Abstract:
The purpose of this research is to make a detailed study of the Thai legal reform from A.D. 1868 to 1935 when Thailand completed a set of legal codes and abolished the extraterritoriality and the fiscal limitation in the country. The thesis is divided into 6 chapters excluding the introduction and the conclusion. The introductory chapter is a survey of the problems, the aim, the scope and the research methods of this thesis. The first gives a brief description of the general background of the ancient Thai law in each period in order to provide the reader with the basic knowledge of this topic. The second chapter presents Thai laws and courts of justice when Thailand signed the unequal treaties with the Western nations. The third chapter is concerned with the legal reform in the reign of King Rama V or Chulalongkom. The ancient Thai law which was based on the Indian law was changed and substituted by the modem Thai law based on the Roman law and the English Common law. The Penal Code of 1908 is the first evidence of this reform. The establishment of the Law School is also dealt with. Chapter IV, related to chapter III, describes the continua¬tion of the code drafting which resulted in the proclamation of the Civil and Commercial Code, the Criminal and Civil Procedure Codes and the law on the Organization of the Courts. Chapter V concerns the changes which arose out of the admi-nistration of the code and the Thai lawyer's status. The sixth chapter deals with the acheivements, the obstacles and the eminent Thai and foreign jurists and judges who rendered a valuable service in effecting these changes. The conclusion summarises the legal reform from the beginning until 1935 and gives the writer's point of view on the laws which have been put on the statute book.