Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 8.djvu/212

196 19^ HARVARD LAW REVIEW. on occasion, how far they are bound to take notice and make application of rules belonging to foreign systems of law ; as where different stages of a transaction have taken place in different juris- dictions. These rules apply largely to matters of private law, and the principles are not confined to any particular local system. Differences of opinion exist among the learned, and the opinions of different writers or schools may prevail with the tribunals of different countries; but it is recognized on all hands that uni- formity is desirable and is to be aimed at as far as possible. Hence the sum of such rules is now commonly called Private International Law. This term has been much discussed, and by some competent persons vehemently disapproved ; ^ but it would not be to the present purpose to enter upon the controversy, which assumes an advanced knowledge of law. What is here sought is merely to make a common modern term intelligible. Another classical division adopted by the Institutes of Justinian from Gains is that which treats the whole body of law (that is, legal rules) as relating either to Persons, Things, or Actions.^ " Omne autem jus quo utimur vel ad personas pertinet vel ad res vel ad actiones." To a certain extent this division coincides with the division already noted of Substantive and Adjective law. The law of Actions is the body of rules determining the modes and processes of legal redress ; it is equivalent to what modern writers call the law of Procedure, but with some additions of the law of Remedies ; for, as pointed out above, the Romans hardly distinguished the right to a certain kind of redress from the process of obtaining it. So far there is nothing calling for fresh explanation. It is to be remembered, however, that, as Maine has pointed out, the distinc- tion of substantive from adjective law must in ancient times have involved a much higher effort of abstraction than we can easily realize now. When we consider the further division of substan- tive law into law of Persons and law of Things, we are struck by the fact that the division, though not in terms confined to private law, has in fact been so confined by the usage of both ancient and modern expounders. It will appear shortly that there is good reason for this. 1 See Holland, Jurisprudence, ch. i8. Some of the objections would be removed by substituting " Law of Nations " for " International Law." 2 Cp. Maine, Early Law and Custom, ch. Ii, and Dr. Moyle's introduction to the First Book of the Institutes.