Louisiana Wrote Its Own Law.

Textbooks say we follow Napoleonic law. The real story is that Louisiana codified its own system — built on Spanish law that was already in force in 1803, shaped by French technique, and still different from every other state today. Louisiana’s Civil Code is Louisiana legislation. It is not a French statute sitting on the shelf.

Louisiana has always written and revised its own codes.

In a Caddo Parish courtroom last year, a judge settling a land dispute did not begin by asking what earlier courts had decided. He opened the Civil Code. In forty-nine other states that would be unusual. In Louisiana it is the system working as designed. Private law here — property, contracts, successions, family relations, obligations — is built around a written code the legislature enacted. Judges interpret the code; they do not invent the rules case by case. Elsewhere, private law is largely what courts have said it is over time. That single difference is still decisive in everyday cases.

Most textbooks shorten this to “Napoleonic law” or “the Napoleonic Code.” The phrase points at the right family tree, but it skips the most important facts: when the United States took control in 1803, the law actually in force was Spanish, not French; Louisiana never enacted the Code Napoléon; and the state has always written and revised its own codes.

In every other American state, private law is built primarily on English common law. Judges decide cases. Those decisions become precedent, and later courts are generally required to follow them. This is the doctrine of stare decisis — Latin for “to stand by things decided.” Once a higher court has ruled on a legal question, lower courts (and often the same court later) treat that ruling as binding. The law develops through the accumulation of judicial decisions.

Louisiana’s private law — property, contracts, successions, family law, and obligations — works differently. It is a civil-law system centered on a comprehensive written code. The code itself is the primary source of law. Judges interpret and apply what the legislature wrote; they do not invent the rules case by case, and earlier decisions do not carry the same binding force they have in common-law states. That distinction is not historical trivia. It still governs real cases in Caddo Parish and Orleans Parish courthouses.

What Was Actually in Force in 1803

Louisiana’s legal history is layered. During the French colonial period, the primary source of private law was the Custom of Paris (Coutume de Paris), a written compilation of customary rules that had developed in the Paris region. It was first printed in the early 1500s and later revised. In 1664 Louis XIV directed that the Custom of Paris, together with the royal ordinances of the French crown, would be the civil law of the French colonies. The Superior Council in New Orleans applied it. The Custom of Paris was not a comprehensive modern code. It was a collection of rules on family matters, inheritance, property, and certain commercial questions, supplemented by royal edicts. Roman law ideas had already been absorbed into it over centuries, but the governing text was French customary law, not Spanish law.

In 1762 France secretly ceded Louisiana to Spain. Spain did not take formal possession until 1769. That year Governor Alejandro O’Reilly arrived in New Orleans with a large military force, suppressed the 1768 revolt against earlier Spanish authority, and reorganized the colony. On 25 November 1769 he issued a proclamation that abolished the French Superior Council and the French legal structure. With limited exceptions (notably the French Code Noir regulating slavery), French law ceased to apply. Spanish law was imposed. O’Reilly’s ordinances directed judges to follow the laws of the Nueva Recopilación de Castilla and the Recopilación de las Leyes de las Indias. The Siete Partidas was also a major source.

The Siete Partidas was a large 13th-century Castilian compilation ordered under Alfonso X (“the Wise”). It is divided into seven parts covering the Catholic faith, the king and nobility, the administration of justice, marriage and family, contracts and obligations, wills and inheritance, and crimes and punishments. It was heavily influenced by Roman and canon law and was written in Castilian rather than Latin. The Nueva Recopilación de Castilla (1567) was a later official collection of the laws of the Kingdom of Castile; it remained the principal compilation of Castilian law for more than two centuries and served as supplementary law in Spain’s overseas territories. Together with the Recopilación de las Indias (the compilation of laws for the Spanish colonies), these were the main Spanish sources in force in Louisiana from 1769 until the American period. By the time of the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, the territory had been under Spanish civil law for more than three decades. American officials did not find a legal vacuum or the older French colonial law. They found an operating Spanish system.

