A Translator's Toolbox: The Law, Moreau-Lislet's Library, and the Presence of Multilingual Dictionaries in Nineteenth-Century Louisiana

• Author: Agustín Parise
• Position: Assistant Professor, Faculty of Law, Maastricht University (The Netherlands); LLB, LLD, Universidad de Buenos Aires (Argentina); LLM, Paul M. Hebert Law Center, Louisiana State University (USA); PhD, Maastricht University.
• Pages: 1163-1184

A Translator’s Toolbox: The Law, Moreau-Lislet’s Library, and the Presence of Multilingual Dictionaries in Nineteenth-Century Louisiana Agustín Parise  INTRODUCTION The private law of Louisiana—as encapsulated prominently in the Louisiana Civil Code—presents two interesting features: this law is applicable in a mixed jurisdiction and is drafted in the English language. Louisiana indeed combines aspects of both common and civil law, and jurists who intend to implement continental European principles may value this interaction of systems while undertaking their practices and studies in the common law and vice versa. 1 After all, Louisiana may be considered a “Civil Law island” partially surrounded by a “sea of Common Law”—a status that has to be safeguarded to survive. 2 In addition, although the lingua franca now is English, the previous lingua franca applied in Louisiana for a significant time period. The fact that the Louisiana Constitution of 1845 instructed the bilingual publication in French and English is relevant for understating the legal history of civil Copyright 2016, by AGUSTÍN PARISE. * Assistant Professor, Faculty of Law, Maastricht University (The Netherlands); LLB, LLD, Universidad de Buenos Aires (Argentina); LLM, Paul M. Hebert Law Center, Louisiana State University (USA); PhD, Maastricht University. This Article was drafted on the occasion of the Louisiana Law Review ’s 2016 Symposium of the Civil Law held in Baton Rouge on March 18, 2016 to celebrate the life and work of Alain A. Levasseur. The Author is indebted to Georgia D. Chadwick and Vicenç F. Feliú for facilitating, in 2009, a copy of the 1832 manuscript inventory of Moreau-Lislet’s library. The title of this Article found inspiration in the study by Robert Feikema Karachuk, A Workman’s Tools: The Law Library of Henry Adams Bullard , 42 AM. J. LEGAL HIST. 160 (1998). 1. Agustín Parise, Report on the State of Louisiana to the Second Thematic Congress of the International Academy of Comparative Law , 31 MISS. C. L. REV. 397, 403 (2013). 2. Agustín Parise, Non-Pecuniary Damages in the Louisiana Civil Code Article 1928: Originality in the Early Nineteenth Century and Its Projected Use in Further Codification Endeavors 14 (May 18, 2006) (unpublished LL.M. thesis, Paul M. Hebert Law Center, Louisiana State University) (on file with the Louisiana State University Law Library). 1164 LOUISIANA LAW REVIEW [Vol. 76 law codification in Louisiana. 3 The Louisiana Constitution of 1868, however, returned to mandatory promulgation in the English language. 4 Spanish, another language that had significant presence in the founding years of Louisiana, 5 plays a significant role in fully understanding the current private law in Louisiana vis-à-vis the private law in Latin American jurisdictions. Scholars both of continental European and common law systems may look to Louisiana for civil law terminology in English. 6 Alain A. Levasseur is well aware of those two interesting features, as his work has reflected for a number of decades. Levasseur defends the civil law from his position at Louisiana State University, acting also as director of its Center for European Studies. He holds law degrees from Université de Paris and Tulane University, and honorary degrees from Université d’Aix-Marseille and Université de Paris Panthéon Assas . 7 Among his many works are the Louisiana Civil Code Précis Series , 8 where he showcases the unique composition of private law in Louisiana, and his Dictionary of the Civil Code , 9 where he excels in presenting civil law terminology in English. Levasseur was one of the members of the expert committee for the 2014 translation of the French Civil Code into English by David W. Gruning, a major step undertaken to showcase the civil law tradition among the English-language legal discourse. 10 Levasseur was also one of the translators of the Catala Avant- 3. See KATE WALLACH, RESEARCH IN LOUISIANA LAW 10 (2d ed. 1960) (citing LA. CONST. art. 132 (1845)). 4. LA. CONST. art. 109 (1868). 5. AGUSTÍN PARISE, HISTORIA DE LA CODIFICACIÓN CIVIL DEL ESTADO DE LUISIANA Y SU INFLUENCIA EN EL CÓDIGO CIVIL ARGENTINO 31–54 (2013). 6. Parise, supra note 1, at 403. 7. See Alain A. Levasseur: Biography , LSU LAW CENTER, http://www.law.lsu .edu/directory/profiles/alain-a-levasseur/ [https://perma.cc/J5FM-3MLW] (last visited Feb. 17, 2016). 8. For additional information on the Louisiana Civil Code Précis Series , see Susan Gualtier, Book Review, Louisiana Civil Code Précis Series , 5 J. CIV. L. STUD. 305 (2012), and Louisiana Civil Code Précis Series , RUSSELL LONG CHAIR & CCLS NEWSL. (Ctr. of Civil Law Studies, Baton Rouge, La.), June 2010, at 3, available at http://www.law.lsu.edu/ccls/newsletter/ [https://perma.cc/X74J-8WPG] (last visited Feb. 17, 2016). 