1789 · Charters, declarations and treaties
Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen
France
A revolutionary statement that all people are born free and equal in rights, and that law is the expression of the general will.
Why it matters
It is a founding text of modern human-rights law, and it is still part of the French constitutional order.
Built on
Went on to shape
1804
French Civil Code (Napoleonic Code)
France
built on the equality and property rights of the Revolution
1812
Constitution of Cádiz
Spain
drew on the ideas of 1789 and on the French constitution of 1791
1831
Constitution of Belgium
Belgium
built on the rights and principles of 1789, with English parliamentary practice
1948
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
United Nations
echoes its language of equality and dignity
1958
Constitution of the French Fifth Republic
France
its preamble still adopts the rights of 1789
Counting texts that borrowed from the texts that borrowed from this one, 45 later texts on this timeline trace back to it.
Countries in the Legal Families Atlas
TheLawToKnow Tools’s timeline lists links of influence only where the borrowing is widely documented. Historians sometimes disagree about how much one text shaped another. It is an educational overview, not legal advice.
