Comparative Law and the influences of Bryan Garner and Guido Fernando Silva Soares on my legal investigations – what I’ve been teaching my AI assistants since Apple’s Intelligence first Beta release.

When I first read Bryan Garner’s Legal Writing in Plain English more than 25 years ago, I knew immediately that my style would be based on his groundbreaking approach.

The book, along with Guido Fernando Silva Soares’ Common Law - Introduction to the US Legal System, is at the core of my values (and at my ChatGPT Assistants and their deep system integration with Apple’s Intelligence, which I’ve been testing since its very first Beta release).

Avoiding legalese while keeping the necessary professional formality of legal writing is the balance I’ve been searching for my whole law career, and now I’ve been repeating several prompts, instructions, and procedures over and over to make my AI assistants do the heavy lifting work so I can improve consistently my investigations.

Legal comparison is a vital tool for analyzing and applying concepts across legal systems. It focuses on two main approaches: historical evolution within a single system and contemporary comparisons of distinct systems. Beyond theoretical insights, it equips practitioners to adapt foreign legal concepts to local contexts. However, linguistic and cultural differences pose significant challenges, with the necessary careful translation and interpretation.

According to the late Professor Guido F. S. Soares, Legal Comparison is a fascinating and rewarding field within the broader discipline of legal science, focusing on comparing legal systems. This comparison can take place from two broad perspectives based on the national legal system in force at the time of analysis:

Successiveness in Time: This involves comparing two systems over time, assuming the earlier legal framework has fully developed and serves as the foundation for the later system. Examples include studies of Roman law or the Portuguese legal system before Brazilian independence compared to Brazil’s modern legal framework.

Concomitance of Systems: This approach compares two coexisting legal systems in different countries during the same historical period.

The first perspective, rooted in legal history, emphasizes the evolution of a legal system through different stages. The second, on the other hand, focuses on scientifically analyzing distinct systems to uncover their similarities and differences.

Beyond advancing scholarly understanding of various legal systems and families, legal comparison offers practical benefits. It aids legal professionals in adapting foreign legal concepts to a given legal system, ensuring justice is not denied—a critical principle in any democratic regime.

Comparative law operates as a scientific discipline, identifying common principles across legal systems. By transcending normative boundaries, it aims to develop a general theory of legal comparativism—comparable to a universal grammar for legal languages. This science goes deep into the unique features of individual legal systems and compares them to highlight shared values.

Legal norms are deeply tied to the language and culture of the societies that create them. While legal science can be expressed in any language, it must account for linguistic and cultural differences, particularly when the same language applies to distinct legal systems (e.g., Portuguese in Brazil and Portugal). Comparative law faces two main translation challenges:

Translation-Explanation: Providing a straightforward translation of technical terms to ensure accessibility.

Translation-Equivalence: Identifying corresponding meanings between legal concepts across systems.

For instance, Brazilian judges may need to recognize the effects of a private trust agreement governed by English law, even though the Brazilian legal framework does not allow property restrictions beyond those strictly defined by law (e.g., usufruct or servitudes). Comparative law demonstrates that the trust, originally developed in English Equity to protect vulnerable individuals, can be adapted even in systems lacking an equivalent legal provision.

When I translate Sociedade Anônima do Futebol - SAF as Soccer Corporation, the idea is to bring as easy as possible, the translations equivalence and explanation at the same time (since my main target audiences are Brazil and The US).

Despite linguistic and cultural barriers, legal comparison remains essential for understanding and applying foreign legal concepts. Its rigorous methodology bridges systemic and cultural differences, enabling justice to be fairly applied across legal systems.