Texas Penal Code
The Texas Penal Code is the principal criminal code of the State of Texas. The Code was originally enacted in 1856 and underwent substantial revision in 1973, with the passage of the Revised Penal Code, in large part based on the American Law Institute's Model Penal Code. History. The first codification of Texas criminal law was the Texas Penal Code of 1856. Prior to 1856, criminal law in Texas was governed by the common law, with the exception of a few penal statutes. In 1854, the fifth Legislature passed an act requiring the Governor to appoint  a commission to codify the civil and criminal laws of Texas. Only the Penal Code and Code of Criminal Procedure, both authored by James Willie, were passed by the sixth Legislature and were effective as of February 1, 1857. These came to be referred to as the "Old Codes." The code underwent a major reorganization and reconciliation of existing criminal laws with the adoption of the Texas Penal Code of 1974. According to the Texas Legislative Counsel, the main objectives of the Revised Penal Code were to (1) consolidate, simplify, and clarify the substantive law of crimes; (2) modernize a  Penal Code designed for the preindustrialized, rural, and underpopulated Texas society of a century ago; (3) identify and proscribe, with as much precision as possible, all significantly harmful criminal conduct; (4) rationally grade offenses, according to the harm they cause or threaten, and sensibly apportion the sentencing authority between the judiciary and correctional system; (5) codify the general principles of the penal law; and (6) collect in a single code all significant penal law, transferring to more appropriate locations in the statutes regulatory and similar laws that merely employed a penal sanction. Dean W. Page Keeton of the University of  Texas played a key role in drafting, revising, and promoting the Revised Penal Code. Organization. The Texas Penal Code is organized into titles and chapters. As of 2017, the basic structure is as follows: