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GDL Law Notes GDL English Legal System Notes

Case Law Notes

Updated Case Law Notes

GDL English Legal System Notes

GDL English Legal System

Approximately 103 pages

A collection of the best GDL notes the director of Oxbridge Notes (an Oxford law graduate) could find after combing through applications from top students and carefully evaluating each on accuracy, formatting, logical structure, spelling/grammar, conciseness and "wow-factor". In short these are what we believe to be the strongest set of GDL notes available in the UK this year....

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Case law

  • Judicial precedent

    • In deciding a case, a judge must follow any decision that has been made by a higher court in a case with similar facts.

    • Judges are bound only by the part of the judgment that forms the legal principle that was the basis of the earlier decision, known as the ratio decidendi.

    • The rest of the judgment is known as obiter dicta and is not binding.

  • The hierarchy of the courts

    • The Court of Justice of the European Union is the highest authority on European law, in other matters the Supreme Court is the highest court in the UK.

    • Under the 1966 Practice Direction, the Supreme Court is not bound by its previous decisions.

  • How do judges really decide cases?

    • According to the traditional declaratory theory laid down by William Blackstone, judges do not make law but merely discover and declare the law that has always been.

    • Ronald Dworkin also accepts that the judges have no real discretion in making case law, but he bases this view on his concept that law is a seamless web of principles.

    • Very different views have been put forward by other academics.

    • ...

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