Abstract
Language and law are codes of communication across cultures as well as criteria to identify a specific society and differentiate it from others. In these two respects, language and law are inextricably tied by a synergistic symbiosis. Yet, language and law are also equally subject to the cruel aporia stemming from their unrealistic aspiration to universalism.
Any academic language is a bridge built to overcome differences between cultures and borders. It is equally true that justice is part of humanity, a common heritage of mankind—irreducible to cultural relativism—and that each society is so specific that its legal system is not comparable or not even rigorously accessible to any other.
The contradiction is deceptive in the same manner as is the opposition between natural law and positivism: for positivism must be anchored in natural law in order to respect human dignity and justice and natural law cannot exist a priori and may only be expressed in a given society by its peculiar legal culture and through its positive legal order.
The author wishes to thank Isabelle Faber, Martin Sychold and Daniel Boyer for their precious insights, meaningful comments and delightful discussions.
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Notes
- 1.
Wilhelm von Humboldt, Werke in fünf Bänden, t. III, Schriften zur Sprachphilosophie, Wissentschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt, 1979, at 424 ff.
- 2.
Sylvain Soleil, Langue Française, in D. Alland, S. Rials (ed), Dictionnaire de la culture juridique, Paris, Puf, 2003, p. 916 explains that, historically, artificial unification of language has also served political purposes. For instance, the codification of French started in 1635 with the creation of the Académie française by Cardinal Richelieu and continued, at different paces, throughout the following centuries, with the political aim of unifying the country and centralising its administration.
- 3.
Irène Rosier-Catach, Langue, in B. Cassin (ed), Vocabulaire Européen de Philosophies, Seuil, Le Robert, Tours, 2004, p. 682.
- 4.
The whole passage reads as follows : « Videntes enim Philosophi nullum idioma vulgare esse completum et perfectum, per quod perfecte exprimere possent naturas rerum, et mores hominum, et cursus astrorum, et alia de quibus disputare volebant, invenerunt sibi quasi proprium idioma, quod dicitur latinum, vel idioma literale: quod constituerunt adeo latum et copiosum, ut per ipsum possent omnes suos conceptus sufficienter exprimere. Quare si hoc idioma est completum, et alia idiomata non possumus recte et distincte loqui, nisi ab ipsa infantia assuescamus ad illa: ex parte eloquentiae, videlicet ut recte et distincte loquamur idioma latinum, si volumus literas discere, debemus ab ipsa infantia literis insudare ». Egidio Romano (Giles of Rome), De regimine principum libri III, Rome 1607, r. Aalen, Scientia Verlag 1967, 2.2.7., p. 304.
- 5.
« Laici vero dicuntur habere ydiomata vocum impositarum ad placitum, quae ydiomata docentur pueri a matribus et parentibus. Et ita ydiomata multiplicia sunt apud Latinos [...] Clerici vero Latini dicuntur habere ydioma idem apud omnes eos, et istud docentur pueri in scolis a magistris ». Henry of Crissey’s quoted by Emmanuel Bury, Tous vos gens latin: le latin, langue savante, langue mondaine (XIVe-XVIIe siécles), Dalloz, Paris, 2005, p. 36.
- 6.
Dante Alighieri, De vulgari eloquentia e De monarchia ((reprod.) reintegrate nel testo con nuovi commenti da Giambattista Giuliani, Le Monnier, Florence, 1878, available on line (http://gallica.bnf.fr). For a comment on the relationship between Latin and the linguae alienae, see extensively I. Rosier-Catach, cit., p. 682 ss.
- 7.
Dante Alighieri, De vulgari eloquentia, cit., Caput I, at 20. The passage reads: « Nobilior est vulgaris tum quia prima fuit humano generi usitata; tum quia totus orbis ipsa perfruitur, licet in diversas prolationes et vocabula sit divisa; tum quia naturalis est nobis, cum illa potius artificialis existat ». See Franco Lo Piparo, Signa and grammar in Dante, The History of Linguistics in Italy, Paolo Ramat, Hans-Josef Niederehe, E. F. K. Koerner (ed.), 1986, at 8 and passim.
- 8.
See Paolo Grossi, “Giuristi e linguisti: un comune luogo ordinante della società”, in Rivista Trimestrale di diritto e procedura civile, 2014, p. 1 ss. p. 3.
- 9.
See the introduction of the Ordonnance du 25 août 1539 sur le fait de la justice and its art. 111, still applied by the Cour de cassation (http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichTexte.do?cidTexte=LEGITEXT000006070939): “Et pour ce que telles choses sont souvent advenues sur l’intelligence des mots latins contenus esdits arrests, nous voulons d’oresnavant que tous, arrests, ensemble toutes autres procédures, soient de nos cours souveraines et autres subalternes et inférieures, soient de registres, enquestes, contrats, commissions, sentences testaments, et autres quelconques, actes et exploicts de justice, ou qui en dépendent, soient prononcés, enregistrés et délivrés aux parties en langage maternel françois et non autrement.”
