History
The history of legal education in Cluj partly coincides with the history of the University of Cluj. Thus, the Transylvanian prince Stephen Báthory (1571 – 1575), later king of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (1575 – 1586), issued on May 12, 1581 in Vilnius, the founding diploma of Vilnius, by which the Jesuit Major College of Cluj (Academia Claudiopolitana Societatis Jesu) was established. Later, the founding act was confirmed by Pope Gregory XIII on February 9, 1582.
In the spirit of the times, Law could not be missing from the founding faculties of the University of Cluj: theology, philosophy and law. Higher education was conducted in Latin. Under the leadership of Antonio Possevino (diplomat, historian and trusted man of the Pope), the teaching staff of the three faculties was made up of 35 Jesuit monks, and in 1585, a total of 130 students were enrolled in Cluj, at all three faculties.
Temporarily, in 1603, with the cessation of the activity of the first Jesuit Order on the territory of Transylvania, the activity of the University of Cluj and its Faculty of Law was interrupted.
Later historical references show that in 1698 there was the Academia Claudiopolitana (which became, in 1725, Universitas Claudiopolitana). Within the Habsburg Empire and following the decision of Empress Maria Theresa, in the second half of the 18th century the University of Cluj was reactivated, this time with the help of the Piarist monastic order. Organized after the model of the University of Vienna, the new educational institution was made up of four faculties: legal sciences, philology, theology and medicine-surgery. Courses began on December 15, 1774 and from this moment we are talking about a Faculty of Law with university rank where natural law and the Institutes were taught (two hours per day), universal public law and gentile law (one hour per day), respectively, for both Law and Theology students, canon law.
As a result of the reforms of Emperor Joseph II, Latin was replaced in 1781 by German as the language of instruction, the Faculty acquired the legal status of a royal high school (lyceum regium), and the curriculum of the Faculty of Law was supplemented with courses in economic sciences and mining law.
At the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, the Transylvanian School, through Ioan Budai-Deleanu, showed interest in the legal system, which he presented in works such as the Rândueala judecătorească de obște (Vienna, 1787); Carte de pravilă ce cuprinde legile asupra faptelor rele ele (Cernăuți, 1807); Codul penal (Lvov, 1807); Codul civil (Lvov, 1812). In 1826, a professor of Romanian nationality who taught at the Department of Legal Sciences of the Piarist High School in Cluj between 1817 and 1824, Ladislau (Vasile) Vaida, published Synopsis historiae juris Transilvaniae (A Outline of the History of Transylvanian Law).
Among the ideas of the Revolution of 1848 was the need to establish, in Cluj, a Romanian Faculty of Philosophy and Law. Not by chance, because Romanian intellectuals such as Alexandru Pop (Papiu Ilarian), Petru Roșca, Ioan Rațiu, the Hodoș brothers, Vasile and Ladislau Buteanu, Ioan Axentie and, especially, Avram Iancu studied law in Cluj and founded, in 1845, an academic association led by the Cluj jurist Alexandru Bohățiel.
Documents from the time show that on August 25, 1863, the Cluj Law Academy was established as an institution of higher legal education. Legal courses initially lasted three, and then four years, and the language of instruction was Hungarian. In those days and after the formation of Austria-Hungary, the Encyclopedia of Law and State Sciences, Roman Law, Hungarian Criminal Law and Criminal Procedure, Austrian Civil Law, Canon Law or Commercial Law were taught here. In 1872, the Academy was integrated into the structure of the new Franz Joseph University, becoming the Faculty of Law and State Sciences. It had 12 departments, and 173 young people began their legal training. The first rector was elected from among the professors of the Faculty, in the person of Áron Berde, a lecturer at the Department of Finance and National Economy. The construction of the current central headquarters of the University, which also housed the Faculty of Law, was completed in 1902, and that of the Central University Library in 1909 (the latter was built after the model of the University Library in Basel by Budapest architects Korb Flóris and Giergl Kálman).
In those days, students of the Faculty of Law in Cluj completed their studies with two basic exams: the first in History of Law and Roman Law, and the second in Philosophy of Law, Public Law and Economics. A doctorate in Legal Sciences, without which employment in the judicial system was not possible, required significantly more, namely passing the exams in Philosophy of Law and International Law, Roman Law, Church Law, Hungarian Public Law, Austrian Civil Law, Criminal Law and Criminal Procedure, Commercial and Exchange Law and Hungarian Civil Jurisprudence, respectively.