That Spanish system is not the same as today’s Louisiana Civil Code. The Siete Partidas and the Recopilaciones were collections of earlier laws and doctrines, not a single modern civil code organized around general principles of persons, things, and obligations in the style of the 1804 French Code civil. Louisiana’s own codes (beginning with the 1808 Digest) reorganized the law that was then in force, used French codification technique and wording for form and many articles, and later revisions continued to reshape it. Some substantive rules traceable to Spanish and Roman sources survived or were carried forward; others were replaced.

The 1825 Civil Code, in particular, more fully displaced the continuing authority of the prior Spanish law. What remains is Louisiana legislation — the current Civil Code — not the Siete Partidas or the Nueva Recopilación sitting on the shelf. The layered history (French Custom of Paris, then Spanish law after 1769, then Louisiana’s own codes) is real, but the law applied in a Parish courtroom today is the code the Louisiana legislature has enacted and revised.

The 1808 Digest: A Digest of the Laws Then in Force

In 1806 the territorial legislature directed James Brown and Louis Moreau-Lislet to compile a civil code for the Territory of Orleans. Moreau-Lislet, born in Saint-Domingue and trained in Paris just before the Revolution, was fluent in French, Spanish, and English. He and Brown produced the Digest of the Civil Laws now in Force in the Territory of Orleans, enacted on March 31, 1808. It was the first civil code in the Western Hemisphere.

The Digest was commissioned as a digest of the laws then in force — meaning the Spanish law operating in the territory — adapted to the new American system of government. It was written in French and translated into English. Its structure followed the modern French style (three books on persons, things, and modes of acquiring ownership), and it drew heavily on the unfinished French Projet de l’An VIII of 1800 and the 1804 Code Napoléon for organization and many provisions.

Scholars have argued for decades about the exact mix. Linguistic studies show substantial borrowing of French wording. Other research, supported by the famous de la Vergne volume (a copy of the 1808 Digest with interleaved manuscript notes attributed to Moreau-Lislet), shows that those notes point mainly to Roman and Spanish authorities and almost never cite the French Code. The long-running debate is whether the Digest was primarily Spanish substance expressed in French language and form, or a more direct reception of French materials. Both French technique and Spanish substance are present. What is clear is that the legislature asked for a digest of existing law, and the drafters produced Louisiana’s own text rather than simply enacting the Code Napoléon.

Louisiana Wrote Its Own Codes

Louisiana never adopted the Code Napoléon as its law. It wrote successive codes of its own:

• The 1808 Digest.
• The Civil Code of 1825 (drafted by Moreau-Lislet, Edward Livingston, and Pierre Derbigny). This revision more clearly elevated French sources, expressly repealed the prior Spanish, Roman, and French laws that had remained in force, and became the direct ancestor of the modern code.
• The revised Civil Code of 1870, which has been continuously amended ever since.

The Code Napoléon — formally the Code civil des Français, promulgated on 21 March 1804 — was the comprehensive civil code produced under Napoleon. It reorganized French private law into a single, systematic text covering persons, property, and obligations. It drew on earlier French revolutionary drafts (including the Projet of 1800), Roman law, and the writings of jurists such as Domat and Pothier. Its structure and many of its formulations became highly influential across Europe and beyond. Louisiana never adopted that French code as its law.

Today’s Louisiana Civil Code is Louisiana legislation. It is not a French statute sitting on the shelf. It is organized into a Preliminary Title and four Books and contains thousands of articles. Private law remains civilian; public law, criminal law, and procedure have absorbed more common-law and American statutory influence. Louisiana is therefore a mixed jurisdiction, but the civilian core of private law is deliberate and enduring.

Civil Law and Common Law: The Practical Difference

The core difference is the source of the rules.

In every other American state, private law is built primarily on English common law. Judges decide cases. Those decisions become precedent, and later courts are generally required to follow them. This is the doctrine of stare decisis — Latin for “to stand by things decided.” Once a higher court has ruled on a legal question, lower courts (and often the same court later) treat that ruling as binding. The law develops through the accumulation of judicial decisions rather than from a single comprehensive code.

