Editing Codification (law) (section)

==Common law jurisdictions==
{{main|Common law}}
[[Common law]] has been codified in many jurisdictions and in many areas of law: examples include [[criminal code]]s in many jurisdictions, and include the [[California Civil Code]] and the ''[[Consolidated Laws of New York]]'' ([[New York State]]).

===England and Wales===
The English judge [[Sir Mackenzie Chalmers]] is renowned as the draftsman of the [[Bills of Exchange Act 1882]], the [[Sale of Goods Act 1893]] and the [[Marine Insurance Act 1906]], all of which codified existing [[common law]] principles. The Sale of Goods Act was repealed and re-enacted by the [[Sale of Goods Act 1979]] in a manner that revealed how sound the 1893 original had been.{{NoteTag|For the most part, the Sale of Goods Act 1979 retains the wording and section numbers of its 1893 predecessor.}} The Marine Insurance Act (mildly amended) has been a notable success, adopted ''verbatim'' in many common law jurisdictions.

Most of England's [[criminal law]]s have been codified, partly because this enables precision and certainty in prosecution. However, large areas of the common law, such as the [[law of contract]] and the [[law of tort]] remain remarkably untouched. In the last 80 years there have been statutes that address immediate problems, such as the [[Law Reform (Frustrated Contracts) Act 1943]] (which, ''inter alia'', coped with contracts rendered void by war), and the [[Contracts (Rights of Third Parties) Act 1999]], which amended the [[Privity of contract|doctrine of privity]]. However, there has been no progress on the adoption of [[Harvey McGregor]]'s ''Contract Code'' (1993), even though the [[Law Commission]], together with the Scots Law Commission, asked him to produce a proposal for the comprehensive codification and unification of the contract law of England and Scotland. Similarly, codification in the law of tort has been at best piecemeal, a rare example of progress being the [[Law Reform (Contributory Negligence) Act 1945]].

[[Consolidation bill|Consolidation bills]] are routinely passed to organize the law.

===Ireland===
[[Law of the Republic of Ireland]] evolved from [[English law]], the greatest point of difference being the existence of the [[Constitution of Ireland]] as a single document. The unofficial "popular edition" of the Constitution is regularly updated to take account of [[Amendments to the Constitution of Ireland|amendments to it]], while the official text enrolled in the [[Supreme Court of Ireland|Supreme Court]] in 1938 has been replaced five times: in 1942, 1980, 1989, 1999, and 2019.<ref name="sc2020">{{cite book |author1=Supreme Court of Ireland |title=Annual Report 2019 |date=2020 |location=Dublin |pages=50–52 |url=http://www.supremecourt.ie/supremecourt/sclibrary3.nsf/(WebFiles)/3E96211DAA2B6F1C8025851A0035EF6C/$FILE/SupremeCourt_AnnualReport_2019_Online_LoRes.pdf#page=52 |access-date=13 August 2022 |chapter=Sixth enrolment of the Constitution}}</ref> As in England, subordinate laws are not officially codified, although [[consolidation bill]]s have restated the law in many areas. Since 2006 the [[Law Reform Commission (Ireland)|Law Reform Commission]] (LRC) has published semi-official "revised" editions of [[Acts of the Oireachtas]] taking account of textual and other amendments to the original version.<ref name="lrc-ie">{{cite web |title=Revised Acts |url=https://revisedacts.lawreform.ie/revacts/intro |publisher=Law Reform Commission |location=Dublin |access-date=23 August 2022}}</ref> The [[Finance Act]]s are excluded from the LRC programme.<ref name="lrc-ie"/> Private companies produce unofficial consolidated versions of these and other commercially important pre-2005 laws. An official advisory committee between 2006 and 2010 produced a Draft Criminal Code.<ref>{{multiref|
{{cite book |author1=Criminal Law Codification Advisory Committee |title=Draft Criminal Code and Commentary |url=https://www.gov.ie/en/publication/d4fa7-draft-criminal-code-and-commentary/ |publisher=Stationery Office |location=Dublin |access-date=2 September 2022 |date=20 September 2013 |orig-year=2010 |isbn=978-1-4064-2783-7  }}|
{{cite web |title=Latest News |url=http://www.criminalcode.ie/website/CLCAC/clcac.nsf/page/news-en |website=Official website |publisher=Criminal Law Codification Advisory Committee |access-date=2 September 2022 |language=en}}
}}
</ref>

