Page:Civil code of Japan compared with French (1902-05-01).pdf/5

358 law. The Japanese Code is right in placing general provisions relating to agency in Book I, and giving a special place to mandates as a species of contract, in Book III. As to the effect of the cessation of an agent’s powers with respect to third persons, Art. 112 of the Japanese Code provides that the extinction of the right of representation cannot be set up against a third person acting in good faith; but this does not apply if the third person is ignorant of the fact by reason of his own negligence. This is materially the same as the provisions of the French Code. The German Code goes further and declares that a third person must be notified of the fact of such extinction in order that it may be set up against him (Art. 170, 171, 172). It may be questioned whether the German Code does not go too far in its endeavor to protect the rights of third persons.

— According to Art. 1304 of the French Code the decree of a court is essential to nullify or to rescind a contract. Regarding acts which are void it is provided in the Japanese Code that acts void in themselves do not acquire validity by ratification, but if a party to an act ratifies it knowing its invalidity, such ratification is regarded as the performance of a fresh act. As to the manner of rescinding a voidable act, the Japanese Code, like the German Code, has adopted a simpler course by providing, in Art. 123, that in cases where the other party to a voidable act is specified, rescission is effected by an expression of intention made to him.

— The time when the enjoyment of a right is to begin or to end may be made to depend on events. The French Code provides that such an event must in fact be a future and an uncertain one. According to the Japanese Code an event may be made a condition, the happening of which is uncertain to the parties. But it is not necessary that it should be a future event because from one point of view nothing in this world is precarious. Everything may be said to have its predestined end. But, subjectively considered, to human eyes many things are uncertain, and consequently there is no reason why such events should not be made conditions for beginning or ending the enjoyment of rights. Art. 131 provides that “when the condition has already happened at the time of the legal act, the latter is unconditionally valid if the condition is precedent, and is void if the condition is subsequent,” thus showing that the condition need not necessarily be a future event.

As to the effect of the fulfilment of the condition, Art. 1179, of the French Code, enacts “