Company Law

The modern registered company may fairly be described as one of humankind's greatest inventions. Indeed, the Economist of 18 December 1926 said: "The economic historian of the future may assign to the nameless inventor of the principle of limited liability, as applied to trading corporations, a place of honour with Watt and Stephenson, and other pioneers of the Industrial Revolution." As a vehicle for commence and a source of wealth, the company is both ubiquitous and unrivalled, being a more significant factor in the lives of most people than any other institution, including the state and arguably the charge. Although the modern company owes its immediate creation to the legislature, the nature of the corporate form and the content of company law has historically been a joint venture between parliament and the courts. It is thus the case that the decision of the House of Loads in Solomon v A Solomon & Co Ltd is more often cited as the foundation of modern company law than are the Joint Stock Companies Act 1844 (UK), the Limited Liability Act 1855 (UK), or, in New Zealand, the Joint Stock Companies Act 1860