Louisiana’s private law — property, contracts, successions, family law, and obligations — works differently. It is a civil-law system centered on a comprehensive written code. The code itself is the primary source of law. Judges interpret and apply what the legislature wrote; they do not invent the rules case by case, and earlier decisions do not carry the same binding force they have in common-law states.

In Louisiana, legislation is primary. Civil Code Article 1 states that the sources of law are legislation and custom. Judges apply and interpret the written code. One court decision does not automatically become binding law the way it does in the other states. A later court is not required to follow a single earlier ruling simply because that ruling exists. Louisiana instead uses an idea called jurisprudence constante. When courts have decided the same point the same way many times over a long period, that consistent line of decisions carries strong weight. Lawyers and judges treat it as highly persuasive, and in practice it often settles the question. Even then, those decisions remain secondary to the code itself. If the code says something different, the code controls. Louisiana courts do pay serious attention to consistent case law, but the formal rule is still different from the common-law system: the written code comes first.

That difference shows up in ordinary cases. In Louisiana, property is called either immovable (land and things attached to it) or movable (everything else). Other states usually say real property or personal property. When people buy and sell ordinary goods, Louisiana uses the rules in its Civil Code. It has never adopted Uniform Commercial Code Article 2, the statute most other states use for those sales.

Succession is the Louisiana term for what other states call probate — the legal process of transferring a person’s property after death. Louisiana still has forced heirship. In general, children under 24, or children of any age who are permanently incapacitated, have a protected share of their parent’s estate that the parent cannot freely give away. The system also uses ideas such as usufruct (the right to use property and keep its fruits or income for a time) and naked ownership (the underlying ownership that remains after the usufruct ends). These do not have exact matches in common-law states.

Forced heirship (the protected share) is a limit on how much a parent can give away. Children under 24 years old, or children of any age who are permanently incapacitated, are entitled to a reserved portion of their parent’s estate (called the legitime or forced portion). The parent cannot freely dispose of that share by will. That is a protection for certain children.

Usufruct is a different idea — you can live in the house and use it, but you don’t own the house itself. The ownership (naked ownership) belongs to someone else, often the kids. No other state does it that way.”It is the right to use property and keep its fruits or income for a period of time, while someone else holds the underlying ownership (called naked ownership). A common example in Louisiana is the surviving spouse’s usufruct over community property after the other spouse dies. The spouse can live in the house or receive the income from the property for life (or until remarriage, depending on the circumstances), but the children or other heirs hold the naked ownership and will fully own the property when the usufruct ends.

Forced heirship protects a child’s share of the estate. Usufruct is a way of splitting the rights in property over time.

They can both exist at the same time because they are different rights in the same property.

Here’s how it works with a house that was community property:

• The surviving spouse already owns their own half of the house outright. That half was already theirs.
• The deceased spouse’s half of the house goes to the children (as naked owners).
• The surviving spouse gets a usufruct over that half. That means the spouse can keep living in the whole house and using it, even though the children hold the underlying ownership of the deceased parent’s half.
• When the usufruct ends (usually when the surviving spouse dies or remarries, if there is no will), the children become full owners of that half.

Forced heirship protects the children’s share (the naked ownership of the forced portion). The usufruct lets the surviving spouse continue to use the house in the meantime. The law treats a usufruct in favor of the surviving spouse as allowed even over the forced portion, because the children still receive their ownership interest — they just do not get full use of it until the usufruct ends.

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This does not require a court fight in the ordinary case. If the person died without a will, the usufruct arises automatically under Civil Code Article 890. The succession is still opened and the rights are recognized through the normal succession process, but the basic split (spouse keeps own half + usufruct; children get naked ownership) is the default rule. A will can change some of the details, but it cannot completely eliminate a forced heir’s protected share.

So the children do not lose the house. They get the ownership interest, and the surviving spouse gets the right to use it for a time.

Other practical differences appear in court procedure. The right to a civil jury trial in Louisiana comes from statutes, not from the state constitution. Appellate courts also have broader power to re-examine the facts of a case than appellate courts typically do in the other states. Even the bar exam is different: 21 hours over three non-consecutive days, with no Multistate Bar Examination.

