his decree according to the right of the case. If the defendant had contracted to sell to the plaintiff a tract of land, while a court of law could only in the action of assumpsit or covenant give judg ment for damages, the Chancellor, meeting the very equity of the case, ordered the defendant to make title and to account for the revenues, and compelled obedience to his decrees by proceedings known to his court.

The kind of jurisdiction assumed by courts of equity, may be illustrated by an example from the statute of frauds and perjuries passed in England in 1677, and adopted in some form or another in most of our sister States. By this act, among other things, it was provided that no action should be brought upon any contract for the sale of lands, unless the agreement or some memorandum or note thereof should be in writing and signed by the party to be charged therewith.

Now it sometimes happens that verbal contracts are made and partially performed, as for example the intended purchaser who paid part of the price and has been put in possession. By the strict letter of the statute the vendee would be defeated in his action upon the verbal contract. But a court of equity viewing the statute as made for the purpose of preventing fraud, comes to the relief of the purchaser, on the ground that to allow the vendor to avail himself of his advantage would be to encourage one of the mischiefs which the legislature intended to prevent. It compels him to answer plaintiff's complaint under oath, and decrees a specific proformance. Under our State law, where equity and law are administered together, the like relief is only granted where the defendant admits the contract under oath, and possession has been delivered the vendee. Equity, among other things, grants relief in the following cases, viz suits for the specific preformance of contracts for the sale of real estate; to foreciose or redeem mortgages; to stay waste of lands; to enforce trusts; to relieve against fraud and enjoin parties against enforceing judgments of courts at law where obtained by fraud; to compel a party to answer under oath, in order that the replies of defendant, or the documents, where any are disclosed as existing, may be used as evidence in suits at law; to settle long and intricate accounts; to marshal securities; to settle boundaries; to correct mistakes in contracts; to relieve, in some cases, against penalties and forfeitures, and to protect the rights of married women, minors, etc. It is thus seen from the examples given

that equity embraces a very considerable proportion of jurisprudence, and as it is governed by principles of its own, it is easy to see that in many instances it may come in conflict with the State laws. For if citizenship gives the United States courts jurisdiction, and the case be one of exclusive equity jurisdiction, and should be brought in the United States courts, it will not be heard, except on the equity side and according to the rules in equity, no matter what is the State practice in the same case.

The practice on the law side of the courts of the United States sitting in Louisiana in civil cases, is governed by the practice of the State, which practice was adopted in 1824 by the act of Congress for the Federal courts, as stated above.

Criminal proceedings, both in the courts of the United States and the State courts, are conducted, as already shown, according to the forms of the common law.

Without adverting to their more remote origin, the following branches of law come to us with the forms with which they have been clothed, and the principles with which they are allied from England, viz:

Admiralty and matters of maritime jurisdiction; the law and practice of courts of admiralty; equity and the rules and practice of courts of chancery.

Bankruptcy;

Criminal law and criminal proceedings, including warrants for arrest, indictments, informations, etc., although unlike the original States of this Union, we have no common law offences, and all crimes and misdemeanors are created by statutes.

Evidence, criminal and civil.

Commercial law, which in addition to maritime contracts just mentioned, among others, embraces promissory notes, bills of exchange, bank paper, checks, etc.

The great writ of habeas corpus.

And martial law, of which this city, since O'Reilly's entry, in 1769, has had large experience, both Spanish and American.

The law relative to the status of persons, domicil, minority, emancipation including the venia ætatis, corporations, (universitates), donations, testaments, dotal rights and property, the contract of sale, exchange, letting and hiring, including leases, loan to use, loan for consumption, partnership, mandate, suretyship, annuities and rents, the aleatory contracts, pawns and pledges, antichresis, privileges, mortgages, usucaption, prescription, the

discharge of debts by novation, compensation, payment with subrogation, release, or acceptilation, and the effect of notarial acts, are from the civil law.

