Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) civil law, as used in this article, a modern legal system based upon Roman law, as distinguished from common law. Civil law is based on written legal codes, a hallmark of the Roman legal system, in wh...

(Encyclopedia) common law, system of law that prevails in England and in countries colonized by England. The name is derived from the medieval theory that the law administered by the king's courts represented the co...

(Encyclopedia) Beer's law [for August Beer], physical law stating that the quantity of light absorbed by a substance dissolved in a nonabsorbing solvent is directly proportional to the concentration of the substance...

(Encyclopedia) natural law, theory that some laws are basic and fundamental to human nature and are discoverable by human reason without reference to specific legislative enactments or judicial decisions. Natural la...

(Encyclopedia) canon law, in the Roman Catholic Church, the body of law based on the legislation of the councils (both ecumenical and local) and the popes, as well as the bishops (for diocesan matters). It is the la...

(Encyclopedia) international law, body of rules considered legally binding in the relations between national states, also known as the law of nations. It is sometimes called public international law in contrast to p...

(Encyclopedia) commercial law, the laws that govern business transactions, except those relating to the maritime transportation of goods (see maritime law). Commercial law developed as a distinct body of jurispruden...

(Encyclopedia) maritime law, system of law concerning navigation and overseas commerce. Because ships sail from nation to nation over seas no nation owns, nations need to seek agreement over customs related to shipp...

(Encyclopedia) Law, John, 1671–1729, Scottish financier in France, b. Edinburgh. After killing a man in a duel (1694) he fled to Amsterdam, where he studied banking. Returning to Scotland (1700), he proposed to Pa...

(Encyclopedia) Coulomb's law ko͞oˈlŏmz [key], in physics, law stating that the electrostatic force between two charged bodies is proportional to the product of the amount of charge on the bodies divided by the sq...