The professors of the Faculty of Law also came to Cluj from other Academies of Law: Bratislava, Sibiu, Oradea, Košice. Among those who taught here, Professor Kolosvári Sandor, professor of private law until 1910, co-author of the Corpus Statutorum Hungariae Municipalium (collection of statutes of municipalities in Hungary between the 16th and 18th centuries) and translator of Werböczy’s Tripartite together with Kelemen Óvari, or Professor Ferenc Finkey, whose works laid the foundations of criminal law and the law regarding the execution of punishment in Transylvania, stood out.
Starting with 1919, after the unification of Transylvania with Romania, the “Franz Josef” University becomes the University of Cluj (University of Dacia Superiore), and the Faculty of Law is organized within it. The transition to teaching in Romanian is not easy, however, because the university and its faculties lacked professors who could teach in Romanian. However, in the first year after the creation of the University of Dacia Superiore, 909 students enroll in the Faculty.
Among the first teaching staff of the Faculty of Law of the University of Dacia Superiore, there were renowned personalities in the field of law, such as: Professor Victor Onişor, author of the first complete administrative law textbook in the country; Professor Traian Pop, a criminalist and criminologist with extensive activity in the two fields; Professor Romulus Boilă, a specialist in constitutional law; Ion Cătuneanu, professor of Romanian law and doctoral student of Theodor Mommsen in Berlin; Vasile Dimitriu, professor of commercial law and the first elected rector of the University of Cluj; Camil Negrea, professor of local civil law and also rector of the university; Emil Haţieganu, professor of commercial law and civil procedure, former honorary member of the Romanian Academy; George N. Leon, professor of finance and statistics, twice awarded by the Romanian Academy.
For example, in the academic year 1927 – 1928 the course program and professors of the Faculty of Law, for the four years of study, were as follows:
First Year: Philosophy of Law (Cassiu Maniu), Church Law (Petre Poruțiu), Roman Law (Ion C. Cătuneanu), History of Romanian Law (Victor Onișor)
Second Year: Constitutional Law (Romul Boilă), Criminal Law (Traian Pop), Political Economy (Dumitru B. Ionescu), Finance (George N. Leon), Romanian Civil Law (Iorgu Radu)
Third Year: Local Civil Law (Camil Negrea), Administrative and Financial Law (Victor Onișor), Criminal Procedure (Traian Pop), International Law (Iorgu Radu), Local Commercial Law (Petre Poruțiu), Romanian Commercial Law (Emil Hațieganu)
Fourth Year: Politics (Cassiu Maniu), Civil Procedure (Emil Hațieganu), Local Civil Law (Camil Negrea), Statistics (George N. Leon), Social Policy (Niculae Ghiulea), Industrial Legislation (Niculae Ghiulea).
The professors of the Faculty of Law in Cluj (part of the University of Dacia Superior and then of the “King Ferdinand I” University) also stood out, at the time, through their works. In the early 1920s, professor Traian Pop excelled with a veritable treatise on Comparative Criminal Law. Penology and Penitentiary Science, at a time when the dawn of legal comparability was just beginning in Western Europe. Professor Cătuneanu published An Elementary Course in Roman Law, Victor Onișor The History of Romanian Law, and George N. Leon Elements of Financial Science. Camil Negrea wrote Civil Law Valid in Transylvania, Banat, Crișana and Maramureș, and Romul Boilă (along with Paul Negulescu and George Alexianu) the Administrative Code of Romania.
Probably the intense scientific activity, the presence in the great law faculties in Europe or the successful completion of doctorates in the West also attracted the presence of eminent personalities in Cluj. In the spring of 1925, the dean of the Law Faculty of Bordeaux and one of those who founded the Revue Internationale de la Theorie du Droit, Léon Duguit, visited the Faculty, dined at the restaurant of the New York Hotel (later the Continental Hotel) and lectured at the University Library.
It was the turn of Henri Capitant, from the Faculty of Law in Paris, to visit the Faculty in May 1929 and give a lecture on the “Draft of the Inter-Allied Code of Obligations and Contracts”. He was followed, in May 1930, by Professor Georges Ripert, also from the Faculty of Law in Paris, who gave two lectures at the University Library: “Le romantisme juridique” and “L’art de ne pas payer ses dettes”.
Also in 1930, at the proposal of the Faculty of Law, the University awarded the title of Doctor Honoris Causa to Auguste-Félix-Charles de Beaupoil, count of Saint-Aulaire. Having arrived as ambassador to Romania in the tumultuous summer of 1916, when Romania entered World War I, the count ambassador published “Notes of a Former Diplomat. In Romania, 1916–1920”, an excellent analysis of the profound transformations that were taking place before his eyes.
