Legal rights

(noun)

The rights bestowed onto a person by a given legal system (i.e., rights that can be modified, repealed, and restrained by human laws).

Related Terms

Examples of Legal rights in the following topics:

  • Natural Rights

    • Natural rights are usually juxtaposed with the concept of legal rights.
    • Legal rights are those bestowed onto a person by a given legal system (i.e., rights that can be modified, repealed, and restrained by human laws).
    • The question of the relation between natural and legal rights, therefore, is often an aspect of social contract theory.
    • Thus, people form an implicit social contract, ceding their natural rights to the authority to protect the people from abuse, and living henceforth under the legal rights of that authority.
    • Any contract that tried to legally alienate such a right would be inherently invalid.

  • Early Roman Society

    • Citizenship, of which there were grades with varying rights and privileges
    • Men who lived in towns outside of Rome might also hold citizenship, but some lacked the right to vote.
    • Classes of non-citizens existed and held different legal rights.
    • Under Roman law, slaves were considered property and held no rights.
    • Because it was defined mainly in terms of a lack of legal rights and status, it was also not considered a permanent or inescapable position.

  • The Universal Declaration of Human Rights

    • The Declaration consists of thirty articles which, although not legally binding, have been elaborated in subsequent international treaties, economic transfers, regional human rights instruments, national constitutions, and other laws.
    • The International Bill of Human Rights consists of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and its two Optional Protocols.
    • The Declaration has served as the foundation for two binding UN human rights covenants: the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.
    • Even though it is not legally binding, the Declaration has been adopted in or has influenced most national constitutions since 1948.
    • Understand the purpose and legal effect of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

  • Louis XIV and the Huguenots

    • The persecution of the Huguenots became one of the critical factors in Louis XIV's consolidation of royal power and resulted in Catholicism being the only legally tolerated religion in France, despite Louis' conflict with the Pope.
    • It granted the Calvinist Protestants of France, known as Huguenots, substantial rights in a predominately Catholic nation.
    • It offered general freedom of conscience to individuals and many specific concessions to the Protestants, such as amnesty and the reinstatement of their civil rights, including the right to work in any field or for the state and to bring grievances directly to the king.
    • Although this was within his legal rights, this policy (known as dragonnades) inflicted severe financial strain and atrocious abuse on Protestants.
    • This restored to non-Catholics their civil rights and the freedom to worship openly.

  • Women in Pre-Islamic Arabia

    • Women had almost no legal status under tribal law in pre-Islamic Arabia.
    • Under the customary tribal law existing in Arabia at the advent of Islam, as a general rule women had virtually no legal status.
    • The tribal leader enforced the tribe's spoken rules, which generally limited the rights of the women.
    • Under the customary tribal law existing in Arabia before the rise of Islam, as a general rule women had virtually no legal status; fathers sold their daughters into marriage for a price, the husband could terminate the union at will, and women had little or no property or succession rights.
    • Assess the role and rights of women in Islamic and pre-Islamic Arabia

  • The Manor System

    • Manorialism was characterized by the vesting of legal and economic power in the lord of a manor.
    • Many such rights were enforceable by the serf in the manorial court.
    • Villeins had more rights and a higher status than the lowest serf, but existed under a number of legal restrictions that differentiated them from freemen.
    • Landlords, even where legally entitled to do so, rarely evicted villeins, because of the value of their labour.
    • On the right, a man leans on a bag, presumably to draw seeds that he will then sow.

  • Justinian and Theodora

    • Emperor Justinian was responsible for substantial expansion, a legal code, and the Hagia Sophia but suffered defeats against the Persians.
    • Emperor Justinian's most important contribution, perhaps, was a unified Roman legal code.
    • The Romans had attempted to systematize the legal code in the fifth century but had not completed the effort.
    • Theodora participated in Justinian's legal and spiritual reforms, and her involvement in the increase of the rights of women was substantial.
    • She also expanded the rights of women in divorce and property ownership, instituted the death penalty for rape, forbade exposure of unwanted infants, gave mothers some guardianship rights over their children, and forbade the killing of a wife who committed adultery.

  • Chinese Philosophy

    • Confucianism, Daoism, Legalism, and Mohism all began during the Zhou Dynasty in the 6th century BCE, and had very strong influences on Chinese civilization.
    • Some ethical concepts included Yì (the moral disposition to do good), Lǐ (ritual norms for everyday life) and Zhì (the ability to see what is right in the behavior of others).
    • Although Confucianism and Daoism are the Chinese philosophies that have endured most to this day, even more important to this early period was a lesser-known philosophy called Legalism.
    • According to Legalism, the state was far more important than the individual.
    • Legalism was generally in competition with Confucianism, which advocated a just and reciprocal relationship between the state and its subjects.

  • Feudalism

    • Feudalism was a set of legal and military customs in medieval Europe that was determined by the ownership of land.
    • Feudalism was a set of legal and military customs in medieval Europe that flourished between the 9th and 15th centuries.
    • The classic version of feudalism describes a set of reciprocal legal and military obligations among the warrior nobility, revolving around the three key concepts of lords, vassals, and fiefs.
    • The obligations and corresponding rights between lord and vassal concerning the fief formed the basis of the feudal relationship.
    • Roland (right) receives the sword, Durandal, from the hands of Charlemagne (left).

  • Yaroslav the Wise

    • Yaroslav I, also known as Yaroslav the Wise, developed the first legal codes, beautified Kievan Rus', and formed major political alliances with the West during his nearly 40-year reign.
    • He also created some of the first legal codes in Kievan Rus'.
    • These first steps also most likely led to the first legal code in Kievan Rus' under Yaroslav.
    • Developing a more established hierarchy within the Russian Orthodox Church, including a statute outlining the rights of the clergy and establishing the sobor of bishops.
    • This initial legal code would live on and be refined into the Russkaya Pravda in the 12th century.