A report on The Spirit of Law

De l'esprit des loix, 1st edn 1748, 2 vols.
De l'esprit des loix, 1st edn 1748, 2 vols.

Treatise on political theory, as well as a pioneering work in comparative law, published in 1748 by Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu.

- The Spirit of Law
De l'esprit des loix, 1st edn 1748, 2 vols.

6 related topics with Alpha

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Portrait by an anonymous artist, 1753–1794

Montesquieu

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French judge, man of letters, historian, and political philosopher.

French judge, man of letters, historian, and political philosopher.

Portrait by an anonymous artist, 1753–1794
Château de la Brède
Montesquieu's 1748 [[:File:Montesquieu, De l'Esprit des loix (1st ed, 1748, vol 1).pdf|De l'Esprit des loix]]
Lettres familières à divers amis d'Italie, 1767

His anonymously published The Spirit of Law (1748), which was received well in both Great Britain and the American colonies, influenced the Founding Fathers of the United States in drafting the U.S. Constitution.

Page one of the officially engrossed copy of the Constitution signed by delegates. A print run of 500 copies of the final version preceded this copy.

Constitution of the United States

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Supreme law of the United States of America.

Supreme law of the United States of America.

Page one of the officially engrossed copy of the Constitution signed by delegates. A print run of 500 copies of the final version preceded this copy.
Signing of the Constitution, September 17, 1787 (1940 by Howard Chandler Christy)
Dates the 13 states ratified the Constitution
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"We the People" in an original edition
Closing endorsement section of the United States Constitution
United States Bill of Rights Currently housed in the National Archives.
John Jay, 1789–1795
John Marshall, 1801–1835
Salmon P. Chase {{refn|group= lower-alpha|The Chase Court, 1864–1873, in 1865 were Salmon P. Chase (chief Justice); Hon. Nathan Clifford, Maine; Stephen J. Field, Justice Supreme Court, U.S.; Hon. Samuel F. Miller, U.S. Supreme Court; Hon. Noah H. Swayne, Justice Supreme Court, U.S.; Judge Morrison R. Waite}}
William Howard Taft {{refn|group= lower-alpha|The Taft Court, 1921–1930, in 1925 were James Clark McReynolds, Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., William Howard Taft (chief justice), Willis Van Devanter, Louis Brandeis. Edward Sanford, George Sutherland, Pierce Butler, Harlan Fiske Stone}}
Earl Warren {{refn|group= lower-alpha|The Warren Court, 1953–1969, in 1963 were Felix Frankfurter; Hugo Black; Earl Warren (chief justice); Stanley Reed; William O. Douglas. Tom Clark; Robert H. Jackson; Harold Burton; Sherman Minton}}
William Rehnquist {{refn|group= lower-alpha|The Rehnquist Court, 1986–2005.}}
José Rizal
Sun Yat-sen

In his The Spirit of Law, Montesquieu argues that the separation of state powers should be by its service to the people's liberty: legislative, executive and judicial.

John Locke

Separation of powers

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Separation of powers refers to the division of a state's government into branches, each with separate, independent powers and responsibilities, so that the powers of one branch are not in conflict with those of the other branches.

Separation of powers refers to the division of a state's government into branches, each with separate, independent powers and responsibilities, so that the powers of one branch are not in conflict with those of the other branches.

John Locke
Montesquieu
George Washington at Constitutional Convention of 1787, signing of U.S. Constitution

In The Spirit of the Laws (1748), Montesquieu described the various forms of distribution of political power among a legislature, an executive, and a judiciary.

Constitution of the Year XII (First French Republic)

Constitution

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Aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organisation or other type of entity and commonly determine how that entity is to be governed.

Aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organisation or other type of entity and commonly determine how that entity is to be governed.

Constitution of the Year XII (First French Republic)
Constitution of the Kingdom of Naples in 1848.
Detail from Hammurabi's stele shows him receiving the laws of Babylon from the seated sun deity.
Diagram illustrating the classification of constitutions by Aristotle.
Third volume of the compilation of Catalan Constitutions of 1585
The Cossack Constitution of Pylyp Orlyk, 1710.
A painting depicting George Washington at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 signing of the U.S. Constitution
Constitution of May 3, 1791 (painting by Jan Matejko, 1891). Polish King Stanisław August (left, in regal ermine-trimmed cloak), enters St. John's Cathedral, where Sejm deputies will swear to uphold the new Constitution; in background, Warsaw's Royal Castle, where the Constitution has just been adopted.
Presidential copy of the Russian Constitution.
Magna Carta
United States Constitution

It is notable in that it established a democratic standard for the separation of powers in government between the legislative, executive, and judiciary branches, well before the publication of Montesquieu's Spirit of the Laws.

