Introduction CHAPTER OBJECTIVES 1. Understand each of five jurispradential approaches to answering the question, "What is law?” Explain the legal objectives shat aré common to American public and private law. Understand how our nation’s legal history and culture have contributed to law and legal institutions as we know them today. Develop the ability t0 read and brief an appellate court opinion. 5. Explain in general terms the concepts underlying the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses. 6. Understand the basic differences between civil and criminal law, 7. Understand the basic differences between tort and contract law. WHAT IS LAW? ‘The study of legal philosophy is called jurisprudence. Many of the world’s greatest philosophers have theorized about the nature and meaning of law. Juris- prudential philosophers ask questions like these: What is law? Is bad law still law? Is custom law? Is law what it says in the statute books, or what really happens in practice? Philosophers have debated the essential nature of law for centuries, et there is no single commonly accepted definition, oncom arn an ye pelea hiner ming mat ee6 CHAPTER 1 OBJECTIVES OF LAW One of the foundations of our society is the belief that ours is a nation committed to the rule of law. No person is above the law. Our shared legal heri~ tage binds us together as Americans. We use law to regulate people in their relationships with each ‘other, and in their relationships with government, Law reflects our societal aspirations, our culture, and our political and economic beliefs. It provides mechanisms for resolving disputes and for control ling government officials. Private law includes property, family, tort, probate, and corporate law. Public law includes constitutional, criminal, and administrative law. Common to both, however, are certain legal objectives. Continuity and Stability It is important that established laws change gradu ally. Litigants have greater confidence that justice has been done when preexisting rules are used to determine legal outcomes. Laws work best when people become aware of them and lean how they work and why they are necessary. Stable laws are also more likely to be applied uniformly and consistently throughout a jurisdiction, and will be better understood by those charged with enforcement, Stable laws are also very important to creating and maintaining a healthy economy because they are predictable and serve as a guide for conduct Businesspeople, for example, are not likely to incur risk in a volatile legal and political environ ment. They are likely to feel more comfortable in making investments and taking economic risks where it appears likely that the future will resemble the present and the recent past. This stability is threatened by society's appetite for producing rules, Various state and federal legislative and administrative rule-making bodies are currently promulgating so many regulations that it i difficult, if not impossible, for affected citizens to stay current, Adaptability In one sense, it would be desirable if society could ‘xeate a great big “legal cookbook” that contained a prescribed law or rule for every conceivable situa tion. We would then only have to look in the cookbook for definitive answers to all legal pro- bblems, In reality, there is no such cookbook, Leg- islators produce statutes that have a broad scope and that are designed to promote the public healt, safety, welfare, and morals. Judges make law in conjunction with resolving’ disputes that have been properly brought before the court. Experience hhas shown that legislative enactments and judicial ‘opinions produce imperfect law. Lawmakers cannot anticipate every factual possibility. Courts in partic~ ular, often feel compelled to recognize exceptions to general rules in order to provide justice in indi- vidual cases. Judges often find that there are gaps in the law that they have to fill in order to decide a case, or that a long-standing rule no longer makes any sense, given current circumstances and societal values. In this way, law adapts to social, environ mental, and political changes within our evolving societyJustice, Speed, and Economy Although most people would agree with the pre~ amble to the U.S. Constitution that itis the role of the government “to establish justice,” there is no consensus about what that means, Some see justice as a natural law-type settlement, which means each party to a dispute receives what he or she is due. To other people justice means that 3 specified process was followed by governmental institutions, In some situations, justice requires the elimination of disere- tion so that law is applied more equally. In other situations, justice requires the inclusion of discretion (equity) so that the law is not applied too mechani- cally. In this respect, itis helpful to look at recent history. Our current notions of justice with respect to race, gender, and class differ from the views of many of our forebears. Posterity will probably have a concept