Maritime laws of France.-Le Guidon.

ARTICLE XIV.

Of the Laws of France.

§ 1. FOR a long period, France possessed no particular maritime laws, except those contained in a compilation, entitled, le Guidon de la mer, or Us et coutumes concernant les droit maratimes, qui furent adoptés en faveur de la ville de Rouen. The Guidon contains also some ancient ordinances of the kingdom, relative to the merchant marine, of 1400, 1517, and 1584, making a part of the royal ordinances of the admiralty.*

2. Louis the XIVth laid the foundation for the prosperity of navigation and maritime commerce, and secured its future progress, by increasing his naval power, and by rendering a great number of ports and harbours more commodious, more secure, and easy of access. (359) Nothing was wanting to crown

* Le Guidon is to be found in the 2d part of Cleirac, Us et Coutumes de la Mer, page 179. Neither the author of this collection, nor the date of its compilation, is mentioned. It consists of twenty chapters, several of which relate to the subject of assurance; and though its language is obsolete and incorrect, it contains many valuable principles of maritime law.....T.

(359) During the minority of Louis XIV, France had neither arsenals, naval stores, ship timber, nor even ports; for to have them inaccessible and useless, was the same as to have none. At the death of Cardinal Mazarine, the whole French marine consisted of 18 ships, from 30 to 70 guns. The dearth of naval stores

Louis XIV, establishes the marine of France, and compiles a Code of laws.

the glory of so noble an enterprise, but the formation of a Code of particular laws, in which should be united every thing necessary to instruct mariners in their duties, to establish the police of ports, bays, and rivers, to determine, at the same time, the rights, privileges, and prerogatives of the admiralty, the order to be observed in its judicial proceedings, the functions and duties of judges, and offi

was so great, that they were destitute of cables, cordage, sails, &c. and even of powder and matches. Every thing was wanted. At first, Holland furnished these different articles, and even permitted the French to build two ships of the line in that country, and to establish in the city of Amsterdam, a foundery of cannon for the naval service. See Lett. et Negoc. d'Estrad. tom. 4, p. 342, &c. The French were not long before they learned how to dispense with foreign aid. Ship-builders from the United Provinces, mastmakers, and forgers of anchors from Sweden, came to France; Riga, Hamburg, and Dantzick, sent rope-makers, weavers, &c. All these workmen had French apprentices, who, in a short time, equalled, or surpassed their masters. A general review of all the persons fitted for the naval service was made, and 60,000 men were soon arranged into classes. Five arsenals were erected, and many ships built in the dock-yards of France. Brest beheld in its road a numerous fleet under the orders of the duke of Beaufort, consisting of fifty ships. In this number was not included, the Levant squadron, the junction of which would have greatly increased the general forces. See Beaufort's Letters to de Ruyter, the 12th of July, 1667. This prodigy was performed by the genius of Colbert; for it was truly a prodigy to create a marine under circumstances, in which the taste of the nation, and so many moral and physical difficulties, opposed the gigantic projects of Louis XIV. This prince extended his views still further. He wished to be a maritime legislator, and he became one.-Valin, Preface à l'Ordonnance de la Marine.

Ordinance of August, 1681, and its commentators.

cers, employed to maintain and preserve a just system in maritime, and mercantile affairs. All this has been admirably performed in the marine ordinance, of August, 1681, which is, without contradiction, the most masterly act of legislation, promulgated by that incomparable monarch, and has become, in some sort, the common law of all the neighbouring nations.*

3. This ordinance has been commented upon by three different writers. Marville, who is the first, published his commentary, in 1714, which met with little success, though there have been six editions of it. Valin, whose commentary appeared in 1760, by the excellence of his observations on this ordinance, in the new edition, published at Rochelle, in 1776, is justly entitled to universal approbation. The third, is by an advocate of Marseilles, of the name of Jausseau; it contains some notes relative to the particular usages of that place.

4. The ordinance of 1681, excepting the title, des Prises, contains nothing relative to the military ma

* Lord Mansfield, to whom the laws of England are so much indebted, appears to have derived much of his knowledge of maritime law, "from this ordinance, and from the elaborate and useful commentary of Valin." Marshall on Insurance, Introduction, p. 18. Mr. Abbott, in the preface to his excellent "treatise of the law relative to merchant ships and seamen," in speaking of this ordinance, observes, that, "in matter, method, and style, it is one of the most finished acts of legislation that ever was promul gated."...T.

Various marine ordinances.-New plans of reform.

rine. It was preceded by a collection of separate ordinances, published in 1675, and again, in 1677; but these were of no force after the publication of the general ordinance, of 1689, to which the subsequent ordinances, in 1765, and 1776, made some slight amendments. Since the revolution, laws of the greatest importance relative to the military marine, have been published; but as these are not yet fully settled, it is not proper to give any account of them here.

5. The prosperity of the maritime commerce of France, having given rise to new transactions, to abuses grown into usages, and to principles of commercial jurisprudence, which could not be foreseen in framing the ordinances of 1681, it has become necessary to make an entire reform of the laws by which the affairs of maritime commerce are to be regulated. These circumstances have called loudly for such revision. It was directed to be made by the ancient government; but at that time, the success of the best schemes, and the most useful reforms, depended on the stability of the power of the minister who had the courage to propose them, and maritime legislation continued in this imperfect state until the revolution, during which it degenerated still more.

6. The consular government, more steady in its plans, and more energetic in their execution, conceived the important project of a reform of the commercial and maritime laws. By a decree of the 4th April, 1801, it established a commission, under the

New maritime and commercial Code, of 1802.

direction of the minister of the Interior, composed of seven members, (360) who were to digest the plan of a commercial and maritime Code. This great work, (to which I have had the honour indirectly to contribute, having been invited to the sittings of the commissioners, who received my opinion on the part relative to maritime affairs) has been completed, and was published in 1802, by a consular decree, of the 6th December, 1802, by which it was directed to be sent to all the tribunals, and councils of commerce, requesting them to give their opinions upon it, within a certain time.

7. If it be honourable for the persons who composed this commission, to have been selected to prepare the new Code of laws, for the regulation of commerce and the marine, and to have acted together with an unshaken zeal and disinterestedness, they have received a recompense the most pleasing and the most flattering to their ambition, in the approbation and praise bestowed by the very persons who must become the judges of their work. The justice thus rendered to the diligence of the commission, and to the sagacity with which the Code has been compiled, has encouraged three of its members, M.

(360) These were M. M. Gomeau, Judge in the Court of Appeals at Paris; Boursier, formerly a maritime Judge; Vignon, the President of the Tribunal of Commerce; Legras, a lawyer; Vital, Roux, a merchant; Coulomb, an ancient magistrate; Mourgue, administrator of the hospitals.