Whar are the Sources of Law? Non-retroactivity of the law?

Sources of Law:The law refers to written sources, but there are also custom and statutes.


1. The categories of written standards

Any text is less than the constitution. The constitution is the mother source of law. It may be called by the President of the Republic, the President of the Assembly or the Senate, by 60 deputies or 60 senators.

• the Constitution
• The law through parliament
• Decrees by the President of the Republic or the Prime Minister
• Orders by ministers, by the prefects or mayors

The treaties legislative supra value only if they have been ratified, ie the Treaty of Rome. There is a higher authority than the law.

2. The application of the law in time

The characteristics of the law:

The law is general, permanent and compulsory for all citizens.

* The generality: the law is applicable to all throughout the country. There are no class distinctions, no discrimination. There are many exceptions, e.g the president of the republic, women's suffrage in 1946, more needs husband's permission to work since 1965, entitled to have a different housing the husband in the 80 in France a distinction on the maternity legislation.


* The permanence: as long as it remains in the written law and still applies, to eliminate it must be repealed. The revocation may be express when a new text explicitly states that the old law is repealed, ie the law of 19 October 2000.


The repeal may be implied when a new text contains provisions contrary to or inconsistent with the ancient texts.


* The bindingness: the law applies to everyone. A mandatory law applies regardless of the will of the citizens, e.g criminal law, respect the decency as not rent rooms by the hour. A supplementary law applies unless otherwise wishes of the two contracting parties. Any contract law is a supplementary law, Article 1134 of the Civil Code states that legally formed conventions take place laws to those who made them.

The law must be known, this knowledge through its publication in the Official Journal: no one should ignore the law.



b. The non-retroactivity of the law
Article 2 of the Civil Code says that the law provides only for the future, it has no retroactive effect. The new law does not apply to facts or situations prior rights to publication. We often talk of immediate application of the law, it will apply to current events but not to legal situations already born, in this case there is survival of the old law.


However, this principle has exceptions:

• The law expresses itself retroactive, i.e in 1945 on collaboration.
• The laws are interpretative, these ordinances clarify the meaning or scope of a recently enacted law.
• The more lenient criminal provisions.

Competing sources

They are three in number, it is the custom, doctrine and jurisprudence.

1 The custom

The custom is defined as the repeated use within a group that after a certain time considers it a law, e.g the woman by marrying takes the name of her husband. It is oral (not written), local application. This custom must be the subject of a consensus, that is to say that people submit to this custom.

2. The doctrine

These writings made by legal writers. Their writings are either the law or the court decisions.

3. Case law

This is all the court decisions that pose principles and solutions of the problems. Over the court is high and the decision will reach a plenum decision is binding on lower courts. Case law has some default report to law. Indeed it is relative because the decision is made for a trial that involves only two people. It is fragile, it is never in the shelter of a case of rollover. The fact remains that the case law is creative laws, e.g a 1976 judgment that specifies when a company is insolvent will be taken up later by a new law.