of justice that differs from our own. Rule 1 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure provides that procedural rules should be construed to secure the just, speedy and inexpensive deter- mination of every action,” Although it would be desirable if our judicial systems could satisfy all three of these objectives, they are often in contlict Asa society we continually have to make choices about how much justice we desire and can afford. Consider a society dedicated to achieving the highest possible levels of justice in its judicial sys- tem. Elsborate measures would be required to ensure that all relevant evidence has been located and all possible witnesses identified and permitted to testify. In such a society, all litigants would be INTRODUCTION 7 entitled to the services of investigators, thorough pretrial discovery procedures, and qualified and ‘experienced trial attorneys, Great care would have to be taken to ensure that jurors were truly unbi- ased and competent to render a fair verdict. Only highly probative evidence would be permitted as proof, and various levels of appellate review would be required to consider carefully whether significant substantive of procedural errors were made at tril. Obviously, such a process would be very slow and very expensive. Denying deserving plaintiffs a recovery until the process had run its course could itself be unfair, because a recovery would be denied for several years Instead, some judicial systems build in cost cutting measures such as six-person instead of twelve-person juries. They also make it easier for juries to reach decisions by permitting less than-unanimous verdicts. Although each cost~ cutting step risks more error in the system, there are limits as to how much justice society is willing to provide. People have a multitude of needs, including medical care, housing, education, and defense, as well as a limited interest in paying taxes. These competing needs have to be priori- tized. In recent years, governmental funding of poverty lawyers has been greatly reduced, This has ‘occurred at a time when the costs of litigating aver- age cases have risen substantially. As the costs of using the legal system increase, fewer persons will be able to afford to use litigation to resolve their disputes, Private attorneys often decline to represent a potential client if the likely recovery in the case will not produce an acceptable profit. An example of how law balances the desire for justice with a concem for cost appears in the case of Goss v. Lopez (which can be read on the textbook website). In that case the U.S. Supreme Court determined that public school administrators only have to provide rudimentary procedural due pro- ‘cess to students who face shore suspensions. The Supreme Court explained that requiring schools to provide students with extensive tral-type proce~ dures would make the disciplinary process too ‘expensive, In Chapter XIV we examine alternative methods for resolving disputes. oncom arn an ye pelea hiner ming mat ee8 CHAPTER 1 Determining Desirable Public Policy Historically, law has been used to determine desi able public policy. It has been used to establish and then abolish discrimination on the basis of race, gender, age, and sexual preference. Law has been used to promote environmental protection and to permit resource exploitation. Through law, society determines whether doctors can assist in suicides, whether people of the same sex can mary, and which kinds of video games minors can purchase. ORIGIN OF LAW IN THE UNITED STATES ‘The British victory over the French in the French and Indian War and the signing of the Treaty of Paris (1763) concluded the competition between the two nations for domination of North America A French victory might well have resulted in the establishment of the French Jegal systerit in the col~ onies along the Atlantic seaboard. The:British vie~ tory, however, preserved the English: common law system for what would become the United States The following discussion highlights some of the important milestones in the development of the common law. The Origins of English Common Law Anglo-Saxon kings ruled England prior to 1066, During the reign of Edward the Confessor (1042— 1066), wealthy landowners and noblemen, called earls, gained power over local affairs. There was no central legislature or national judicial cout. Instead, the country was organized into communal units, based on population. Each unit was called a hundred, and was headed by an official called the reeve, The primary function of the hundred was Judicial; it held court once each month and dealt with routine civil and criminal matters. Local free men resolved these cases in accordance with local custom.”