What you're talking about is a feature of common-law. I'm talking about civil law or codified jurisdictions. The ancestor comment confused the US for being a (

What you're talking about is a feature of common-law. I'm talking about civil law or codified jurisdictions. The ancestor comment confused the US for being a (mostly) codified system, which is why I quoted that, but it was really about describing civil law as being "precise and consistent". In hindsight I see that it's confusing...