The Commemoration of the Bicentennial of the 1825 Louisiana Civil Code was completed on January 21st at a ceremony held at the Louisiana Supreme Court. A volume of scholarly works compiled by the Loyola Law Review were presented to the Court, the four Louisiana Law Schools, and the Steering Committee for the Bicentennial.
In July 2023, Managing Member Alan Brackett was appointed to serve as a co-chair on the Supreme Court of Louisiana Historical Society’s Steering Committee to commemorate the bicentennial along with John T. Oliver. The ceremony was the culmination of a series of events that Alan, along with E. Phelps Gay and Harry J. “Skip” Philips, Jr., members of the Historical Society Board of Directors, had planned to celebrate this important milestone in Louisiana’s legal heritage and its unique place in the civilian world.
1825 Civil Code Events
Over the past few months David Rigamer with Community Relations at the Louisiana Supreme Court has been compiling recordings of the CLE Programs delivered by various speakers (Judges, Lawyers, Historians) as part of the Historical Society’s Commemoration of the Bicentennial of the 1825 Louisiana Civil Code.
To view the recordings, please click here >
Ronald J. Scalise, Jr., a John Minor Wisdom Professor of Civil Law at Tulane Law School, was also asked to write a short essay on the code—who drafted it, why a new code was deemed necessary, what sources the drafters consulted, what changes were made from the Digest of 1808, and why the code has had an “enduring impact” over two hundred years.
In response, Professor Scalise wrote a richly informative essay, “The Louisiana Civil Code of 1825: A Reflection on the Bicentennial.”