* The hundreds were grouped into units called shires (counties), which in eatlier times often had ‘ss sin ot nar rey sca ncn es Cag nag ranean sgu oman oa been Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. The shire was of much greater importance than the hundred. ‘The king used it for military, administrative, and judicial purposes, The king administered the shices through the person of the shire reeve (sheril). Royal sheviit existed in each of the shires throughout the coun- uy. The sheriff was the king's principal judicial and administrative officer at the local level. Sheriffs col- lected taxes, urged support of the king’s administra tive and military policies, and performed limited judicial functions.” ‘The shire court, composed of all the freemen in the county, was held twice a year and was presided over by the bishop and the sheriff* It handled criminal, civil, and religious matters that were too serious or difficult for the hundred court, as well as disputes about land ownership.” The freemen in attendance used local custom as the basis for making decisions, even in religious matters, resulting in a variety of regional practices dhroughout the country. Anglo-Saxon law did not permit a person to approach the king to appeal the decisions of these communal courts? The Anglo-Saxon king had a number of func~ tions: He raised armies and a navy for the defense of the kingdom. He issued writs, which were admin- istrative letters containing the royal seal." ‘The writs were used to order courts to convene, the serif to do justice, and to award grants of land and privi- leges.” ‘The king administered the country with the assistance of the royal household, an early form of king's council.” He also declared laws (called dooms),"' sometimes after consulting with the ‘Witan, 2 national assembly of important nobles.”® ‘When Edward the Confessor died childless in 1066, the candidates to succeed him were his brother-in-law, Harold, Earl of Wessex, and his cousin, William, Duke of Normandy (a French duchy). Harold was English and the most powerfil baron in the country. William was French. Each chimed that Edward had selected him as the next king. William also claimed that Harold had agreed to support William's claim to the thtone.”* Harold, however, was elected king by the Witan and was crowned, William's response was to assemble an amy, cross the English Channel, and invade England.The Norman Invasion In 1066, Duke William of Normandy, with 5,000 soldiers and 2,500 horses, defeated the Angl Saxons, and killed King Harold at the Battle of Hastings.” William became king of England, and the Normans asumed control of the country. Although the Anglo-Saxons had implemented a type of feudalism before the invasion, the Normans developed and refined it. Feudalism was a military, political, and social structure that ordered relation ships among people. Under feudalism, a series of duties and obligations existed between a lord and his vasals. In England, the Normans merged feu- dalism with the Anglo-Saxon institution of the national king, William insisted, for example, that all land in Englnd belonged ultimately to the king, and in 1086 he required all landholders to swear allegiance to him.** In this way, all his barons and lords and their vassals were personally obligated to hiry by feudal law. At his coronation, King William decreed. that, Englishmen, could keep. the customary laws that had been in force during the reign of the Anglo-Saxon King Edward the Con- fessor. This meant that the communal, hundred, and shire cours could continue to resolve disp between the English as they had in the past.” William did, however, make one significant change in the jurisdiction of the communal courts: He rejected the Anglo-Saxon practice of allowing church officials to use the communal courts to decide religious matters. Instead, he mandated that the church should establish its own courts and that religious matters should be decided according to canon (church) law, rather than customary law.“ William also declared that the Normans would settle their disputes in the courts of the lords and barons in agreement with feudal law England at that time consisted of two societies, one French and the other English," French was the language spoken by the victorious Normans, as well as by the king, the upper classes, the clergy, and scholars"? Following the invasion, English was only spoken by the lower classes, and it did not achieve prominence and become the language of the courts and the “common law” until 1362."° ps ei INTRODUCTION 9 ‘The French legacy can be seen in many words used by lawyers today. Acquit, en bane, voir dire, demurrer, embezzle, and detainer arc some examples of English words that were bor- rowed from the French. Although the Normans spoke French, formal documents were written in Latin. This may help to explain why students reading judicial opinions in the twenty-fi century encounter Latin words such as certiorari subpoena, mens rea, actus reus, in camera, mandamus, capias, and pro se. The Development of the Common Law Over time, marriages between Norman and English ilies blurred the old class system. William's son Henry (who became Henry 1), for example, mar- ried a descendant of the Anglo-Saxon royal house." Tt was not until after 1453, when the French drove