Civil Code of Haiti (1864 printed edition)

This is the foundational instrument of Haitian private law, in a nineteenth-century printed edition: typeset by the Imprimerie Générale de Ch. Lahure in Paris and sold by Bouchereau, printer-bookseller in Port-au-Prince, 1864. Its opening statement records the constitutional mechanics of its own making - the Chamber of Representatives of the Communes, on the proposal of the President of Haiti, passed the thirty-six laws forming the Civil Code of Haiti. Law no. 1 governs the promulgation, effects and application of laws in general: laws are enforceable throughout Haitian territory by virtue of promulgation by the President, and are executed in each commune from the moment the promulgation can be known there, with promulgation deemed known in each commune according to the rule the article then sets. The remaining laws run through the classical civil-law subject matter. Much of the code, in amended form, remains the law of Haiti, which makes an early printed edition both a legal source and a record of the state of the text before more than a century and a half of amendment.