfred the Great and reaffirmed by Edward the Confessor. In making this compilation, Alfred drew upon the Mercian laws existing in the counties bordering on Wales and retaining old British customs; upon the West Saxon of southern and southwestern counties of England; and upon the Danish of the western coast, where a Danish settlement had been effected. Some affirm, with apparent good reason, that it was framed in part from the Old Testament; portions of it were undoubtedly taken from the principles of the Roman Pandects. These were compiled by Roman lawyers by command of Justinian from the writings and opinions of the old Roman jurists and formed a part of the body of the civil law of Rome, which has been accepted as the basis of medieval legislation and of nearly all European law. The spirit of these laws found its way into England through the clergy, who were the only learned class of that period. Some centuries later the laws themselves became embodied in the common law of England in a more positive and extensive form.

§ 21. Growth of the common law.-At the time of the Norman conquest the invaders found the English people living under a code of laws which was

compiled by Edward the Confessor, upon the basis of the code of Alfred, which has already been mentioned. The renewal by Magna Charta of the "ancient Saxon privileges" was the re-enactment of a part of the code of Edward. Although the common law is an unwritten law, its rules and principles have been handed down from generation to generation, and sometimes have almost approached in exactitude the complete and precise form of statute law. An illustration of the adaptability of the common law to the wants of society is found in the manner in which the rules of the law merchant were incorporated into or were assimilated by the common law. During the operation of the feudal system the rules of the common law were inadequate to the needs of the mercantile classes. As controversies came before the courts, they were in the habit of applying to commercial contracts the rules which had been adopted among merchants in their business dealings, just as courts now interpret and enforce the contracts of men engaged in the various callings of life, according to the customs and usages prevailing in such callings. So numerous were the rules of the law merchant, and so important had the mercantile classes become, that by a statute enacted during the reign of James I these rules were declared to be a part of the common law. And substantially as they were when this statute was enacted, they have come to be a part of the common law of the United States.

§ 22. Common law in the United States.-The common law of the states comprising the United States consists of the common law of England as modified by English statutes previous to the colonization of America, so far as it was adapted to the al

tered conditions and circumstances of the colonies, and those English statutes passed afterwards prior to the American Revolution, which were practically accepted and adopted in America, and the judicial precedents and established customs of the states themselves. The common law is presumed to exist in the colonial states and in states where the population was largely representative of those states. In fact, all the states except Louisiana have in one form or another adopted the common law. The United States as a nation has no law that is not embodied in the constitution, treaties or laws enacted by congress.

§ 23. Statutes as legal sources.-A statute is that legal source of the law which consists in the declaration of legal rules by the properly constituted authorities. The authority to declare such rules is generally known as legislative power. In the United States it is vested in the congress, the legislatures and the municipal councils of the federal, state and city governments respectively. In the latter case the rules are generally known as ordinances. These statutes are interpreted, applied and enforced by the courts of the state. In an abstract sense, the principles and rules laid down by the courts in the exercise of this function constitute the law, while the statutes themselves are the sources of the law.

§ 24. Constitutions. We come now to inquire as to the manner in which the supreme power of the state prescribes the rules of civil conduct, as they are embodied in the statutes. The constitution of the nation, or of the state, is the direct and imperative expression of the will of the people. Legislatures and courts are under the constitution, and are created by it or by its authority. This paramount written law, the Constitution of the United States, can only