scholarly journals Preventing lawful and decent burial: resurrecting dead offences

Legal Studies ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 36 (2) ◽  
pp. 354-374 ◽  
Author(s):  
Imogen Jones ◽  
Muireann Quigley
Keyword(s):  
Common Law ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
High Profile ◽  
Administration Of Justice ◽  
The Common ◽  
Per Se

Recent high-profile convictions have called attention to the common law offence of preventing a lawful and decent burial. This offence, which can only be found in its modern incarnation since 1974, is being used with increasing frequency. We argue that there is, however, little justification (or need) for criminalising the prevention of burial per se. The historical context of the need to regulate the disposal of corpses is no longer relevant. Moreover, the ambit of the offence is such that it cannot be argued to be targeting acts of intentional disrespect to deceased bodies. We suggest that acts which intentionally impede the administration of justice are rightly criminal, but other offences already deal more appropriately with these. We conclude that the contemporary use of the offence of preventing a lawful and decent burial contributes to an unnecessary proliferation of overlapping offences, providing prosecutors and juries with a way to assign liability to a person whom they suspect, but cannot prove, is guilty of more serious charges.

Dangerous things and the Non-Natural User of Land

1929 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 376-397
Author(s):  
W. T. S. Stallybrass
Keyword(s):  
Common Law ◽  
True Nature ◽  
Moral Qualities ◽  
The Common ◽  
Per Se ◽  
The Law

It is perhaps true that one of the most important moral qualities of a man, especially an undergraduate, is a knowledge of where to ‘draw the line’; it is certainly true that one of the most essential parts of a lawyer's equipment is the capacity for drawing distinctions correctly. The whole framework of the law is based upon distinctions, and the drawing of false distinctions is as disastrous as is the failure to draw those that are based upon sound reasoning. It is the object of this article to consider, very tentatively, two distinctions which have been introduced into the common law relating to injury done to others by the property of the defendant: in the first place, the distinction between those things which are dangerous per se and those things which are dangerous sub modo, and in the second place, the distinction between the natural and the non-natural user of land. I shall then endeavour to consider the relation of these two problems to each other. But there will be no attempt to state the nature or extent of the liability that arises; for example, I shall not consider the true nature of the rule in Rylands v. Fletcher or the extent of the duty owed by him who deals with dangerous chattels, though some light may incidentally be thrown upon such matters.

A new chapter in the law of sexual harassment in Malaysia: The emergence of the torts of harassment and sexual harassment

2019 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 191-207
Author(s):  
Abdul Majid ◽  
Sri Yogamalar ◽  
Audrey Kim Lan Siah ◽  
Jane L Y Terpstra-Tong ◽  
Luc Borrowman
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Harassment ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Federal Court ◽  
The World ◽  
The Common ◽  
Per Se ◽  
The Law ◽  
First Time

In a landmark case in 2016, Malaysia’s apex court, the Federal Court, explicitly recognised for the first time, the common law tort of sexual harassment. Actually, the Federal Court did more than that; its recognition of the common law tort of sexual harassment is built on its recognising the common law tort of harassment. The recognition of the tort of harassment has escaped notice because attention has been concentrated on the tort of sexual harassment. This article analyses the Federal Court’s exposition of the tort of sexual harassment to reveal that the exegesis itself acknowledges the existence of the tort of harassment per se. The tort of harassment that the Federal Court sent out into the world is largely a creature of its English common law ancestry.

Employment Law in Context

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Cabrelli
Keyword(s):  
Common Law ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Employment Law ◽  
Labour Law ◽  
Practical Applications ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Common ◽  
Employment Rights ◽  
A Company

Employment Law in Context combines extracts from leading cases, articles, and books with commentary to provide a full critical understanding of employment law. As well as providing a grounding in individual labour law, this title offers detailed analysis of the social, economic, political, and historical context in which employment law operates, drawing attention to key and current areas of debate. An innovative running case study contextualizes employment law and demonstrates its practical applications by following the life-cycle of a company from incorporation, through expansion, to liquidation. Reflection points and further reading suggestions are included. The volume is divided into eight main Parts. The first Part provides an introduction to employment law. The next Part looks at the constitution of employment and personal work contracts. This is followed by Part III, which examines the content of the personal employment contract and the obligations imposed by the common law on employers and employees. The fourth Part is about statutory employment rights. The fifth Part covers equality law. Part VI looks at the common law and statutory regulation of dismissals. The Part that follows considers business reorganizations, consultation, and insolvency. Finally, Part VIII describes collective labour law.

Emotions, Power and Popular Opinion about the Administration of Justice: The English Experience, from Coke’s ‘Artificial Reason’ to the Sensibility of ‘True Crime Stories’

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 59-90
Author(s):  
David Lemmings
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Emotional Engagement ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Grass Roots ◽  
Administration Of Justice ◽  
The Common ◽  
True Crime

This article discusses emotions and power in the administration and representation of criminal justice in early modern England. In the early seventeenth century, professional lawyers insisted that only they were competent to understand the ‘artificial reason’ of the common law; and lay opinion was associated with unreliable emotional engagement with the protagonists in trials. ‘Popular jurisprudence’ received renewed impetus from the post-Reformation emphasis on conscience and divine providence, however, and this kind of common sense interpretation often featured in popular accounts of law proceedings. Moreover, the ‘low law’ administered at grass roots level by JPs was less professionalised because most magistrates were not lawyers. The development of popular and emotional jurisprudence is demonstrated in the eighteenth century by analysis of judges’ charges, popular novels, and the reportage of ‘true crime’. Ultimately, and despite further ‘lawyerisation’ of trials, this article argues that the rise of the novel and increased press reporting of criminal justice generated more vicarious engagement with the administration of justice. And this was emotional engagement: eighteenth-century popular jurisprudence represented justice as variously awesome, theatrical and unreasonably oppressive.