the English out of France (except for Calais), however, that the Normans and English were unified as one nation, William died in 1100. The most important his suecessors—in terms of the development of the common lw—were Henry J and Heary’s grand son, Henry Il After the death of the very unpopu- lar William II, the nobles elected Henry I as king. Hemyy I had promised the nobles that if elected he would issue a charter in which he pledged to respect the rights of the nobles. He also promised to be a fair ruler in the manner of William I. This charter is significant because it was a model for the most famous of all charters, the Magna Carta.” Henry I ruled during a prosperous period and strengthened the king’s powers while making peace with the church and feudal barons, He also strengthened the judiciary by requiring members of his council, the Curia Regis, to ride circuit occasionally throughout the country to listen to pleas and supervise the local courts. During this period, the communal courts, the religious courts, and the feudal courts of the barons were still meet ing, and there was much confusion over jurisdic~ tion.” Henry I encouraged people who distrusted the local courts to tum to the king for justice.10 CHAPTER 1 Henry Il was the king most involved in the development of the central judiciary and the com- mon law."* He created a professional royal court to hear civil litigation between ordinary parties (com- mon pleas) and staffed this court with barons who had leamed how to judge from working as mem- bes of the Curia Regis."” The king had some of his Judges sit with him at Westminster (in London), and others traveled throughout the country listen ing to pleas and supervising local courts.*” These royal judges applied the same law in each of the jurisdictions in which they held court.°! ‘They did not treat each case as if t were a case of frst impres= sion, or apply the customary law of the particular region. Decisions were not based on abstract prin ciples and theories. The royal judges decided dis- putes in a consistent manner throughout the country, based on slowly evolving legal rules adopted by the members of the court ** There were important procedural incentives for bringing suit in the royal courts rather than in the local courts, One was that the losing party in a communal or feudal court could havethe decision reviewed by common pleas. Another was that the King enforced royal court judgments. Last, royal courts used juries instead of trials by battle and ordeal.** ‘One type of problem that was often brought to the king involved land disputes between neighbor ing nobles. One noble would claim part of his neighbor's land and seize it without bringing the matter to the attention of any court. Henry II's response was to allow victims to petition him for ‘writ of right, ‘This writ, which was purchased from the king, directed the communal courts to do full justice without delay or to appear in a royal court and give an explanation.”* ‘The development of the wnt of right resulted in a law making it illegal to dispossess someone of land without a trial conducted according to a royal wait ‘The Normans became very creative in the way they used writs. Under the Norman kings, prospec tive plaintiffs had to obtain writs in order to litigate any chim, As the demand for writs increased, the responsibility for issuing them was transferred from nec arn tary ee sana ohne min eng mnaten he eee the king to the chancellor,** and in later years to the courts themselves. Each writ conferred jurisdic~ tion on a designated court to resolve a particular dispute. It also specified many of the procedures to be followed since there was no general code of civil procedure to regulate the conduct of litigation.** A writ, for example, would often be addressed to the sheriff and would require him to summons in the defendant and convene a jury. In Henry T's er, there were very few writs, By Henry IITs reign, many writs existed, including entry, debs, detinue, account, replevin, covenant, and novel disscisin (wrongful ejection).°” A few. master registers of writs were developed to form a primitive “law library.” By roughly 1200, the principal components of the common law system were in place, National law had replaced local and regional customs of the shire and hundred, A body of royal judges applied a common law dhroughout the nation, a tradition of respecting precedent was established, and the writ system was fanctioning.** The development of legal literature was impor- tant-to the development and improvement of the common law.*” Henry Bracton, a thirteenth- century English lawyer, wrote commentaries on the writs of the day during the reign of Henry IIL (Henry I's grandson) and collected cases from the preceding twenty years.” During the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, lawyers and law students began a series of “Year Books,” a collection of the cases that had been heard in the most important court for each year. The Year Books were discon- tinued in 1535 and were replaced by case reports, which were informal collections by various authors Some of these authors, such as Chief Justice Edward Coke (pronounced “‘cook”), were well known and highly respected.