Samoilenko О.

Samoilenko О. The Code of laws of the Russian Empire – a memorial of juridical thought of XIX century

This article is devoted to the unique systematization of legislation – the Laws of the Russian Empire. The basic reasons for the establishment of the Code have been analyzed. It was a collection of the current legislative acts placed in thematic order. “Laws of the Russian empire” was published in 1832. January 31, 1833 it was announced the current source of law beginning from January 1, 1835. The structure of the Code was determined by M. M. Speranski and included eight major departments distributed in 15 volumes. The Code was republished in 1842 and 1857, later there were republished only individual volumes and laws, that were adopted between new editions of the Code, were contained in the “Supplement to the Code.” According to M.M. Speranski, the Code was to be a general structure of laws, but it did not serve all branches of law. The Code first formulated and summarized many legal concepts. The Code contributed to the formation of the legal system and had a significant impact on the development of jurisprudence. The article reveals both achievements and drawbacks of the Code: imperfection, archaic current Russian legislation, incorporative form of systematization etc. It was discovered its importance for Ukraine: the use of General-law showed that many general rules conflict with traditional norms of law that developed in Ukraine. Therefore, the second edition of the Code in 1842 included provisions that were introduced for use only in Chernihiv and Poltava provinces. Those standards were 53 from 3979 articles.

Keywords: Code of Laws of the Russian Empire, the law, customary law, systematization of legislation, incorporation, codification.

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