France classified African customs in order to reshape them toward French natural-law principles
Evidence
- Besides regulating the technical administration of the new courts, these instructions explained, albeit generally, how customary law was to be applied in conformity with the dictates of French civilization. The native courts were to refer to custom primarily in civil disputes involving marriage, contracts, questions of descent, and inheritance. Administrators were to make a point of rationally classifying these customs and endowing them “with a clarity they too often lack”; this classification was the first step toward modifying African customs according “to the fundamental principles of natural law, the original source of all legislation.” In the civil realm, in other words, Roume was the voice of moderation; the emphasis was less on abrupt change than on gradual and informed intervention. The one exception was slavery, which could no longer be recognized. — Alice L. Conklin, A Mission to Civilize_ The Republican…, 315
Categorization
- DEFINE: Explains the method of ‘gradual and informed intervention’ — rational classification of customs as the first step toward modifying them toward French natural law.
- ADDENDUM: Parallels the grafting metaphor from ‘Grafting & Growth’: classification as grafting metropolitan principles onto native custom.