®' Coke published thirteen volumes of cases between 1572 and 1616, The reports established a process that in 1865 resulted in the publication of official law reports. In. 1765, Sir William Blackstone, an Oxford professor, pub- lished a collection of his lectures in a book titled Commentaries on the Laws of England, which was immensely popular in the Amezican colonies. The first American judicial reports were published in1789, and James Kent's influential Commentaries on American Law was published between 1826 and 1830.°* ‘The common law came to what is now the United States as a result of Britain's colonization policies. In the early 1600s, British monarchs began awarding charters to merchants and proprie~ tors to establish colonies along the Aantic coast of North America, Over the next 150 years, a steady flow of immigrants, most of whom were British, crossed the Atlantic, bringing the English language, culture, law books, and the English Iegal tradition, ‘The common law was one major component of that tradition; another was the court of equity. The Origin of the English Equitable Court Until the fourteenth century, the common hw courts were willing to consider arguments based on conscience as well as law. The judges were con~ cemed with equity (fairness and mercy) as well as legality. By the fifeenth century, however, the common law courts were sometimes less concerned with justice than with technicalities. Common law pleading was complex and jury tampering was common.”? The courts often refused to allow par ties to testify, and there were no procedures for discovering an opponent's evidence. Although the common law courts were able to act against land and would award money judgments, they refused to grant injunctive relief (cout orders directing individuals to perform or refiain fiom engaging in certain acts)."* Unusual situations arose for which there was no common law relief, or where the relief available was inadequate as a remedy. In addi- tion, the law courts were often slow, and litigation was very costly, Increasingly, dissatisfied parties began to petition the king and his council to inter~ vene in the name of justice. As the number of peti- tions rose, the king and council forwarded the petitions to the chancellor. ‘The chancellor, originally a high-ranking member of the clergy, was part of the royal house~ hold, He was the king's leading advisor in political matters and was a professional administrator. The chancellor's staff included people with judicial INTRODUCTION " experience who issued the writs that enabled suitors to litigate in the common law courts. Because they were ecclesiastics, the early chancellors were not trained as common law lawyers. They were well educated,"” however, and were familiar with the canon law of the Roman Catholic Church." ‘Asa result, the chancellors were often more recep- tive to arguments based on morality than to argu= ments based exclusively on legality, ‘As chancellors began to hear petitions, the court of chancery, or equity court, came into being. It granted relief based on broad principles of right and justice in cases in which the restrictions of the common law prevented it. Chancellors began to use the writ of subpoena to speed up their hearings and the writ of summons to require peo- ple to appear in the chancery."” Chancery trials were conducted before a single judge who sat with- out a jury. The chancellor, who exercised discre- tion and did not rely on precedent in granting relief, would only act where extraordinary relief ‘was required, because no writ applied to the wrong from which the petitioner sought relief One such area was specific performance of con tracts, Although a suit for what we would call breach of contract could be maintained in a com- mon law court, that court could not require a con- teacting party. to perform his bargain. ‘The chancellor, however, could issue such an order directed to the nonperforming person and could enforce it with the contempt power. ‘The equity court became very popular and was very busy by the middle 1500s. For centuries, com- mon law and equity were administered in England by these two separate courts, Each court applied its ‘own system of jurisprudence and followed its own judicial rules and remedies. Much of traditional equity is based on concepts such as adequacy, prac ticality, clean hands, and hardship (matters we dis- ‘cuss in Chapter VID). The equity court's workload continued to grow, as did the chancellor's staff. By the seventeenth century, the most important of the chancellor's staff clerks were called masters in chan cery. The chief master was called the Master of the Rolls, Masters in chancery helped the chancellor conduct the equity court, particularly while the2 CHAPTER 1 chancellor was performing nonjudicial duties for the king Initially, despite their