Concept of Maritime Law

Admiralty law or maritime law is a distinct body of law that governs maritime questions and offenses. It is a body of both domestic law governing maritime activities, and private international law governing the relationships between private entities that operate vessels on the oceans. It deals with matters including marine commerce, marine navigation, marine salvaging, shipping, sailors, and the transportation of passengers and goods by sea. Admiralty law also covers many commercial activities, although land based or occurring wholly on land, that are maritime in character.

Admiralty law is distinguished from the Law of the Sea, which is a body of public international law dealing with navigational rights, mineral rights, jurisdiction over coastal waters and international law governing relationships between nations.

Although each legal jurisdiction usually has its own enacted legislation governing maritime matters, admiralty law is characterized by a significant amount of international law developed in recent decades, including numerous multilateral treaties.

Gilmore and Black, in their the Law of Admiralty, define maritime law as ‘’A corpus of rules, concepts and legal practices governing certain centrally important concerns of the business of carrying goods and passengers by water’’. On the other hand, William Tetley’s Glossary of Maritime Terms describes maritime law as ‘’a complete system of law, public and private, substantive and procedural, national and international’’. The famous legal dictionary – Black’s Law Dictionary, in its part, defines maritime law as ‘’the body of law governing marine commerce and navigation, the carriage at of persons and property, and marine affairs in general; the rules governing contract, tort and workers’ compensation claims or relating to commerce on or over water’’.

The definitions given above, though comprehensive, are not necessarily inclusive of all matters dealt under this specific area of law. While Tetley’s definition emphasizes how broad maritime law can be, the two other definitions concentrate on the central aspects of the law. A rather simpler but broad definition of maritime law would be: the branch of jurisprudence that governs ships and shipping. As the law of ships, it regulates the nationality, ownership and registration of vessels. As the law of shipping, it governs the relationship between private entities which operate vessels on the oceans. In other words, it governs maritime questions such as sea carriage, contract of affreightment, marine insurance, maritime lien and the like.  It is distinguished from another etymologically identical area of law –the law of the sea. The law of the sea is a branch of public international law which aims to regulate the relationship between states in respect of those areas of the sea and seabed subject to coastal state jurisdiction and beyond. Whereas, maritime law/admiralty law is  a body of private law that govern the legal relationships arising from the transportation of passengers and cargoes on the high seas and other navigable waters. The principal parties affected by maritime law are the crew, the ship-owner, the cargo owner, the charterer and the marine insurer. Generally, maritime law could be understood as a body of domestic law governing the relationships between parties engaged in maritime commerce.

In most jurisdictions, maritime law applies to seawater only. Shipping activities in interior waterways are usually governed by a separate set of rules. There are, however, some countries that extend the scope of their maritime law to shipping activities in interior water bodies. In Scandinavian countries, for example, maritime law applies to shipping activities in all water bodies, including lakes, rivers, and canals.

The scope of application of our Maritime Code is, like in most of the shipping nations, limited to shipping activities on seawaters only. These could be inferred from the general framework of the Code, particularly the preface. In the Preface to the 1960 Maritime Code of Ethiopia, it is stated that the codification of the Code was felt imperative with the return of Ethiopia’s ancient sea coast on the Red Sea and the subsequent expansion of Ethiopia’s maritime power.

The definition given to “ships” is also of some help in determining the scope of our Maritime Code. For the purpose of this Code, provides Art. 1, “a ship is …any seagoing vessel…” This definition is not inclusive of any other watercraft used as a means of transportation in any other water body. Thus, our Maritime Code is not the pertinent legislation that governs shipping activities of non-seagoing vessels.

Legislative provisions, other than that of the Maritime Code, are also indicative of this fact. For example, Art.563 of the Commercial Code excludes carriage of goods/persons in inland waterways from the ambit of carriage by sea, which is the concern of the Maritime Code (See Art. 565 of Com. Code).