Legal Systems of the World

Comparative law

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Study of differences and similarities between the law of different countries.

Study of differences and similarities between the law of different countries.

Legal Systems of the World
Sir Henry James Sumner Maine, British jurist and first professor of comparative law at Oxford.

His comparative approach is obvious in the following excerpt from Chapter III of Book I of his masterpiece, De l'esprit des lois (1748; first translated by Thomas Nugent, 1750): "[T]he political and civil laws of each nation ... should be adapted in such a manner to the people for whom they are framed that it should be a great chance if those of one nation suit another.

"Am I Not a Man and a Brother?", 1787 medallion designed by Josiah Wedgwood for the British anti-slavery campaign

Abolitionism

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Movement to end slavery.

Movement to end slavery.

"Am I Not a Man and a Brother?", 1787 medallion designed by Josiah Wedgwood for the British anti-slavery campaign
The Chevalier de Saint-Georges, known as the "Black Mozart", was, by his social position, and by his political involvement, a figurehead of free blacks.
Jacques Pierre Brissot (1754–1793), who organized the Society of the Friends of the Blacks in 1788.
Proclamation of the Abolition of Slavery in the French Colonies, 27 April 1848, by Biard (1849)
Lord Mansfield (1705–1793), whose opinion in Somerset's Case (1772) was widely taken to have held that there was no basis in law for slavery in England.
Olaudah Equiano was a member of an abolitionist group of prominent free Africans living in Britain, and he was active among leaders of the anti-slave trade movement in the 1780s.
The painting of the 1840 Anti-Slavery Convention at Exeter Hall.
A poster advertising a special chapel service to celebrate the Abolition of Slavery in 1838
William Wilberforce (1759–1833), politician and philanthropist who was a leader of the movement to abolish the slave trade.
Thomas Clarkson was the key speaker at the British and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society's (today known as Anti-Slavery International) first conference in London, 1840
Hugh Elliot was a noted abolitionist. Whilst Governor in the British West Indies, he was reported to be the driving force behind the arrest, trial and execution of a wealthy white planter Arthur Hodge for the murder of a slave.
Punishing slaves at Calabouço, in Rio de Janeiro, c. 1822. Brazil in 1888 was the last nation in the Western Hemisphere to abolish slavery.
Chief Justice Thomas Andrew Lumisden Strange – helped free Black Nova Scotian slaves
Uncle Tom's Cabin inflamed public opinion in the North and Britain against the evils of slavery.
Black volunteer soldiers muster out to their first freedom, Harper's Weekly, 1866
Medical examination photo of Gordon showing his scourged back, widely distributed by Abolitionists to expose the brutality of slavery. From at least the 1860s onwards, photography was a powerful tool in the abolitionist movement.
José Gregorio Monagas abolished slavery in Venezuela in 1854.
Statue on Kunta Kinteh Island, The Gambia, commemorating the end of the Atlantic slave trade; the stick figure is a Kanaga mask.
Actress Lucy Liu speaking out against slavery
Abolition of slavery in the various states of the US over time:Abolition of slavery during or shortly after the American Revolution The Northwest Ordinance, 1787 Gradual emancipation in New York (starting 1799) and New Jersey (starting 1804) The Missouri Compromise, 1821 Effective abolition of slavery by Mexican or joint US/British authority Abolition of slavery by Congressional action, 1861 Abolition of slavery by Congressional action, 1862 Emancipation Proclamation as originally issued, 1 Jan 1863 Subsequent operation of the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 Abolition of slavery by state action during the Civil War Operation of the Emancipation Proclamation in 1864 Operation of the Emancipation Proclamation in 1865 Thirteenth Amendment to the US constitution, 18 Dec 1865 Territory incorporated into the US after the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment

During the Age of Enlightenment, many philosophers wrote pamphlets against slavery and its moral and economical justifications, including Montesquieu in The Spirit of the Laws (1748) and Denis Diderot in the Encyclopédie.