Page 314 - Latent Defect or Excessive Price?Exploring Early Modern Legal Approach to Remedying Defects in Goods Exchanged for Money - Bruijn

SEVENTEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURY NATURAL LAW
should not scour the civil law for contrived arguments, since seeing that one who is said to take with him the thing, can also restore the same, D. 19.2.6. In civil law this is understood to be so by reasoning that he held it for as long as he made use of it'.144
According to Schilter, first, the means by which the plaintiff's wish is realised are not important. It does not matter which remedy the plaintiff brings wishing to lower his rent. The judge will translate his petitum into a substantive claim for reimbursing the price or rent by the other party. Secondly, in Schilter's view the contrived arguments thought out in the ius commune tradition disregard that in civil law it is not about technicalities, but about giving each person his due (suum cuique tribuere).145 If that is possible by extending a Roman law remedy originally limited to a specific contract that is what should be done.
Nevertheless, despite scholars such as Althusius, Meier and Schilter, traditional Bartolist theory remained having a strong footing in the writings of their contemporaries. Following Doneau, who had uncritically restated medieval communis opinio which regarded the lack of transfer of ownership as the underlying reason behind D. 21.1.63 excluding extension146, Samuel von Cocceji repeats almost verbatim this doctrine formulated hundreds of years before:
'After all, the essentials differ and that is what up to this time the rules depend on. Because in sales an eternal right is transferred but in lease only a temporary and brief use of the thing, it follows there is a slight prejudice. From that difference originates the right to rescind which does not occur in things of minor worth. If something was promised or the lessor had acted with fraud, one can sue the lessor to have him return the thing with the remedy on the lease contract, D. 19.1.2'.147
Apparently, only in the event of a warranty given or fraud could the lessor be held accountable for defects in the thing he leased out.
Most usus modernus-scholars adhere to this view. Benedict Carpzov (1595-1666)148, Johann Strauch (1614-1679)149, Lauterbach, Stryk, Titius and Heinrich Hahn (1605-1668)150 all oppose an extension of the aedilician remedies to lease. First, because the lessor does
144 Schilter, Praxis iuris romani, to D. 21.1, § XII, p. 312: ...quum etiam iure Romano instituta actione etsi non redhibitoria officio iudicis contineatur, ut pretium quandoque reddita re, recipiatur, multo magis mera officii iudicis imploratione id continebitur. Neque obest, quod Carpzovius decis. 222, 22, tradit, propterea non habere locum redhibitionem in locatione, quia rem non possit restituere conductor, quum eam non haberet, sed eius tantum usum. Neque enim ius civile cavillandum est, ut namque quis dicitur rem conducere, ita etiam eandem restituere l. 6, π, loc. cond. quod intelligitur civiliter ea ratione, qua tenuit, quoad usum'..
145 Cf. Pufendorf, De iure naturae, 2.3, p. 164: 'Justus inter homines habetur, cui cordi est neminem laedere, suum cuique tribuere'; Wolff, Ius naturae, vol. 1, § 922, p. 605.
146 See 4.2.2.
147 Samuel von Cocceji, Ius controversum, ad tit. 21.1, q. ii, resp.: 'Essentia tamen differunt, adeoque
hactenus et quae inde pendent regulis. Cum igitur emtione ius perpetuum transferatur, locatione vero tantum temporarius et momentarius rei usus, adeoque leve inde praejudicium, ab hac ipsa differentia oritur ius illud rescindens, quod non competit in rebus parvi momenti, si quid tamen promissum sit, vel culpa locatoris appareat, ex conducti agi potest ad redhibitionem, l. 2, de Act. emt.'.
148 For biographical data see E. Döhring, 'Carpzov, Benedict', in: NDB 3 (1957), p. 156.
149 For biographical data see A. von Eisenhart, 'Strauch, Johann, in: ADB 36 (1893), pp. 528-531.
150 CERL <thesaurus.cerl.org>
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