no appeal, save upon a point of
form, and appeal lies solely to the court of cassation at Rome. From
the penal tribunals appeal lies, in cases not dealt with by the assize
courts, to the twenty courts of appeal.

[Footnote 560: Prior to 1901 the administrative and
electoral _mandamenti_ and the _mandamenti
giudiziarii_ were identical geographically, and
there were 1,805 of them in the kingdom. By a law
of the year mentioned the judicial _mandamenti_
were reduced in number to 1,535.]

At the top of the system stand five largely independent courts of
cassation, located at the old capitals of Turin, Florence, Naples,
Palermo, and Rome. Each of these exercises, within its own territory,
final jurisdiction in all cases involving the ordinary civil law. The
court of cassation at Rome, it is true, has been given exclusive
jurisdiction in conflicts of competence between different courts,
conflicts between the courts and the administrative authorities, the
transfer of suits from one tribunal to another, writs of error in
criminal cases, and a variety of other special matters. But, aside
from this, the five tribunals are absolutely equal in function; there
is no appeal from one to another, and the decisions arrived at by one
do not constitute precedents which the others are obligated to
recognize. One of the most striking aspects, indeed, of the Italian
judicial system is its lack of centralization; though it should be
added that the centralizing principle which, since 1870, has dominated
so notably all other departments of the government has been gradually
winning its way in the judiciary.

*422. The Administrative Courts.*--In Italy, as in continental countries
generally, there is preserved a sharp distinction between public and
private law; but the separation of functions of the ordinary and the
administrative courts is much less clear-cut than in France and
elsewhere. In 1865, indeed, the surviving administrative courts of (p. 383)
the states which had been drawn into the kingdom, were abolished and
it was arranged that the ordinary courts should exercise unrestricted
jurisdiction in all criminal cases and in all civil cases in which, by
the decision of the Council of State, a civil or political right was
involved. The system worked poorly and by laws of June 2, 1889, and
May 1, 1890, a special section of the