differing aims, the com- mon law cours and the equity court cooperated with cach other. Starting with Henry VII's reign, common law lawyers rather than ecclesiastics were named chancellor, which improved relations between courts of law and equity” Sir Thomas More, 2 chancellor, invited the common lw judges to incorporate the notion of conscience into the common law, but the judges declined, pre~ ferring to stand behind the decisions of the juries Gradually, however, this dual-court system created a competition for business, and the common lw courts became more flexible by borrowing from equity. ‘The equitable courts were also changing, and chancellors began to identify jurisdictional boundaries between the equitable and common Jaw courts, Equity, for example, agreed to furnish a remedy only when the common law procedure was deficient or the remedy at common law was inadequate.” Beginning in 1649, the decisions’of the. chan cellors were sporadically collected and published, 2 process that led to the establishment of equitable precedent.”* Eventually, equitable precedent made the equity courts as formalistic and rigid as the com= mon law courts had been in equity's early days.”* ‘This dual-court system continued in England vantil the passage by Parliament of the Judicature Acts of 1873 and 1875, which merged the equitable and common law cours into a unified court Some North American colonies along the Atlantic coast diverged fiom British precedent when it came to the establishment of equity courts Massachusetts never established an equity court, and its tial courts were not permitted to exercise the equitable powers of the chancellor until 1870, ‘Maryland, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, North Carolina, and South Carolina initially estab lished separate cousts for common law and equity. However, by 1900 common law and equity had merged into a single judicial system in most states ‘As you read the cases included in this textbook, ‘you will notice that plaintifs often request legal and equitable relief in the same complaint. A plaintiff ‘may demand money damages (common law relief), a declaratory judgment (equitable relief), and an injunction (equitable relief) in the complaint. This creates no problem for the courts. The legal issues will be tried by a jury (unless the parties prefer a bench trial), and the equitable issues will be decided by the judge sitting as a chancellor according to the rules of equity. In Chapter VII we look more closely at the differences between the common law and equitable remedies A PROCEDURAL PRIMER The following highly simplified overview of liti- gation is intended to give you a sense of the big picture before we examine each stage of the process in more detail, Like a trial attomey’s opening state~ ment in a jury tral, itis intended to help you see how the various procedural stages fit together. This abbreviated treatment omits many of the details and is intentionally very limited in scope. Every lawsuit is based on some event that ‘causes a person to feel that he or she has been egally injured in some manner by anothet. The injured party will offen contact an attorney to dis- cuss the matter, The attorney will listen to the facts, make a determination about whether the client has a case, and present the client with a range of options for pursuing a chim. These options will often include informal attempts to settle the claim, alter- native dispute resolution methods such as those dis- cussed in Chapter XIV, and filing suit in court Afier weighing the costs and benefits of each option and listening to the advice of the attomey, the cli- cent will make a decision as to how to proceed, If the decision is made to file suit, the lawyer will draft a document called a complaint and a writ of summons, and scrve them on the defendant in accordance with the law. The complaint will explain the plaintif’s claims and requested relief ‘The summons will tell the defendant to serve a document called an answer in which the defendant responds to the claims made in the complaint, on the plaintiffs attomey by a statutorily determined date. If the defendant's attomey finds any legal36 CHAPTER 1 In spite of the existence of well-established stan: dards of procedural due process, Idaho's statutory Scheme for VSP designation minimizes, at every turn, ‘the possibilty shat an offender has the constitutionally required notice and opportunity to be heard. The offender is not provided notice or opportunity to be heard before the Board. At he district court level, the offender is provided only a summary of the informa- tion considered by the Board, presenting little mean- ingful opportunity to respond to specific information considered by the Board. The offender is given his first ‘opportunity to be heard only if he can persuade the district court that there is a genuine issue of material fact whether he isa VSP. In the event that the offender clears this threshold hurdle, he then bears the burden. of disproving the propriety of the designation, all