The legal status of the fetus: an international review

The article examines the way that courts and legislatures in the United Kingdom, the United States of America, Canada and Australia have answered questions regarding the legal status of a fetus. These questions have arisen in a variety of legal situations: the article deals with succession, criminal, child protection and negligence law. The conclusion offered is that a fetus has a value and an existence that the law should recognise. This does not mean, however, that in all circumstances the law should protect the interests of the fetus. Law-makers will respond differently to claims made on behalf of a fetus, depending on the context. The fetus does not have a uniform value or character in the eyes of the law. The law makes choices as to the situations in which it will take account of actual or threatened antenatal harm.     

论实际承运人的法律地位

论述实际承运人向货方承担责任是否导致运输合同相对性的突破是解决实际承运人法律地位问题的关键,分析在法定责任下和约定责任下实际承运人的法律地位,指出实际承运人是承运人的债务履行辅助人,运输合同突破至实际承运人不具有实际的意义,反而会损害贷方利益.     

Hospital committee proceedings and reports: their legal status.

This Article examines the legal status of hospital committee proceedings and reports, focusing on how they may be used in a medicolegal context. Specific topics dealt with include the hospital medical staff in legal perspective, the concept of institutional responsibility, liability considerations arising from committee work, and the discovery and admissiblity of committee records in litigation cases. The author concludes that the danger of committee members facing liability for their activities is slight and that the fear that these reports and proceedings may be subject to discovery or be admissible into evidence in subsequent litigation is remote because candid and conscientious evaluations of clinical practices within every institution are essential and, therefore, public policy must encourage such evaluations by maintaining the confidentiality of committee activities.     

论人类基因及基因信息的法律地位

明确人类基因及基因信息的法律地位是对其进行法律规制的前提。基因属于物质的范畴,而基因信息是一种信息,二者是构成世界的两种不同的元素,因此,在法律上需要对二者区别对待。基因在没有与特定的人体分离的时候,是身体权的客体;而当其与人体分离之后,则可以成为财产权的客体。基因信息可以分为整个人类共同所有的不具有差异性的基因信息、某一人类族群所共同拥有的基因信息和标志着个人特征的基因信息三类;前二者分别属于人类共同继承的财产和国家财产;第三类则既可以成为财产权的客体,又可以成为人格权中的隐私权的客体。     

大陆法系民事诉讼鉴定人的法律定位及相关问题研析

大陆法系国家及地区的民事审判实行"职权进行主义(Verhandlungsmaxime)".在其诉讼程序中,以自己专业知识辅助法官查明案件事实的案外人被称为"鉴定人",其口头或书面陈述被称为"鉴定意见".就鉴定人的诉讼地位识别而言,大陆法系的通说为"折衷论",即侧重于将鉴定人视为一种"法官的专业辅助人",仅在有限的程度上才会兼顾其另一属性—"证据方法".大陆法系民事诉讼的具体制度一贯强调"鉴定人不偏不倚的中立性",极力排斥其"党派性".在鉴定人制度方面,大陆法系主要存在两大缺陷:一是在案件事实判断方面,法官过于依赖其指定的鉴定人,存在后者非法篡夺前者事实认定权的问题和现象;二是由于交叉询问制度(the cross-examination)的缺乏,再加上私人鉴定人过于弱小的诉讼地位,使大陆法系的法律系统无法有效地控制和评估鉴定人的意见.这两大缺陷都与识别鉴定人地位的"折衷论"有关.     

论按揭的法律地位

本文研究的是按揭,将从整体上对与按揭相关的一些问题作一个初步的分析。这些问题大致是：1．什么是按揭?中国大陆的按揭与英美法上的接揭(mortgage)有何不同?2．为什么说按揭是一种独立的物权形式,它与抵押、质押、让与担保有何不同?3．按揭的法律定位是什么?也就是本文的最后结论。…….     

The legal nature of shares in landowning joint stock companies in the nineteenth century

This essay examines some of the contexts in which women appear especially in non-royal deeds from the kingdom of Scotland in the years between roughly 1150 and 1350. It is based on a survey of several thousand charters written on behalf of both men and women, native, Anglo-Norman and European. It considers how charter evidence may be used to illuminate the extent to which women both used and shaped the laws and customs that governed the conveyance of land in medieval Scotland, and examines changes in women's legal capacity over time. Recent studies on literacy in later medieval Europe have shown that women participated actively in the literate culture of the period and that they exerted a sometimes profound influence on written texts themselves, and this theme is explored at some length in the context of Scottish charter evidence. Also examined is the extent to which traditional Gaelic customs in respect of women's property rights shaped and influenced the early common law of Scotland.     

The legal status of juveniles in Cameroon

This paper examines the legal status of juveniles in Cameroon. It defines a juvenile as a “human being below the age of eighteen years unless, under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier” (Article 1 Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC)). It treats the historical development of the rights of children and discusses their protection under the Cameroon Penal Code (CPC), the Civil Status Registration Ordinance (CSRO), Family Law (FL) and International Instruments (II) ratified by the country. Existing gaps in the protective measures are indicated and recommendations provided.     

The juridical status of the fetus: a proposal for legal protection of the unborn

This article investigates the juridical status of the fetus. It assesses what this status should be in the light of recent developments in case law, legislation, medicine, and technology (particularly in vitro fertilization). The article is presented in 5 sections: Section 1 deals with the supreme court's landmark decision in Roe vs. Wade, which relied on biological stages of fetal development rather than philosophical determination of when life begins. Section 2 examines the historical reliance on birth as the point at which legal protection vests in the developing human. Section 3 compares fetuses with newborn children, identifying relevant similarities and differences. Section 4 studies whether the fetus at all stages of development should have the same protection (the author concludes they should not). Section 5 examines the practical implications of choosing viability as a developmental stage of special significance for legal protection.     

卫生法地位研究

卫生法是否为独立的法律部门，是卫生法学研究的热点问题。本文在对划分法律部门的目的、意义和标准重新构思的基础．认为卫生法在职能、调整对象和调整方法上都不足以成为一个独立的法律部门。尽管作为独立的卫生法法律部门难以成立，但完全可以形成一个以卫生法律规范和卫生法律问题为研究对象的独立、综合的卫生法学学科。     

"Insuring" the continued solvency of pharmaceutical companies in the face of product liability class actions

Costly product liability lawsuits continue to plague the pharmaceutical industry, and insurance to cover these losses is severely inadequate. Furthermore, questionable regulation of drugs exists once a pharmaceutical has passed FDA approval. This article describes a plan that uses a capitalistic, rather than a governmental, approach to solve both the insurance and the quality control problems. Although the proposed plan has never been used to insure pharmaceutical companies, different permutations of it have been used to insure other litigation-prone industries. Success from the proposed insurance entity results from the combined knowledge of scientists and actuaries to provide both protection from product liability lawsuits for the pharmaceutical industry and enhanced post-market surveillance of pharmaceuticals.