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→The common law
==The common law==
The common law of Canada is hundreds of years old and has its roots in England in the 12th Century, when Henry II decided to start farming out the job of hearing complaints about people's disputes to judges. The judges would roam the countryside, which is where the term ''circuit court'' originates, deciding these problems on behalf of the king. Acting on behalf of the same employer, the judges needed to make sure that their decisions were similar. The "king" couldn't decide that breaking into someone's house was a civil offence on one day and that it wasn't on another. As a result, a judge felt themselves to be bound by the decisions of their fellow judges, and that is the meaning of "the common law." It the law that is common to the whole of the country.
(This, incidentally, was a huge improvement over what was happening in Europe at the same time, where the law collapsed along with the rule of the Roman Empire. "The law" became something that changed from village to village according to local custom. In fact, the original job of the jury was to decide what the local law was, not to decide the facts of a case. The concept of a law that was common to an entire country was a bit radical!)