the hile being denied access to many of the documents upon which the designation may have been based... We do not question the legitimate state interest in identifying those offenders who pose a high risk of reoffending or engaging in predatory sexual conduct, However, the United States Constitution prohibits the state from doing so without affording the offender due process. In our views, Idaho's statutory scheme vio- lates an offender's right to procedural due process by failing to provide notice and an opportunity to be heard at a meaningful time and in a meaningful man- nner and by placing the burden of proofon the offender... at the only heating in which he is permit. ted to appear. Conclusion When information upon which the VSP designation is based is withheld from an offender it cannot be sald that there is either notice or a meaningful opportunity to be heard. The procedures afforded by the statute must comport with constitutional standards of proce- dural due process. [Flairness can rarely be obtained by secret, one- sided determination of facts decisive of rights... [5] fecrecy is not congenial to truth-seeking and self- righteousness gives too slender an assurance of right- ‘ness. No better instrument has been devised for arriv- ing at truth than to give a person in jeopardy of serious loss notice of the case against him and oppor- tunity to meet it. The statutory scheme for VSP designation is con- stitutionally infirm, The district court did not succeed in fashioning an ad hoc remedy to the invalid statute Until Smith has the benefit of his constitutional right to notice and an opportunity to be heard, the State ‘may not designate him as a VSP. Accordingly, we reverse the decision of the district court and remand this matter to the district court with direction to vacate ‘Smith's designation as a VSP.. Case Questions as this one? According to the Idaho Supreme Court, what fundamental constitutional rights were denied to Smith? To what extent should judges consider the real-life consequences of their actions when deciding a case such 3. Were you surprised that legislation this flawed could be enacted into law? 4, How should citizens feel about the court's decision in favor of Smit CRIMINAL AND CIVIL LAW The distinction between criminal and civil law is a very important concept in our legal system (see Figure 1.1). This text deals primarily with civil law. A civil suit involves a dispute between private indi- viduals involving either a breach of an agreement or a breach of a duty imposed by law. A criminal action is brought by the government against an individual who has allegedly committed a crime Crimes are classified as treason, felonies, and Szeto tore hater ct em pm wine ur cic ? misdemeanors, depending on the punishment attached to the crime. Treason is a crime defined only by the Constitution, Article III, Section 3, clause 1. To commit treason—levying war against the United States, or adhering to or giving aid or comfort to its enemies—there must be an overt act and the intent to commit treason, A felony is a crime that is clasified by statute in the place in which it is committed. That is, the severity of the punishment for a felony varies from place to place. A felony is generally regarded as being any criminalINTRODUCTION 37 wr inat Taran act ogo soy te preceeding in| | ule concern the duty one by ues conering cone al = patna ‘ranvaalsraer ‘tone soeay cwiotorees | | uy mposiany | | oy irecseaty | | ober cucirat | | Acimocatnes | | onorses ep sonoue cmc Be Saroonert” | |-maybe paces | | " byineus. pres enon bat aan erate, | | Sirchiton | | oyammery | | caatinee ‘rane | Leow [_SSorn FIGURE 11. Criminal and Civil Law offense for which a defendant may be imprisoned for more than one year, or executed. One deter- nines whether a crime is a felony according to the sentence that might lawfully be imposed, not according to the sentence actually ordered. Felonies do not include misdemeanors, offenses that are generally punishable by a maximum term of impris- onment of les than one year. In a civil suit, the court attempts to remedy the dispute between individuals by determining their legal rights, awarding money damages to the injured pany, or directing one party to perform or refiain from performing a specific act. Since a crime isan act against society, the criminal court punishes 4 guilty defendant by imposing a fine or imprison ment or both, In a criminal prosecution, the rules of court procedure differ. In order to meet the burden of proof to find a person guilty of a crime, guilt must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt, a sti ter standard than the preponderance of evidence usually required in a eivil case As.we will see in the next ease, when the same act givesrise to both a criminal proceeding and a civil suit, the actions are completely independent of cach other. Katko v. Briney involves a civil suit for damages brought against the victim of a criminal larceny, by the person convicted of committing the crime. ont rete sa