- 10.
French echoes remain in some words, expressions and sentence patterns: tort, force majeure, attorney general, malice aforethought (literally translating “malice prepensée”), etc.
- 11.
See 4, George II c. 26 (1731) transcripted from J. Raithby, The Statutes at large from Magna Charta to the Unions of the Kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, London, 1811, vol. IX, p. 228-229: “Whereas many and great Mischiefs do frequently happen to the Subjects of this Kingdom from the Proceedings in Courts of Justice being in an unknown Language; those who are summoned and impleaded having no Knowledge or Understanding of what is alledged for or against them in the Pleadings of their Lawyers and Attornies, who use a Character not legible to any but Persons practising the Law: To remedy those great Mischiefs, and to protect the Lives and Fortunes of the Subjects of that Part of Great Britain called England, more effectually than heretofore, from the Peril of being ensnared or brought in Danger by Forms and Proceedings in Courts of Justice, in an unknown language, Be it enacted by the King’s Most Excellent Majesty […] That from and after the twenty fifth Day of March One thousand seven hundred and thirty three, all Writs […] and all proceedings whatsoever in any courts of justice […] and which concern the law and administration of justice, shall be in the English tongue and language, and not in Latin or French, or any other tongue or language whatsoever, and shall be written or printed in a common legible hand and character, and not in any hand commonly called Court-hand”.
- 12.
Rémi Brague, “Europe, The languages and traditions that constitute philosophy”, in Barbara Cassin (ed.), Emily Apter, Jacques Lezra, Michael Wood (Translation eds.), Dictionary of Untranslatable: A Philosophical Lexicon, Princeton University Press, 2014, p. 323 with reference to the passage of Bacon’s Moralis Philosophiae, at 6.4.
- 13.
See the experiences of the numerous translations and application of codes in legal systems other than those that created them (i.e. the Napoleonic Code that was in force in all Italian Provinces in the nineteenth century, the Swiss code in force in Turkey for 90 years, etc.).
- 14.
A. Supiot, Communiquer ou se comprendre ? La question du régime linguistique de la recherche en sciences humaines et sociales, Trivium, 2013, p. 1 ss. n° 17 invites researchers to cultivate the differences of languages in scientific communications, in light of the Japanese experience that he presents. Since the end of the nineteenth century, Japan has acquired western scientific concepts, including a number of legal and institutional concepts. This appropriation has been conducted, according to Supiot, through a constant comparison of the differences between the categories used in French, German, English or American scientific thinking. This work has required a constant confrontation with all the western languages, without privileging one over the others. From an opposite perspective, Marie-Claude Prémont, Tropismes du droit, Logique métaphorique et logique métonymique du langage juridique, Liber, Thémis, 2003, passim, esp. at 9 ff. and 185, draws attention to the inherent dangers of self-contained structures of legal thought, on which she focuses from a purely linguistic point of view, independently from any vision of law as an autopoietic system (Luhmann) or as a mathematic and thus neutral code of conducts (with reference to Kelsen). According to the author, the habitual use of rhetorical figures as metaphors and metonyms – diffused in all of the western traditions that can thus be melted into one – influences the structure of legal thinking per seand, in so doing, hinders true societal evolution and authentic human progress. In point of fact, serious concerns on the negative impact of language in shaping legal rules have been voiced in the context of Assisted Reproductive Technology legislation. Legal-medical language is said to have contributed to shift from the consideration of women as persons and subjects with rights to their objectification in disembodied organs serving as procedural means to achieve a “successful birth”. The concept of “successful birth” is meant to include both the birth of a living child and that of a non-disabled child. See Isabelle Faber, Women’s Autonomy and Reproductive Responsibilities During the Course of Assisted Reproductive Technology, Thesis, Sydney, 2016, at 23 ff.
- 15.
On the dialectics between quid iuris? and quid iustum? see Italo Mancini, L’ethos dell’Occidente, Genova, Marietti, 1990, p. 64 and passim, explaining that any attempt to trace a clear distinction between ius and ethos leads to aporetic theories and to the Monstra Legum feared by Immanuel Kant and eventually born out of pieces of legislation as the infamous Nürnberger Gesetze.
On the principle Iura novit curia see Ilaria Pretelli, Shaheeza Lalani, The Principle Iura Aliena Novit Curia and the Role of Foreign Advisory Services in Swiss Judicial Practice, in Yuko Nishitani (ed.), Treatment of Foreign Law - Dynamics Towards Convergence?, vol. 26 Ius Comparatum, forthcoming in 2017.
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Pretelli, I. (2017). Language as a Bridge Between Legal Cultures and Universal Justice: Linguae Alienae Novit Curia? . In: Schauer, M., Verschraegen, B. (eds) General Reports of the XIXth Congress of the International Academy of Comparative Law Rapports Généraux du XIXème Congrès de l'Académie Internationale de Droit Comparé. Ius Comparatum - Global Studies in Comparative Law(), vol 24. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1066-2_29
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