1.2 Comparison between Procedural and Substantive Law

Point Substantive Procedural Function Defines rights, duties, offences Enforces them through process Question answered What is owed? What is punishable? How is it claimed, tried, executed? Point Substantive Procedural Source examples Criminal Code 2074; Civil Code's contract/family parts Criminal Procedure Code 2074; Civil Procedure Code 2074; Evidence Act 2031 Effect of change Alters rights retroactively-prospectively (the non-retroactivity debates) Generally applies to pending proceedings (the no-vested-right-in-procedure doctrine) Analogy The play's script The theatre's stagecraft The boundary's hard cases (the classification disputes): limitation (procedural by classification, substantive in effect — a right-destroying procedure); evidence rules' substantive edges (burden-of-proof presumptions); the courts' retroactivity discipline for procedural amendments.