The Louisiana Supreme Court

The Louisiana Supreme Court is the highest court in the state. It sits in New Orleans and has seven justices. Like other state supreme courts, it has the final say on questions of Louisiana law. Because Louisiana’s private law is built around a written code, the court’s role in civil cases is shaped by that civilian framework. It interprets the Civil Code and other legislation. Its decisions are highly influential, and lower courts follow them in practice. At the same time, the court operates within the civilian idea that legislation is the primary source of law.

A single decision does not create binding precedent in the strict common-law sense of stare decisis. When the court (or lower courts) has decided the same point the same way many times, that consistent line of decisions — jurisprudence constante — carries strong persuasive weight and is treated with real respect. Even then, it remains secondary to the code itself. If the code and a long line of cases conflict, the code controls. The Louisiana Supreme Court has recognized this distinction: a series of consistent decisions forms the basis of jurisprudence constante, but judicial decisions are not an authoritative source of law in the same way legislation is.

The Bar Exam

Louisiana’s bar exam is different from the exam given in every other state. It is the longest bar exam in the country: 21 hours of testing spread over three non-consecutive days (Monday, Wednesday, and Friday). There is no Multistate Bar Examination (the multiple-choice test used almost everywhere else) and no Multistate Performance Test. The exam consists of nine written parts. Five of them focus on Louisiana’s codes (Civil Code subjects and the Code of Civil Procedure). The other four cover subjects such as constitutional law, criminal law and procedure, evidence, and federal jurisdiction and procedure. Code subjects are weighted more heavily than the non-code subjects. Applicants must also pass the Multistate Professional Responsibility Examination (MPRE). Because the exam is built around Louisiana’s own civil-law materials rather than the national common-law subjects tested on the Multistate Bar Examination, it reflects the same practical difference that appears in the state’s courts: the written code is central.

The French Connection Is Real — and Limited

The French influence is genuine and important. The 1808 Digest was structured like the French codes and borrowed extensively from the Projet of 1800 and the 1804 Code Napoléon for form and many articles. The 1825 Code went further in elevating French sources and cutting off the continuing force of prior Spanish law. Moreau-Lislet and his colleagues knew the French materials and used them. Napoleon’s codification project is part of the ancestry.

It is not the whole ancestry. Spanish law was the law in force in 1803. Spanish sources such as the Siete Partidas shaped the substance the drafters were digesting. Roman law underlies both traditions. Louisiana then wrote, revised, and continues to revise its own code. The result is a system that shares a family tree with the Code Napoléon but is not a copy of it.

Textbooks reach for “Napoleonic law” because it quickly signals that Louisiana is the outlier. The more precise statement is this: Louisiana codified its own civil law. That law rests on the Spanish system that was operating when the United States arrived, was shaped by French codification technique and doctrine, and has been Louisiana’s own legislation ever since. The distinction between a comprehensive written code and judge-made common law is still the one that matters when a case is argued in Shreveport or New Orleans.

