Calling all lawyers! List of specific fields for Law

[vicky_molokh]

Greetings, all!

Anyone know what is the full list of fields for the Law skill? Basic mentions Constitutional, Contract, Criminal, Police, and I'm guessing that Administrative has to fit in there somewhere. However, it seems somehow incomplete. I remember once hearing that Marriage Contract & Divorce is a field of its own about as complicated as any one of the aforementioned ones, but I'm not sure if it was a lawyery in-joke.

I took 'International/Contract' to represent my PC's specialisation in sorts of stuff that involves contracts and business between companies that are commonly tangled due to belonging to different jurisdictions and thus commonly having to pick one, the other, or a third neutral one when an agreement has to be made, as well as the closest thing that seems to be to Duncanite approach to contracts. GM okayed it. But now I'm thinking whether he needs some other fields too. (Then again, maybe I'm better off just pushing one skill and pretending my tie is on fire.)

Thanks in advance!

[rust]

Different cultures have different fields of law, but perhaps this is a start:

http://www.lsac.org/jd/think/fields-of-law.asp

[Anders]

Religious law has been an important speciality.

[rust]

Other common specialties are Aviation Law, Maritime Law and Military Law.
Some cultures have elaborate fields of law dealing with specific resources,
like for example Water Law, or specific cultural phenomena.

[Mr_Sandman]

Here's a couple list of specialties:
http://www.lsac.org/jd/think/fields-of-law.asp
http://lawschools.com/resources/law-career-specialties

[Icelander]

There exist a whole lot of fields, but not all of them are equally large. Some might fairly plausibly be treated as subfields within larger specialities.

The way the Icelandic legal system works, Police is not a valid separate speciality. It's mostly a subfield of Administrative law (or whatever you call your speciality dealing with public servants) with a few rules of thumb related to chain of evidence and suchlike that belongs in Criminal. Frankly, that last might just as well be a part of Law Enforcement skill, because 'don't do X and Y' is not really a function of full-blown Law skill. Most accurate within the current system would probably be to treat Law (Police) as an IQ/A Optional Specialisation of Law (Administrative), at least here in Iceland.

As regards your specific question in the first paragraph, Marriage and Divorce Law was taught alongside Inheritance Law and separately from both Contract Law and Property Law. It's a field that deals with dividing property and right between claimants, either according to a preexisting contract or legislative rules or rules of equity. Given that it's unlikely that a lawyer will become involved at all unless there is some doubt about the validity of the contract, I'd say that it would not be accurate to treat divorces as falling under Contract Law. It's closer to Property Law, but that's already a big enough field.

Maybe it would make sense for GURPS to just use the field of Family Law and Inheritance as a separate field where an Optional Specialisation in one or the other is fairly common.

As noted above, Property Law is a huge field that encompasses several fields that are individually at least as complex as the sum total of all the Law related to Police. A lot of Maritime Law as well as Water Law falls under it, for example. So do, in cultures that have them, things like Mining Law. In a manner of speaking, nearly all environmental law is a subset of property law as well, at least as it is structured here.

I'm not a huge fan of how GURPS treats the Law skill, but I've forgotten the scheme I thought up to replace it. It had some analogous to the way financial skills are handled in GURPS, though, with scholarly analysis being separate from day-to-day use of legal skills. Which in turn ought to be seperate from local knowledge.

In reality, someone who can think like a lawyer is at much less disadvantage when changing fields or jurisdictions than GURPS currently has it. He'll need extra time to find relevant local precedents and suchlike, yes, but he'll be able to write and interpret clauses in contracts with almost the same facility, for example. At the very least, characters ought to specialise in the form of legal system and treat individual national legal systems within those as familiarities for many (not all) purposes. And while specialist lawyers do exist, the current rules make little allowance for the fact that a lot of Administrative or Criminal cases turn on Constitutional grounds and so forth. The fields are very interrelated.

[robkelk]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

Greetings, all!

Anyone know what is the full list of fields for the Law skill? Basic mentions Constitutional, Contract, Criminal, Police, and I'm guessing that Administrative has to fit in there somewhere. ...

The Law Society of Upper Canada certifies fifteen specializations:

• Bankruptcy and Insolvency Law
• Citizenship and Immigration Law (Immigration/ Refugee Protection)
• Civil Litigation
• Construction Law
• Corporate and Commercial Law
• Criminal Law
• Environmental Law
• Estates and Trusts Law
• Family Law
• Health Law
• Intellectual Property Law (Trademark/Patent/Copyright)
• Labour Law
• Municipal Law
• Real Estate Law
• Workplace Safety and Insurance Law

Their list bears only a vague resemblance to the one in GURPS... but they're the relevant professionals (at least, they are in Ontario).

[Rocket Man]

Originally Posted by robkelk

The Law Society of Upper Canada certifies fifteen specializations:

• Bankruptcy and Insolvency Law
• Citizenship and Immigration Law (Immigration/ Refugee Protection)
• Civil Litigation
• Construction Law
• Corporate and Commercial Law
• Criminal Law
• Environmental Law
• Estates and Trusts Law
• Family Law
• Health Law
• Intellectual Property Law (Trademark/Patent/Copyright)
• Labour Law
• Municipal Law
• Real Estate Law
• Workplace Safety and Insurance Law

Their list bears only a vague resemblance to the one in GURPS... but they're the relevant professionals (at least, they are in Ontario).

Rob, do Canadian lawyers have to have specific credentials for the province they operate in? That's the way it works in the U.S. -- a lawyer who's certified to practice in Tennessee doesn't automatically have the ability to represent someone in a Colorado courtroom. There's enough differences in state law that that would be a separate specialization by itself.

[apoc527]

Originally Posted by Rocket Man

Rob, do Canadian lawyers have to have specific credentials for the province they operate in? That's the way it works in the U.S. -- a lawyer who's certified to practice in Tennessee doesn't automatically have the ability to represent someone in a Colorado courtroom. There's enough differences in state law that that would be a separate specialization by itself.

Ugh, can you imagine having to get skills for every state, let alone country? Many states have reciprocity, so a lawyer licensed in Idaho can get a license in Montana without having to take another bar exam. Some states, notably California, do not. Nonetheless, I don't think these are separate skills. Familiarities for sure!

[robkelk]

Originally Posted by Rocket Man

Rob, do Canadian lawyers have to have specific credentials for the province they operate in? That's the way it works in the U.S. -- a lawyer who's certified to practice in Tennessee doesn't automatically have the ability to represent someone in a Colorado courtroom. There's enough differences in state law that that would be a separate specialization by itself.

Lawyers have to be accepted by the law society / bar association of the province they practice in, yes. This is usually easy once you've got the first one... but, while most provinces have civil legal codes based on British common law, Québec has a civil law code based on French common law. (Criminal law is much the same across the country.)

The suggestion that apoc527 made about familiarities would apply in Canada, except that Québec civil law would be a specialization rather than a familiarity.