Based on the Royal Decree of Carol II of August 20, 1934, the Academy of Law in Oradea merged with the one in Cluj, and the departments were reorganized. The teaching staff was then completed with valuable teaching staff, among whom the following stood out: Professor Aurelian Ionaşcu, a prolific author in the field of civil law; Professor Eugeniu Speranţia, author of reference works in the history of legal philosophy, sociology and legal logic; Professor George Sofronie, author of important works on public international law; Professor Victor Cădere, who was elected corresponding member of the French Institute. The Institute of Economic and Financial Sciences was founded in 1935, Professor Traian Pop made a decisive contribution to the drafting of the 1936 Criminal Code, Gheorghe Sofronie published a Course on International Law, and the Annals of the Faculty of Law in Cluj were published at the Faculty. Between 1930 and 1940, Cluj was visited by the rector of the University of Paris, Sébastien Charléty, the dean of the Faculty of Law in Paris, Edgar Allix, and Emilio Albertario, the holder of the chair of Roman Law at the University of Rome.
During the interwar period, other notable personalities who published books and articles in France, Germany, Italy and other European countries became professors at the University of Cluj, becoming known and appreciated in the international academic environment. It was also at that time that Professor Tudor Drăganu began to work at the departments of constitutional and administrative law, becoming one of the most renowned authors in these fields, being elected, after the war, president or vice-president of several international organizations.
An extremely important event took place on May 13, 1939, when the dean of the Faculty of Law in Paris, Georges Ripert, received the title of Doctor Honoris Causa from the University of Cluj. Professor Ripert concluded his acceptance speech as follows: “My second homeland is Great Romania.”
In the summer of 1940, following the Vienna Dictate, the Faculty of Law, together with the Faculties of Letters and Philosophy, and Medicine, respectively, moved to Sibiu.
After the reintegration of Northern Transylvania into Romania, the university returned to Cluj, starting with the academic year 1945 – 1946. For a period of time, two faculties of law operated in Cluj, within the two universities: “Victor Babeș”, with teaching in Romanian, and “Janos Bolyai”, with teaching in Hungarian. The two universities, respectively the two faculties of law, merged in 1959.
Throughout the post-war period, prestigious teaching staff continued the tradition of the Cluj law school, teaching, alongside the traditional disciplines, a series of new disciplines, publishing numerous courses, treatises, monographs, and studies. The history of the Faculty cannot be missing names such as those of Tudor Drăganu (professor of Administrative Law, member of the International Institute of Administrative Sciences), Vladimir Hanga (professor of Romanian Law, expert of the United Nations Organization for Civil and Political Rights or member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague), Ioan Zinveliu, Marțian Niciu, Dumitru Firoiu, Gheorghe Boboș, Virgil Câmpianu, Ioan Gliga (author of the first complete financial law textbook that was used at all law schools in Romania) or Ilie Iovănaș.
After 1989, in the context of the profound political and social transformations that Romania was going through, major changes also took place in the Faculty of Law. The number of students increased spectacularly and new valuable teaching staff were hired. The university curricula were restructured, renewing and diversifying the offer of courses, their content, as well as the teaching-learning methods. New university programs were initiated, namely the Community Law section, at the undergraduate level, as well as three master’s programs. The multicultural profile of the faculty was developed, increasing the number of students belonging to different ethnic groups in Romania, offering courses in international languages, as well as in Hungarian. Benefiting from the wide international openness of the “Babeș-Bolyai” University, the Faculty of Law expanded its collaborative relations with European and American universities, within the framework of programs funded by the European Union, the World Bank and other institutions. There is an important network of partnerships within the Erasmus programmes for students, teachers and administrative staff.
Professor Ion Deleanu, an encyclopedic personality with extraordinary contributions in constitutional law and civil procedural law, contributed to the drafting of the Romanian Constitution (1991) and was a judge of the Constitutional Court of Romania. Several graduates of the Faculty of Law in Cluj, including professors Mircea Ștefan Minea and, more recently, Dacian Cosmin Dragoș, were appointed judges of the same Court, and others occupied important positions in the Romanian legal system. Professor Florin Streteanu (current president of the Senate of Babeș-Bolyai University in Cluj-Napoca, ad hoc member of the European Court of Human Rights) contributed with his expertise to the writing of the New Penal Code of Romania, and other members of the academic body, capitalized on their comparative experience in the Commission for the drafting of the New Civil Code (Dan Chirică, Paul Vasilescu, Mircea Bob-Bocșan), respectively of the Code of Administrative Procedure (Ovidiu Podaru). The members of the academic body actively participate in national and international scientific life, are part of prestigious associations, are members of international doctoral committees, are rapporteurs for Romania in various professional associations, lead research institutes in the field of comparative law. In this context, we cannot forget strong personalities such as Dean Liviu Pop, professor of civil law and corresponding member of the Romanian Academy, a manager who contributed to “placing” the Faculty of Law on a path of academic normality in the 1990s and a lively presence in academic life at this time as well.
