Jurisprudence and Different Legal Systems

For your Assignment, research “civil law” based legal systems and
“common law” based legal systems. In an essay of 5 to 7 pages, type in 10-12 point font Times New Roman are acceptable, cite at least three
different characteristics of civil law and common law and discuss in
detail which legal system you consider to be superior to the other. Be
sure to state reasons, with appropriate references, for your position.

Supplemental Information:

Most of the world follows civil law
systems. With civil law, the law is what the legislature says it is and
case precedent is not a part of legal thinking. Judges in a civil law
system do not make new law when they decide cases. Each case is decided
on more of a case by case basis. Also, judges in civil law systems are
usually career government employees, who in some cases have never
practiced law. Judges in a common law influenced system usually come
from the ranks of practicing attorneys who have many years of
experience.

In countries that used to be British colonies, and in the UK today,
there is a common law history in the legal system. (By the way, despite
the similar names, common law marriage did not originate with the
British common law courts and should not be a part of your discussion in
this assignment.) In a common law influenced system, judges on courts
of appeal make new law when they decide cases. Statutes are the law as
well, but cases can set a precedent by which later cases, which are
similar, are decided.

In the U.S., all states, except Louisiana, follow a common law
influenced legal system. Louisiana follows civil law as to its
non-criminal law. In Canada, all provinces, except Quebec, follow a
common law influenced legal system. Quebec follows a civil law system.

Community property law is a product of civil law, but 9 US states
follow it today. The other 41 do not follow community property law.
Community property basically means that each spouse owns half of what
the other spouse earns during the marriage.

When the permanent federal income tax began, in 1913, with
ratification of the 16th Amendment, there was no joint income tax filing
for married people. Each individual who had income had a personal
responsibility to file an income tax return. When World War 2 began,
more and more families began to have two incomes from outside the home.
This created a tax advantage for those in the community property states.
Consider this example: Husband made $10,000 and wife made $40,000. In a
community property state, this was looked at as each of them making
$25,000 a year. This would put both of them is the same midrange tax
bracket. However, a couple with the same income in a separate property
state was paying a lot more in income tax. Although the person who was
only paying on income of $10,000 was paying very little tax, the person
with $40,000 of income was in a very high tax bracket, resulting in the
non-community property state couple paying a lot more in federal income
tax. In order to make taxation more fair across the country for those
with the same amount of household income, Congress created joint income
tax filing for married people, which was essentially adopting a
community property idea, to make federal taxation more uniform around
the country.

The jurisprudence of civil law and common law have influenced each other in many ways.