Topics covered include sources of law, analysis of legal texts, systems of precedent, statutory interpretation, judicial policy, legal professions, legal classifications, institutions of common law. Emphasis will also be placed on developing oral and argumentative skills and on techniques of legal drafting and writing. English constitutional and administrative law is a rapidly changing and expanding field of regulation. The course begins with a comparative and historical account of the development of the Constitution and compares England's unwritten Constitution with both American and European constitutional traditions. The course moves on to link the principles of legal governance to conceptions of democratic control, power, legitimacy and constitutional reform.
Special emphasis is placed on the protection of human rights.
Topics covered include the sovereignty of Parliament and the rule of law, Europe and the Constitution, Royal prerogative, government and administration, police powers, official secrets, freedom of speech and the right to protest, judicial review of executive action. In practice, this distinction seldom reflects the interrelation of contract, tort and statutory regulations. Part I of the Law of Obligations introduces the student to the general scope and nature of obligations, the principles of liability and the scope and availability of remedies. The course then focuses on the creation and life of contractual obligations. The topics covered include formation of contracts, contractual terms, interpretation of contracts.