Social And Political Evolution Of Society In Relation To The Evolution Of Commercial Law

Social and political evolution of society in relation to the evolution of commercial law

Trade in the old age

Commerce, understood as the exchange of goods or services has its origin in bartering. In the beginning, the exchange was intended to consume, but over time the bartering became more complex in such a way that the exchange was not only intended to satisfy a basic need for food, but it can also be made withThe purpose of obtaining a gain. It is at this time that an exchange unit became necessary, resulting in the currency

Hammurabi code

“Law 10: If the buyer has not taken the seller and the witnesses of the sale;If the owner of the lost thing has taken the witnesses who know his lost thing: the buyer is a thief, he will be dead. The owner of the lost thing will recover it."

In Rome, although it is possible to identify some norms that regulated certain very special aspects of trade, it was civil law norms. The aspects of trade regulated by Roman trade were:

Substantive standards

• Echazón by breakdown

This was a legal instrument regulated by the Lactu Lex Rhodia (Rodas’s Law on the goods launched from a ship) that was the collection of a set of uses on maritime trade.

• Phoenus nauticum or thick loan

The coarse. And if the boat did not return as a result of a catastrophe, then the obligation to return the amount provided was extinguished

Adjective norms

• Adjective actions

Roman law regulated the mandate as a contract through which the president acted on behalf of the principal on his own, so that the president was obliged to respond with his assets against third parties

“Law 12: If the seller has gone to the destination (he has died), the buyer will take up to 5 times in the house of the seller of the object of the claim of this process.”Hammurabi Code

Emergence of commercial law in the Middle Ages

Feudalism was born as a political system in which the feudal lord guaranteed the safety of his servants inside the fief. Likewise, feudalism was constituted as an economic system characterized by production for self-consumption. Throughout the Middle Ages, economic, social and political changes were given, for this reason, this stage of the history of man has been divided into: High Middle Ages (V to X) and Low Middle Ages (XI Centuries AXV),

Due to the lack of an adequate legal framework to resolve conflicts derived from the exercise of trade, medieval merchants were organized in guilds according to their industry.

The guilds dictated their statutes based on the uses that governed their activity. For the solution of the conflicts, courts were instituted that applied these statutes

Commercial law arose precisely in this historical moment, since the customary norms of the unions were a system of differentiated norms that specifically regulated the activities of the merchants.

The statutes of the unions were initially only applicable to their members this situation changed as trade evolved.

As an example of these norms we can mention the consulate of the seasy of the thirteenth century:

"Article 1. The Mar Consulate: in the controversies and disagreements of a commercial nature that emerged between entrepreneurs, the Official Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Navigation of Barcelona exercises the arbitration and alternative systems of conflict resolution by means of the Mar Consulate ”

Evolution of commercial law in the Modern Age

Once the state-state was consolidated, the statutes were replaced by laws issued by the sovereigns, since they were the ones who had the exclusive power to issue laws

As a paradigmatic example of commercial legislation of this period we can mention the ordinances of Seville of 1510 and the Bilbao ordinances of 1737, which were issued by the monarchs, but whose content clearly was based on the rules originally issued by the unions.

We can also mention the Land Commerce of 1673 and Maritime Commerce of 1681 issued by King Louis XIV of France, the Sun King, also known as Colbert’s ordinances.

In the illustration, commercial law was rethink as a system of norms that regulate an activity without taking into account the profession of the subjects who carry it out

Codes of standards were developed to systematize legislation by matter gathered in a single order. Following these ideas Napoleon issued the Civil Codes of 1804, a mercantile of 1807, of 1808 criminal procedures and Criminal 1810.

"Commercial legislation is entirely different from civil legislation"

Contemporary age

The nineteenth -century industrial revolution had effects on commercial law. The industrial revolution implied sophistication in the production and exchange of goods and services. In order to facilitate the regulation of trade, the unification of private law was proposed to put aside the division between civil law and commercial law

As for example, we can mention the Federal Code of the Swiss obligations of 1881, which set aside the division between civil and commercial law

In the twentieth century, during this century capitalism and communism were consolidated as economic systems.

