any system, the keen edge of its defects are worn off by custom and habits of thought. The French have a system of decisions, so to speak, but they look upon these decisions in an entirely different way from ourselves. The French barrister or advocate, in plead ing before the Court, will say in effect to the Bench, "Your Honor, you will decide just how you want to, but here is how the Court at Lyons decided in a similar case once, or at Nancy or in Paris. But the advocate will not say to the Court, in effect, "Here is what your Court decided, or the Appeal Court de cided, in a similar case, and so it is your duty to decide so and so. The French judge has a pretty good chance to injure the causes of justice by his freedom from being obliged to follow preced ent to the degree to which his American con frère is accustomed. The really sound edu cation of the French judge is one reason why the system has not yet produced chaos. "A judge must give judgment between parties to a suit. But there his functions cease. He is forbidden to go further than that, that is to say, explains Colmet de Santerre, 'to lay down principles for the future which would be applicable in all cases similar to that in which he has given judgment; for, to do so, he would be encroaching on the prerogatives of the Legislator.' 'This prin ciple rests upon Article 5 of the Civil Code: Judges are not allowed to decide cases sub mitted to them by way of general and settled decisions.'"1 The meaning of this Article 5 of the Civil Code is, says Baudrv-La-Cantinerie2 "tnat the judge cannot perepetuate his views for all time in regard to his interpretation of the law—i. e., interpret the law today in- such a way as to interpret it for the future. So that if a judge has wrongly construed the law the first time, it is useless to continue in the same path. So that the cause of justice will suffer ' Manual of French Law, p. 87. ' Précis de Droit Civil.
less írom two contradictory decisions, than from a series or bad decisions which are con sistent among themselves." In early times French Parliaments rend ered decisions on causes submitted to them which were called "arrêts de règlement. These decisions were quite like our Court de cisions of the present day in America. The king, however, overruled these "arrêts" whenever his caprices led him to desire to do so. The French Civil Code of today (Article 5 above quoted) clearly prohibits a judge from rendering "arrêts de règlement" and this system appears to give satisfaction generally in France. I do not suppose a French lawyer really worries himself about the advantages or disadvantages of the sys tem. He is used to it. The young French practitioner of today will point out that the profession is not as exclusive now as in former times; that conservatism has many advantages; that the branches of avoué (at torney) and notaire (conveyancer) are un reasonable monopolies; that allowing women to plead as advocates is rather of an experi ment; that it is very severe on an arocat (barrister) not to be able to charge for his services and sue for his fees if need be, and so on; but that the present svstem of render ing decisions in France should be exchanged for the American or English system, that the modest abstracts of cases which provide the French barrister with arguments should be swept aside in favor of our teeming shelves groaning under Reports, is as far from his imagination as to borrow judicial ideas from the tribes of Central Africa. The fact that a certain question has been decided altogether differently in different parts of France does not trouble the French lawyer of today. He remembers that if this kind of thing is inconvenient nowadays, it was worse in "the good old times, when, as Voltaire said, a man travelling in his coach from one part of France to another, changed the system of laws under which he was gov