Against the backdrop of collaborative relations and academic friendship, after 1990 several personalities from the legal world received, at the proposal of the Faculty of Law in Cluj, the title of Doctor Honoris Causa of the Babeș-Bolyai University in Cluj-Napoca. First, in 1996, the Spanish jurist Gil Carlos Rodríguez Iglesias (judge at the Court of Justice of the European Communities from 1986 to 2003 and president of the CJEC) and, in 1998, the French professor Jean Morange (University of Paris 2 Pantheón Assas, University of Limoges).
They were followed by Romanian-born professor Vlad Constantinesco (International Faculty of Comparative Law, Strasbourg) in 2001, and Erdö Péter (former rector of Pázmány Péter University and primate of Hungary) in 2002.
Professor Michel Grimaldi of the University of Paris 2 Pantheón Assas was awarded the title of Doctor Honoris Causa in 2007. The President of the Venice Commission, Gianni Buquicchio, received this distinction in 2015, as did the President of the European Court of Human Rights, Dean Spielmann. Ms. Sándor Erzsébet Szalayné, former Ombudsman and a constant supporter of the Hungarian language study line at the Faculty of Law, became Professor Honoris Causa in 2015.
A review of those who have obtained this prestigious distinction, Doctor Honoris Causa, starting in 1873, allows us to mention Berde Aron (professor, first rector of the Hungarian University of Cluj), Csemegi Károly (jurist, author of the Hungarian Penal Code of 1878), Henry Wickham Steed (British historian and journalist), Amir Abbas Hoveyda (Prime Minister of Iran) or Riccardo del Giudice (politician and professor at the University of Rome).
The faculty was visited, in 2019, in the context of the Cluj Tax Forum conferences, also by the eminent professor Adriano di Pietro, professor of tax law at the Faculty of Law of Alma Mater Studiorum – Universitá di Bologna and director of the Institute for Advanced Fiscal Studies at the same institution, who lectured in the Aula Magna.
Studia Universitatis Babeș-Bolyai Magazine. Iurisprudentia continues the publishing tradition of the Annals of the Faculty of Law in Cluj, and newer journals such as Caiete de Drept Penal and Cluj Tax Forum Journal offer publishing opportunities in niche areas for researchers and practitioners of law.
The Faculty of Law operated, between 1996 and 2025, in the premises on Str. Avram Iancu, no. 11. We are talking about a building built in 1909 – 1910, on the site of the Turda Gate Tower, which was the first student dormitory of the “Franz Josef” University.
After 80 years since its expulsion from the University building, under the “wand” of Rector Daniel David, President of the Senate of Babeș-Bolyai University Florin Streteanu and Dean Șerban Diaconescu, in 2025 the Faculty of Law found peace in a new home: the Faculty’s headquarters on Str. Traian Moșoiu, no. 10-12. Starting from the academic year 2025 – 2026, any trace of temporary nature disappears, and the students and professors of the Faculty benefit from adequate spaces for modern legal education.
It is the peace that the Faculty needs in a period marked by challenges of all kinds. Both the Faculty of Law in Cluj and legal education are in a moment of recalibration according to societal developments with an impact on legal studies, the transformation of the economy into one with a pronounced digital component, or the pressure of technology on the educational process as a whole.
Academically, the Faculty of Law in Cluj is undoubtedly one of the most highly regarded law faculties in Romania, with meritorious results of its students and graduates (for example, when it comes to admission to the legal professions or to internal and international competitions), respectively with a professional academic body.
For example, in recent years, over 20% of all candidates admitted to the National Institute of Magistracy come from among the students of our Faculty, and a good part of the notaries and lawyers in Transylvania are graduates of the Faculty of Law in Cluj.
Final note: For more details, we invite you to consult the work: Alexandru-Bogdan Bud, Pages from the history of legal education in Cluj, Ed. Hamangiu – MEGA, Bucharest – Cluj-Napoca, 2017