LAW MERCHANT, The. The law mer chant was a system of law which grew up in Europe during the Middle Ages for the regula tion of the dealings of mariners and merchants in all the commercial countries of the world. It comprised mpeh of what is found in the modern codes of maritime and commercial law.
Four features of the law merchant may be noted: First, it was customary law, unwritten in form, and not emanating from any legisla tive body. It developed to meet the needs and usages of commerce. Second, its procedure and operation were summary in character. The justice dispensed was prompt, speedy and sure. Thus it was designed to meet the needs of the merchant class who wanted their disputes set tled quickly. Third, it was permeated by the principles of equity, justice and good faith. It was eminently practical and disregarded tech nicalities. Fourth, it was international in char acter. It has often been defined as the "private international law of the Middle Ages.° It orig inated, not in any one country, but in the com mercial countries of the civilized world. It ap plied to alien and citizen alike provided he was a merchant or mariner.
The law merchant has now become more or less definitely incorporated into the formal legal systems of the nations of the world, although in some cases, as in Germany and France, it is still administered by separate courts.
The evolution of the law merchant in Eng land has been an important chapter in legal his tory inasmuch as England has been-a great law giving nation as well as a nation dependent to an unusual degree upon trade and commerce.
In the Middle Ages the law merchant in England comprised both maritime and com mercial law and was administered in special local courts created for that purpose in the im portant commercial cities of England. These
courts were sometimes the courts created to dispense justice at the commercial fairs. In the larger cities special courts grew up for the express purpose of administering the law mer chant. Their jurisdiction was recognized by the F-nglish statutes.
In the reign of Edward III separate ad miralty courts were created for the trial of maritime and piracy cases, thereby limiting to commercial actions alone the jurisdiction of the courts of the law merchant. The cormon law courts as they developed became Jealous of competing tribunals and by the end of the 16th century had succeeded in transferring from the jurisdiction of the law merchant to that of the common law all cases arising in internal trade. By the end of another century these special mercantile courts had disappeared entirely and the ordinary courts of common law and equity had assumed jurisdiction in commercial mat ters. The principles of the law merchant were not, however, lost. Litigants could still have their cases decided in accordance with them by °proving" such principles as foreign law is now proved, in other words, by convincing the com mon-law courts that such principles were rec ognized by the customary law of commercial intercourse. When thus °proved° the principle of the law merchant became part of the law of the land. It thus became amalgamated into the general system of the English law.
Consult Carter, 'A History of English Legal Institutions' (4th ed., Chap. 27, 1910) • Holds worth, 'A History of English Law' (1903, Vol. I, Chap. 7); Mitchell, 'The Law Merchant' (1904) • 'Select Essays in Anglo-American Legal History,' by various authors (1907).