A study on the history of Civil Law and the Civil Law in Turkey (1923-1927)

The Law in the Ottoman Empire consisted of two parts. Sharia law, sources from the area of religion and customary law, sources from customary units. Ottoman Civil Law developed by sourcing from the religion in this context, too and was performed until 20th century.In order to modernizate the civil law, Mecelle law which sources from jurisprudence was prepared to adapt the changing world conditions and to compensate the new requirements in 1850's. However, because of being defeated heavily in World War I, the Ottoman Empire was about to collapse politically as well as in the legal aspects. Because Mecelle couldn't compensate the needs of the Ottoman nation, consisted of different religions. A new, different state was founded on the base of values after winning the National Struggle and the understanding of the political change bagen to reflect in society and in law in this state. In order to prepare a civil core which is different from the old one, secular , modern, based on the European systematic commissions were established. As a result of the commissions works, the Swiss Civil Code was translated with some modifications was accepted by the Parliament and adopted as the new Turkish Civil Code.After the new Turkish Civil Code was accepted, naturally, faced with some challenges and criticism. Because a religious based mind society was faced to a secular based mind laws. Keywords: Law , the Turkish Civil Law, Civil Law Commissions , secularism, Ataturk's reforms