=== United States ===

==== The early codification movement ====


In the United States, a critique of the inherited English tradition of [[common law]] and an argument for systematic codification was championed by the [[Society of United Irishmen|United Irish]] exiles [[William Sampson (lawyer)|William Sampson]] (admitted to the New York bar in 1806),<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Walsh |first=Walter J. |date=2014 |title=Rights, Revolutions, Republics, 1750-1850: The Work and Works of William Sampson (1764—1836): A Chronology |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/43234379 |journal=American Journal of Irish Studies |volume=11 |pages=(41–88), 42 |issn=2165-3224 |jstor=43234379}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Walsh |first=Walter |date=2005 |title=The Priest-Penitent Privilege: An Hibernocentric Essay in Postcolonial Jurisprudence |url=https://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/ilj/vol80/iss4/3 |journal=80 Indiana Law Journal 1037 (2005) |volume=80 |issue=4 |issn=0019-6665}}</ref> and [[William Duane (journalist)|William Duane]] publisher of the Jeffersonian paper, the ''[[Philadelphia Aurora]].''<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Bushey |first=Glenn Leroy |date=1938 |title=William Duane, Crusader for Judicial Reform |url=https://journals.psu.edu |journal=Pennsylvania History |volume=V |issue=3 (July |pages=(141-156), 144}}</ref> In 1810, Sampson published ''Trial of the Journeymen Cordwainers of the City of New-York for a Conspiracy to Raise Their Wages,''<ref>{{Cite book |last=Sampson |first=William |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=o_c-AAAAYAAJ |title=Trial of the Journeymen Cordwainers of the City of New-York for a Conspiracy to Raise Their Wages . . . |publisher=I. Riley |year=1810 |location=New York City |language=en}}</ref> commentary on his (unsuccessful) argument in ''The People v Melvin'' (1806) to quash an indictment of illegal worker combination. Insisting on the supremacy of the elected legislature, Sampson's objected that the prosecution was reasoning "abstractedly" from principles of English common law without any reference to statute. It was this, alone, that allowed them to deny journeymen the right to "conspire against starvation" while, without notice or challenge, leaving master tradesmen in a "permanent conspiracy" to suppress wages.<ref name=":12">{{Cite book |last=Howe |first=Mark De Wolfe |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1gGIW0dl1DEC |title=Readings in American Legal History |date=2001 |publisher=Beard Books |isbn=978-1-58798-094-7 |pages=435–436, 141 |language=en}}</ref> He went on to argue that an "indiscriminating adoption of common law" had caused the [[New World|New-World]] society to carry over "barbarities" from the Old: laws that "can only be executed upon those not favoured by fortune with certain privileges" and that in some cases operate "entirely against the poor".<ref name=":1">{{Cite book |last=Howe |first=Mark De Wolfe |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1gGIW0dl1DEC |title=Readings in American Legal History |date=2001 |publisher=Beard Books |isbn=978-1-58798-094-7 |pages=435–436, 141 |language=en}}</ref> 

Sampson's summary ''Discourse on the Common Law'' (1823),<ref>{{Cite book |last=Sampson |first=William |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qrwrg7F3VHEC |title=An Anniversary Discourse: Delivered Before the Historical Society of New York, on Saturday, December 6, 1823; Showing the Origin, Progress, Antiquities, Curiosities, and Nature of the Common Law |date=1824 |publisher=E. Bliss and E. White |language=en}}</ref> holding common law to be contrary to the ethos a democratic republic and urging, with reference to the [[Napoleonic Code|Code Napoleon]], its replacement by a general law of reference, was hailed as "the most sweeping indictment of common law idealism ever written in America" .<ref>Maxwell (1967), p. 240.</ref> It was a source of inspiration for [[Edward Livingston]]<ref name="Subrin">{{cite journal |last1=Subrin |first1=Stephen N. |date=Autumn 1988 |title=David Dudley Field and the Field Code: A Historical Analysis of an Earlier Procedural Vision |url=https://repository.library.northeastern.edu/files/neu:332404/fulltext.pdf |journal=Law and History Review |volume=6 |issue=2 |pages=311–373 |doi=10.2307/743686 |jstor=743686 |s2cid=145512997 |hdl-access=free |hdl=2047/d20002460}}</ref> who drew upon French, and other European, civil law in drafting the 1825 Louisiana Code of Procedure.<ref name=":02">{{Citation |last=Clark |first=David S. |title=Development of Comparative Law in the United States |date=2019-03-21 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cvqNDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA159 |work=The Oxford Handbook of Comparative Law |pages=147–180 |editor-last=Reimann |editor-first=Mathias |access-date=2020-05-17 |publisher=Oxford University Press |language=en |doi=10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198810230.013.6 |isbn=978-0-19-881023-0 |editor2-last=Zimmermann |editor2-first=Reinhard|url-access=subscription }}</ref> Later, Sampson's efforts appeared vindicated in New York where in 1846 a new [[Constitution of New York|state constitution]] directed that the whole body of state law be reduced to a written and systematic code, and in [[David Dudley Field II|David Dudley Field]]'s subsequent drafting of the New York Code of Civil Procedure (1848).<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Subrin |first=Stephen N. |date=1988 |title=David Dudley Field and the Field Code: A Historical Analysis of an Earlier Procedural Vision |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/743686 |journal=Law and History Review |volume=6 |issue=2 |pages=311–373 |doi=10.2307/743686 |issn=0738-2480 |jstor=743686 |s2cid=145512997 |hdl=2047/d20002460|hdl-access=free }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=William Sampson |url=https://history.nycourts.gov/figure/william-sampson/ |access-date=2023-01-11 |website=Historical Society of the New York Courts |language=en-US}}</ref>