9. For additional information on the Dictionary of the Civil Code , see Dictionary of the Civil Code , RUSSELL LONG CHAIR & CCLS NEWSL. (Ctr. of Civil Law Studies, Baton Rouge, La.), Dec. 2014, at 1, available at http://www.law .lsu.edu/ccls/newsletter/ [https://perma.cc/X74J-8WPG] (last visited Feb. 17, 2016). 10. See Legifrance Translations , LEGIFRANCE, http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr /Traductions/en-English/Legifrance-translations [https://perma.cc/46SV-DEEP] (last visited Dec. 1, 2015). 2016] TRANSLATOR’S TOOLBOX 1165 Projet of the French Law of Obligations and the French Law of Prescriptions , and in that context he correctly stated that civilian concepts such as solidarity and confusion should not be translated or interpreted with common law terminology because they could easily generate misunderstandings. 11 Clearly, the knowledge of the Louisiana civil law scholars is invaluable, 12 and other scholars should esteem the more than 200 year-old tradition of English language civil law codification in Louisiana. 13 Levasseur is the world-renowned expert on the life and work of an emblematic codifier of Louisiana law—Louis Casimir Elisabeth MoreauLislet. Levasseur masterfully reconstructed the biography of MoreauLislet, 14 the man behind the Digest of 1808 15 and the Civil Code of 1825. 16 Thanks to Levasseur and his work, Moreau-Lislet has gained for Louisiana a place on the podium together with other great American codifiers, such as Eduardo Acevedo, Andrés Bello, David Dudley Field, Dalmacio Vélez Sarsfield, and Augusto Teixeira de Freitas. Levasseur excelled on that research project as a legal historian, combining his private-law and comparative-law knowledge with the archival skills and meticulousness of a historian. 17 Knowing the work and life of the great American codifiers 11. Alain Levasseur & Vicenç Feliú, The English Fox in the Louisiana Civil Law Chausse-Trappe: Civil Law Concepts in the English Language; Comparativists Beware! , 69 LA. L. REV. 715, 735–39 (2009). 12. See generally id. 13. See generally Olivier Moréteau, Les frontières de la langue et du droit: vers une méthodologie de la traduction juridique , 61 REVUE INTERNATIONALE DE DROIT COMPARE 695 (2009) (Fr.). 14. See, e.g. , ALAIN A. LEVASSEUR, LOUIS CASIMIR ELISABETH MOREAULISLET: FOSTER FATHER OF LOUISIANA CIVIL LAW (1996) [hereinafter LEVASSEUR, MOREAU-LISLET: FOSTER FATHER OF LOUISIANA CIVIL LAW]. There is a new edition of that work, with the assistance of Vicenç Feliú. ALAIN A. LEVASSEUR, LOUIS MOREAU LISLET: THE MAN BEHIND THE DIGEST OF 1808 (2008). 15. For additional information on the Digest of 1808, see Agustín Parise, A Constant Give and Take: Tracing Legal Borrowings in the Louisiana Civil Law Experience , 35 SETON HALL LEGIS. J. 1, 6–14 (2010). 16. For additional information on the Louisiana Civil Code of 1825, see id. at 17–21. 17. The reconstruction of the life of Moreau-Lislet by Levasseur motivated the following statement: Levasseur’s research in original materials from such diverse sources as the French National Archives, the New Orleans Notarial Archives, and even the parish records of Dondon, Haiti, where Moreau Lislet was born, has resulted in a collection of facsimile materials spanning and 1166 LOUISIANA LAW REVIEW [Vol. 76 might assist in better understanding and appreciating the seminal corpora they bequeathed. 18 This Article scrutinizes the works included in Moreau-Lislet’s library and identifies a number of dictionaries that may have served the Louisiana codifier to elaborate his seminal digest, codes, and translations. Previous studies have already highlighted the comparative richness of law libraries and their holdings in nineteenth-century Louisiana. 19 The legal production of Moreau-Lislet—similar to that of Levasseur—crossed languages and jurisdictions and required command of the English, French, and Spanish laws and languages, among others. This Article also aims to illustrate that nineteenth-century Louisiana jurists developed libraries that served as translators’ toolboxes when dealing with a multiplicity of foreign texts. Part I of this Article will address the life and work of Moreau-Lislet, devoting special attention to the translations of the Siete Partidas that Moreau-Lislet and Henry Carleton undertook in 1818 and 1820. Part II will expound on the contents of the Louisiana codifier’s library, focusing on a number of dictionaries and reference works that may have assisted in the daily activities of Moreau-Lislet . This expounding is relevant today, because scholars are continuing to develop translators’ toolboxes in Louisiana—Levasseur himself has developed a toolbox that one can find in his office and in the stacks of the Louisiana State University Law Library. One can grasp changes in legal order by looking at the law books that comprise the libraries of actors behind those changes, because books have always been fundamental tools of the legal profession. 20 Books help jurists find answers to legal questions, to identify useful and needed citations, 21 and to ultimately erect their argumentative designs. documenting the life of Moreau Lislet which is presently held in the Rare Book...