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Primary Sources

1. Digest of the Civil Laws now in Force in the Territory of Orleans (1808)
   Louis Moreau-Lislet & James Brown, A Digest of the Civil Laws Now in Force in the Territory of Orleans, with Alterations and Amendments Adapted to its Present System of Government (New Orleans: Bradford & Anderson, 1808).
   Full text (French and English): LSU Law, Digest of 1808 Online, https://digestof1808.law.lsu.edu/.
   Extended: Digest of 1808 Online, Book 3, Title 3, Article 1.
   Abbreviated: Digest 1808 Online, bk. 3, tit. 3, art. 1.
2. De la Vergne Volume (Moreau-Lislet’s annotated copy)
   Louis Moreau-Lislet, manuscript annotations (c. 1814) in a bound copy of the 1808 Digest, traditionally known as the De la Vergne Volume. Facsimile and typed notes available via LSU Law Digest Online.
   Scholarly descriptions: Robert A. Pascal, “A Recent Discovery: A Copy of the ‘Digest of the Civil Laws’ of 1808 with Moreau Lislet’s Hand,” 26 La. L. Rev. 25 (1965); Mitchell Franklin, “An Important Document in the History of American Roman and Civil Law,” 11 Tul. L. Rev. 89 (1936).
3. Spanish law in force in Louisiana in 1803
   Contemporary evidence that Spanish law (including the Siete Partidas, Recopilación de las Leyes de Indias, and local ordinances) governed the territory:
   Thomas Jefferson, Message to Congress enclosing An Account of Louisiana (14 November 1803), in The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, vol. 41, ed. Barbara B. Oberg (Princeton University Press, 2014).
   Governor William C. C. Claiborne’s reports (1803–1804) describing the Spanish legal system then in force.
   Act of 31 October 1803 (2 Stat. 245) and the subsequent territorial organic acts, which continued the existing laws until altered by the territorial legislature.
4. Louisiana Civil Code (current and historical)
   Louisiana Civil Code (as revised). Official text available through the Louisiana Legislature website.
   Key historical editions: Civil Code of 1825; Civil Code of 1870.
5. Coutume de Paris (Custom of Paris). Principal source of private law in French colonial Louisiana until 1769.
6. Alejandro O’Reilly, proclamation and ordinances of 25 November 1769 (abolishing the French Superior Council and establishing Spanish law and administration).
7. Las Siete Partidas. Louis Moreau-Lislet & Henry Carleton, The Laws of Las Siete Partidas Which Are Still in Force in the State of Louisiana (New Orleans: James M’Karaher, 1820) (2 vols.).
8. Nueva Recopilación de las Leyes de Castilla (1567).
9. Recopilación de Leyes de los Reynos de las Indias (1680).
10. Louisiana Civil Code arts. 1, 890, 1493, 1495, 1499. Official text available on the Louisiana Legislature website.
11. La. Const. art. XII, § 5.

Major Secondary Sources (Scholarly)

1. Alain A. Levasseur & Vicenç Feliú, Moreau Lislet: The Man Behind the Digest of 1808 (Claitor’s Publishing, 2008). Definitive modern study of the principal redactor.
2. Rodolfo Batiza, “The Louisiana Civil Code of 1808: Its Actual Sources and Present Relevance,” 46 Tul. L. Rev. 4 (1971). Argues that a large portion of the Digest’s text was taken from the French Projet of 1800 and the Code civil of 1804.
3. Robert A. Pascal, “Sources of the Digest of 1808: A Reply to Professor Batiza,” 46 Tul. L. Rev. 603 (1972). Contends that the substance remained primarily Spanish even where French wording was used. (The Batiza–Pascal exchange remains the central scholarly debate.)
4. George Dargo, “Digest of 1808: Historical Perspectives,” 24 Tul. Eur. & Civ. L.F. 1 (2009). Places the Digest in its political and cultural context after the Louisiana Purchase.
5. Vernon Valentine Palmer, various articles on the mixed character of Louisiana private law and the continuing role of the Civil Code as the primary source.
6. Jerah Johnson, “La Coutume de Paris: Louisiana’s First Law,” 30 La. Hist. 145 (1989).
7. Law Library of Louisiana, “Colonial Law in New Orleans, 1718–1803” research guide.
8. Gustavus Schmidt, The Civil Law of Spain and Mexico (New Orleans, 1851), and related 19th-century discussions of O’Reilly’s ordinances.
9. Doerr v. Mobil Oil Corp., 774 So. 2d 119 (La. 2000).
10. Willis-Knighton Medical Center v. Caddo-Shreveport Sales & Use Tax Commission, 903 So. 2d 1071 (La. 2005).
11. Louisiana Committee on Bar Admissions, official information on the bar exam format, subjects, and scoring, https://www.lascba.org.

Additional Useful References

• LSU Center of Civil Law Studies publications and the Journal of Civil Law Studies.
• Elizabeth Gaspar Brown, Legal Systems in Conflict: Orleans Territory 1804–1812 (1956).
• The official Louisiana Civil Code and the Louisiana Code of Civil Procedure for current practice.