Sampson sought to disassociate codification from the doctrinaire insistence on positive legislation that had marked [[Jeremy Bentham]]'s championing of the cause in Britain. But, focussing on the French experience, critics thought it sufficient to comment on the futility of trying to compress human behaviour into rigid categories.<ref>Maxwell (1967), p. 246.</ref> President [[Thomas Jefferson]] had remained neutral when Duane's attempted to force the issue in the 1805 election in Pennsylvania. Federalists joined with "Constitutional Republicans" to defeat the reform agenda.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Bushey |first=Glenn Leroy |date=1938 |title=William Duane, Crusader for Judicial Reform |url=https://journals.psu.edu |journal=Pennsylvania History |volume=V |issue=3 (July |pages=(141-156), 153-156}}</ref>

==== Present status ====
{{main|United States Code|Code of Federal Regulations}}

===== Statutory =====
In the United States, [[act of Congress|acts of Congress]], such as federal statutes, are published chronologically in the order in which they become law&nbsp;&ndash; often by being signed by the [[President of the United States|President]], on an individual basis in official pamphlets called "[[slip law]]s", and are grouped together in official bound book form, also chronologically, as "[[session law]]s". The "session law" publication for Federal statutes is called the [[United States Statutes at Large]]. A given act may be a single page or hundreds of pages in length. An act may be classified as either a "Public Law" or a "Private Law".

Because each Congressional act may contain laws on a variety of topics, many acts, or portions thereof, are also rearranged and published in a topical, subject matter codification by the [[Office of the Law Revision Counsel]]. The official codification of Federal statutes is called the [[United States Code]]. Generally, only "Public Laws" are codified. The United States Code is divided into "titles" (based on overall topics) numbered 1 through 54.<ref>[https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-bill/1068 Public Law No: 113-287,  To enact title 54, United States Code, "National Park Service and Related Programs", as positive law.]</ref> [[Title 18 of the United States Code|Title 18]], for example, contains many of the Federal criminal statutes. Title 26 is the [[Internal Revenue Code]].<ref>[https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode USC table of contents]</ref>

Even in code form, however, many statutes by their nature pertain to more than one topic. For example, the statute making [[Tax avoidance and tax evasion|tax evasion]] a felony pertains to both criminal law and tax law, but is found only in the Internal Revenue Code.<ref>see [https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/7201- 26 USC 7201]</ref> Other statutes pertaining to taxation are found not in the Internal Revenue Code but instead, for example, in the Bankruptcy Code in [[Title 11 of the United States Code]], or the Judiciary Code in [[Title 28 of the United States Code|Title 28]]. Another example is the national minimum drinking age, not found in [[Title 27 of the United States Code|Title 27]], ''Intoxicating liquors'', but in [[Title 23 of the United States Code|Title 23]], ''Highways'', [https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/23/158.html §158].

Further, portions of some Congressional acts, such as the provisions for the effective dates of amendments to codified laws, are themselves not codified at all. These statutes may be found by referring to the acts as published in "slip law" and "session law" form. However, commercial publications that specialize in legal materials often arrange and print the uncodified statutes with the codes to which they pertain.

In the United States, the individual states, either officially or through private commercial publishers, generally follow the same three-part model for the publication of their own statutes: slip law, session law, and codification.

===== Regulatory =====
Rules and regulations that are promulgated by agencies of the [[Federal government of the United States#Executive branch|Executive Branch of the United States Federal Government]] are published in the [[Federal Register]] and codified in the [[Code of Federal Regulations]]. These regulations are authorized by specific legislation passed by the legislative branch, and generally have the same force as statutory law.