downing text 2012_Layout 1 - Downing College - University of ...

DOWNING COLLEGE ASSOCIATIONA LIVING M USEUMA year after I left Downing I moved to Canada where I found that even mythird in maths was more appreciated than my 2.1s in the LL.B. and in theEnglish bar exams. As a result I pursued an actuarial career. However, I alwaysretained a fondness for law. When I retired, I moved to Andorra. So, in 2010,when the University of Andorra announced a one year survey course ofAndorran Law, I was interested and made further enquiries. I was rathernervous, that even after twelve years here, my Catalan might not be goodenough to let me follow all that the lecturers would say and then write a 20page dissertation and defend it in Catalan, which is the official language ofAndorra. However, I took the plunge and I found it fascinating.In, nominally, 240 hours, the course covered Catalan legal language, historyand sources of Andorran law, constitutional law, criminal law and procedure,private law and procedure, private international law and administrative law.The history and sources of Andorran law are closely intertwined with thecountry’s constitutional development. Andorra, like the other ministates ofEurope, is a historical accident. In about 954 Count Sunifred of Urgelltransferred his lordship over Andorra to the Bishop of Urgell. However, theBishop had no forces to defend his possessions in troubled times so he enfeoffeda friendly local lord as co-lord of Andorra. They were all vassals of the King ofCatalonia-Aragon. When, for the second time, the male line of the secular colorddied out, there occurred the decisive event in Andorran history: in 1208the heiress married the Count of Foix, a vassal of the King of France. Whenthe Count and the Bishop had a dispute it was settled by a treaty, the Pareatgeof 1278, and this, with occasional amendments, was the constitution of Andorrafor 715 years. In the course of time, the Counts of Foix inherited first theKingdom of Navarre and then the Kingdom of France when Enric II of Foix,a.k.a. Enric III of Navarre, became Henri IV of France. Had there been onlyone lord or had both been of the same feudal allegiance, Andorra would surelyhave been absorbed by one neighbour or the other when the power of the kingsreplaced the feudal powers of the nobles.As it is, the co-princes of Andorra, with very limited but yet real powers, areArchbishop Joan-Enric Vives, Bishop of Urgell, and François Hollande,President of France.The criminal law and the administrative law of Andorra are codified and arelargely put together by copying from the French and Spanish systems.It is the civil law which is special. When an Andorran lawyer refers to el codiin the context of civil law, you might expect that he is referring to the code oflaws which bears the name of the famous emperor of the French (and co-princeof Andorra) and which that emperor drew rather forcefully to the attention of54