Contempt: In the Common Law, but not the Civil Law

1997 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 521-560
Author(s):  
Michael Chesterman
Keyword(s):  
Common Law ◽  
Civil Law ◽  
High Court ◽  
The Road ◽  
Administration Of Justice ◽  
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation ◽  
The Common ◽  
The Law ◽  
Court Orders

To allow Court orders to be disobeyed would be to tread the road towards anarchy. If the orders of the Court can be treated with disrespect, the whole administration of justice is brought into scorn. Daily, thousands of Canadians resort to our Courts for relief against the wrongful acts of others. If the remedies that Courts grant to correct those wrongs can be ignored, then there will be nothing left but for each person to take the law into his own hands. Loss of respect for the Courts will quickly result in the destruction of our society. [O'Leary J, in Canada Metal Co. Ltd v. Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (1975) 48 DLR 3d 641, 669 (High Court of Ontario)]

The English Law of Sanctuary

1990 ◽  
Vol 2 (6) ◽  
pp. 8-13 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. H. Baker
Keyword(s):  
Canon Law ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Early Date ◽  
Administration Of Justice ◽  
Holy Places ◽  
Royal Courts ◽  
The Common ◽  
English Law ◽  
The Law ◽  
The Church

Although the protection of churches and holy places was embodied froman early date in Canon law, the law of sanctuary as it applied in England was necessarily part of the secular common law. The Church never had the physical power to resist the secular authorities in the administration of justice, and although those who violated sanctuary were liable to excommunication the Church could not in cases of conflict prevent the removal from sanctuary of someone to whom the privilege was not allowed by the law of the land. The control of the common law judges was, indeed, tighter than in the case of benefit of clergy. The question whether an accused person was or was not a clerk in Holy Orders was ultimately a question for the ordinary, however much pressure might be put upon him by the judges; but the question of sanctuary or no sanctuary was always a question for the royal courts to decide, upon the application of a person who claimed to have been wrongly arrested in a privileged place. The present summary is confined to the position under English law.

scholarly journals A Question of Seduction: The Case of MacMillan v. Brownlee

1969 ◽  
pp. 447
Author(s):  
Thomas Thorner ◽  
G. N. Reddekopp
Keyword(s):  
Social History ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Detailed Account ◽  
Legal Issue ◽  
Privy Council ◽  
Administration Of Justice ◽  
The Common ◽  
The Law

In a detailed account of the action for seduction involving a former premier of Alberta and his stenographer, the authors review the decisions of the courts from trial level to Privy Council The common law and the effect of statute are discussed in an explanation and analysis of the law of seduction. By reviewing newspaper accounts of public reac tion to the lawsuit, the authors are able to provide both an interesting perspective on Alberta's social history and also a glimpse at an important yet often neglected legal issue: the public's perception of the administration of justice.

scholarly journals Honos alit artes. Studi per il settantesimo compleanno di Mario Ascheri. IV. L’età moderna e contemporanea

2015 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Social History ◽  
Legal Status ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Legal Tradition ◽  
Administration Of Justice ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Common ◽  
History Of Europe ◽  
The Relationship

The studies included in this volume analyze the legal and social history of Europe and North America by the end of the eighteenth century to the contemporary age. The study investigates the relationship between culture and legal status (science, law and government), the administration of justice and the transformation of the legal professions. That lights up the separation, in the whole complex of Western legal tradition, that identifies the countries of the common law.

Foreign Judgments

2019 ◽  
pp. 126-171
Author(s):  
Adrian Briggs
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Brussels Convention ◽  
Private International Law ◽  
Administration Of Justice ◽  
European Regulations ◽  
The Common

This chapter discusses the items of private international law of foreign judgments covered in part by a number of European regulations and other instruments prior to Exit Day. These are the Brussels I Regulation 44/2001 and the recast Brussels I Regulation 1215/2012; the 1988 Lugano Convention and the 2007 Lugano II Convention; the 1968 Brussels Convention as amended from time to time; and a number of minor Regulations such as the European Enforcement Order Regulation 805/2004. According to the Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019, SI 2019 No 479, on Exit Day these instruments are revoked or, in the case of the Conventions given effect by the Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments Act 1982, as amended, repealed. The gap will be filled by the rules of the common law, or by the provisions of a bilateral Convention made under the Foreign Judgements (Reciprocal Enforcement) Act 1933 (or in the case of Cyprus and Malta, presumably by registration under the Administration of Justice Act 1920).

scholarly journals The Case for Specific Performance as the Primary Remedy for Breach of Contract in New Zealand

2004 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 657
Author(s):  
Fionnghuala Cuncannon
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
Historical Development ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Civil Law ◽  
Breach Of Contract ◽  
Administration Of Justice ◽  
Specific Performance ◽  
The Common ◽  
The Right ◽  
Practical Impact

This article examines the appropriateness of damages as the primary remedy for breach of contract in New Zealand. It argues that the civil law approach to contractual remedies, which gives primacy to performance of the obligation, is superior to New Zealand's common law position, which merely seeks to replace the right to performance with an award of damages. The importance of both the normative and practical impact of the remedial framework is examined in order to demonstrate that specific performance is better able to facilitate commercial endeavours. The three justifications for the primacy of damages in the common law (the historical development, the economic theory of efficient breach, and the concern that specific performance will overburden the administration of justice) are examined but rejected as adequate justification for the common law position. It contends that specific performance should be the primary remedy because it is more consistent with the principles that underlie the law of contract. It also contends that specific performance is more practical because it reduces conflict and promotes efficiency. The recommendation is that any change should be through appropriate legislation.

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