American Revolution and Criminal Justice

The American Revolution greatly shaped the criminal justice system in what would become the United States. The criminal justice systems in place before this time had been imported from Europe. Each of the thirteen colonies, an independent entity with a separate charter from the monarch, had its own criminal justice system, traditions, and set of laws and precedents. While influences of the criminal justice systems of France, the Netherlands, and Spain could be found in the North American colonies, certainly the English common law system was the ...