Background. At both the federal and state levels, the law of the United States was mainly derived from the common law system of English law, which was in force at the time of the Revolutionary War. However, U.S. law has diverged greatly from its English ancestor both in terms of substance and procedure.
Case law is the body of prior decisions and precedents that have accumulated over time. Statutory law is made up of statutes, which are formal written laws/codes made by legislators.
Actual cause is the real cause of an event (i.e accident) while proximate cause is the reason that the law sees as the cause of the injury from the accident.