The law respecting the community of acquets and gains is no doubt of German origin. It prevailed in certain provinces of Spain, as for example in Grenada and Salamanca, while other provinces like the South of France, were governed by the dotal regime, called the written law. The community of acquets and gains prevailed in the colony under the custom of Paris, from its first settlement, and it is stated by our excellent historian, Mr. Gayarrt, that it was a subject of complaint to the colonists at one time, that it was extended to the cases where colonists had married (with the forms of the Catholic church) Indian wives, who having less stable habits than the whites frequently absconded after the death of their husbands, with the personal effects, without paying the debts of the estate or settling up the same in due form. (The evil was corrected.)

One of the most marked peculiarities of the laws of Louisiana, as compared with the laws of the other States is this institution of the community of acquets and gains. It is more favourable to married women than any other system with which I am acquainted except the Spanish laws of the Indeas, from which it was, I think, immediately taken. By the custom of Paris and the Napoleon Code the personal effects of the wife, in the absence of a marriage contract, fall into the community. Under our law, in the same case, the personal effects remain the property of the wife, that is, they remain paraphernal.

The advantages of the institution are decidedly in favor of the wife. The husband cannot withdraw from the partnership, and he, the community, and his separate estates, are alike bound for the debts of the community as it respects third persons. The wife, on the other hand, can at its dissolution by death or divorce, withdraw from it without detriment to her separate estate, and where the affairs of the husband are embarrassed she can be declared separate in property from her husband by the courts, and sell under execution the community or his estates to reimburse herself for any property or money used by him in his business, and as the law gives her a mortgage for her security, she is always a formidable adversary to a creditor seeking to recover a debt even of the community. The income of the husband, (married without a marriage contract) from his own labor, and from

his separate property, falls into the community, without any ability on his part to prevent it. On the other hand, the wife has at all times the absolute right to withdraw from her husband, (by contributing one-half of the matrimonial expenses) her separate or paraphernal property, and to manage it herself, and reinvest the income thereof in her own name, and for her own use, and I know no law to prevent her also from sharing in the community at its dissolution.

The husband, it is true, is the head and master of the com munity during the existence of the marriage, and can dispose of the effects of the same at his pleasure and without his wife's sanction by onerous title, that is, for an equivalent; but if he conveys the same by gratuitous title, that is by gift or donation, his estates become responsible to the wife for the loss.

If prior to or at the marriage, the parties choose, they can settle property in what we call dower; the dos of the civil law. Property so settled cannot be sold by either husband or wife, or both, (except in one or two cases,) during the marriage, and thus the wife is assured of her estate at the termination of the marriage.

The provision prohibiting married women from binding themselves with or for their husbands is Spanish, and from the 61st law of Toro. The senatus consultum Velleianum had previously prohibited women from going surety for any one: ne pro ullo foeminae intercederent.

The marital fourth was given by the fifty-third and one hundred and seventeenth novels of Justinian.

The action of redhibition was given by the edict of the ædiles. The order of seizure and sale, to coin a word, that Rhadamanthine provision of our law where execution comes first and judg ment afterward, is from the Spanish law.

The various pacts which supplied the defects of the strict leges civiles are of pretorian origin.

I have thus briefly, and therefore imperfectly glanced at some of the most striking features of our laws. It was my intention to have suggested some amendments which our present circumstances, in my opinion, seem to demand, but the length of this paper precludes the attempt and the subject must be left to others more competent, or reserved for a future occasion.

These laws, such as they are, and with their slight imperfections, are justly dear to the people of Louisiana. They have

protected and shielded the home and the fireside, the labours, the bargains and the acquisitions, the estates, and the persons of this people during all the growth of the State of Louisiana. The immigrant who has come here from the sterile hills of New England, from the more genial climes of the South, from the fertile fields of the West, as well as our ancient French, Spanish and German populations, have approved and blessed these laws. To those who would like to see the body of the common law introduced among us, we say, What have you of value in the common law? The trial by jury, the habeas corpus, known and defined crimes and offences, and enlightened rules of evidence? We have it all here and more: Your criminal law is ours; your

commercial law also is ours. But we have also the most admirable provisions of the civil law filled with benevolence, equity and justice, to regulate our dealings and define our rights in our every day life. That our laws, like all others, may require amendments to make them more perfect, none will deny. Let us amend, but never change them for others, of which our people have no experience, and the adoption of which promises us no advantages in the future.