The ideas of communism were the protection against the merchant, specifically in regard to the consumer protection, the regularization between the patterns and the workers and the social security in charge of the State was created.

While the ideas of capitalism, decaying in communism new forms of financing arose and the stock market was strengthened as an instrument of credit obtaining.

Globalization modified the interaction between countries resulting in the idea of the State as a member of an international community in which the State participates and commits through international treaties, as specialized international organizations, such as the United Nations Commission forInternational Commercial Law.

Evolution of commercial law in Ecuador

With the incorporation of Ecuador to Gran Colombia in May 1822, they continue to apply in commercial matters in force in the colony issued by the Spaniards in everything that does not oppose the Constitution of Cúcuta of 1821 prepared with great influence of Bolívar.

“The entire territory of the Republic helps to develop the beautiful seeds of our happiness and prosperity: public education, agriculture, commerce, arts and sciences, and all national industry branches are within the order of their wise administration,and subject to its benign influence."

“Article 178. No kind of work, culture, industry, or trade will be prohibited from Colombians, except those that are now necessary for the subsistence of the Republic, which will be released by Congress when you judge it appropriate and convenient ”

The Gran Colombia Congress issued on October 12, 1822 eliminates the Special Trade Courts, passing the commercial matters to the knowledge of the ordinary judges or courts;creating in July 1824.

It was decreed:

• Art.14: There will be a Commercial Court in the Department of Quito, in accordance with the Law of October 12, 1821.
• Art. 21: The jurisdiction of the Commercial Court will be throughout the extension of the provinces of Guayaquil, Cuenca and Loja

On November 4, 1831, by the Law of the Constituent Congress, the Executive is empowered to put in the country the Commercial Code of Spain of 1829, which will govern for more than 50 years.

The Commercial Code prepared by the Supreme Court of Justice between 1873 and 1875 was objected by President Antonio Borrero and President Ignacio de Tenintimilla put this legal body at the hands of a Jury of Jurisconsultos and hosting small modifications put it in force on 01 of 01 ofMay 1882, this being the first Ecuadorian Commercial Code.

• "Art.1: Since this law is published, the prison for preceding debts of civil and commercial contracts is abolished."

This Commercial Code was replaced by the one issued on July 30, 1906, by Supreme Decree of General Eloy Alfaro, the same as as body of laws is still in force with many reforms, suppressions and additions.

"Title VI of the second book to the regulation and operation of the Commerce Companies and established, for the first time in Ecuador, the state surveillance on national and foreigners domiciled in Ecuador"

In 1925, the Ecuadorian Commercial Code was reformed, regarding the letters of exchange, and promissory to the order, accepting the law of Brussels, capital of Belgium, which was approved by the respective International Conference and by our country, for our country, forunify the legislation that must govern these commercial documents

Due to their amplitude of commercial relations, with the future of the times, new specialties have appeared, such as corporate law, insurance right, shipping or aeronautical rights, etc. Being in the Commercial Code, the merchant’s world and a group of traditional contracts such as: the commercial sale, the sale with a domain reserve, the commercial exchange, the commercial transport contract, the bill of exchange, the promissory note, thecommercial loan, the ordinary and special garment of commerce, the agricultural and industrialof interest, but in general and mostly they have been maintained by being world -known institutions, with vast world experience, and that Ecuador adopted in its legislation these legal figures since the middle of the last century

• "Art. 1. The Commercial Code governs the obligations of merchants in their commercial operations, and trade acts and contracts, even if they are executed by non -merchants."

Bibliography

• UNAM, Legal Research Center. History of commercial law. Historical background of commercial law. Mexico. National Autonomous University of Mexico. 2016, p. 15-27
• Castro Cristina. Commerce in Ecuadorian legislation. Ecuador: Ambato. Regional Autonomous University of the Andes. 2015, pg. 15-17