|
''Ignorantia juris non excusat''〔Black's Law Dictionary, 5th Edition, pg. 672〕 or ''ignorantia legis neminem excusat''〔Black's Law Dictionary, 5th Edition, pg. 673〕 (Latin for "ignorance of the law excuses not"〔Black's Law Dictionary, 5th Edition, pg. 672〕 and "ignorance of law excuses no one"〔Black's Law Dictionary, 5th Edition, pg. 673〕 respectively) is a legal principle holding that a person who is unaware of a law may not escape liability for violating that law merely because he or she was unaware of its content. European-law countries with a tradition of Roman law may also use an expression from Aristotle translated into Latin: ''nemo censetur ignorare legem'' (nobody is thought to be ignorant of the law) or ''ignorantia iuris nocet'' (not knowing the law is harmful). ==Explanation== The rationale of the doctrine is that if ignorance were an excuse, a person charged with criminal offenses or a subject of a civil lawsuit would merely claim that he or she is unaware of the law in question to avoid liability, even if that person really does know what the law in question is. Thus, the law imputes knowledge of all laws to all persons within the jurisdiction no matter how transiently. Even though it would be impossible, even for someone with substantial legal training, to be aware of every law in operation in every aspect of a state's activities, this is the price paid to ensure that willful blindness cannot become the basis of exculpation. Thus, it is well settled that persons engaged in any undertakings outside what is common for a normal person, such as running a nuclear power plant, will make themselves aware of the laws necessary to engage in that undertaking. If they do not, they cannot complain if they incur liability. The doctrine assumes that the law in question has been properly published and distributed, for example, by being printed in a government gazette, made available over the internet, or printed in volumes available for sale to the public at affordable prices. (Leges instituuntur cum promulgantur. - "Laws are instituted when they are promulgated." 〔Gratian, Decretum, Distinctio 4, dictum post c.3〕) In order that a law obtain the binding force which is proper to a law, it must be applied to the men who have to be ruled by it. Such application is made by their being given notice by promulgation. A law can only bind when it is reasonably possible for those to whom it applies may acquire knowledge of it in order to observe it, even if actual knowledge of the law is absent for a particular individual. A secret law is no law at all. In the criminal law, although ignorance may not clear a defendant of guilt, it can be a consideration in sentencing, particularly where the law is unclear or the defendant sought advice from law enforcement or regulatory officials. For example, in one Canadian case, a person was charged with being in possession of gambling devices after they had been advised by customs officials that it was legal to import such devices into Canada.〔R v Potter (1978), 39 CCC (2d) 538, 3 CR (3d) 154 (PEISC).〕 Although the defendant was convicted, the sentence was an absolute discharge. In addition, there were, particularly in the days before satellite communication and cellular phones, persons who could genuinely be ignorant of the law due to distance or isolation. For example, in a case in British Columbia, a pair of hunters were acquitted of game offenses where the law was changed during the period they were in the wilderness hunting. In reaching this decision, the court refused to follow an early English law case in which a seaman on a clipper before the invention of radio was convicted even though the law had been changed while he was at sea (Bailey (1800) Russ & Ry 1). An alternate explanation of the origin of the maxim, though not particularly relevant to the modern context, can be found with the philosophy of the Greeks and Romans. These were cultures heavily influenced by customary legal systems. Within such a system, law is learned as a person participates in the culture and customs of the community. Thus it is unreasonable to believe a person could have avoided learning them. These rules and customs were also interwoven with ethical and religious dialog so that laws expressed what is right and good and deviation that which is not. We find that Cicero wrote the following in ''De re publica'' (On the Republic): "There is a true law, right reason, agreeable to nature, known to all men, constant and eternal, which calls to duty by its precepts, deters from evil by its prohibition. This law cannot be departed from without guilt. Nor is there one law at Rome and another at Athens, one thing now and another afterward; but the same law, unchanging and eternal, binds all races of man and all times." Plato wrote similarly in Minos: "What’s right is right and what’s wrong is wrong. And isn’t this believed by everyone ... even among the Persians, and always? ... What is fine, no doubt, is everywhere legislated as fine, and what is shameful as shameful; but not the shameful as fine or the fine as shameful." An unintended consequence of believing in the legal maxim gives everyone lawyer status by proxy whether or not they have any knowledge of law, hence the parody, "Everything about law I learned from one legal maxim". 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「ignorantia juris non excusat」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|