Common Law

'''Common Law''', ''n.'' [fr. Law French ''commen ley'' "common law"] 
 1. The body of law derived from judicial decisions, rather than from statutes or constitutions; CASE LAW. Cf. STATUTORY LAW.
 2. The body of law based on the English legal system, as distinct from a civil-law system. Cf. CIVIL LAW ''(1)''.
 3. General law common to the country as a whole, as opposed to special law that has only local application. 
 4. The body of law deriving from law courts as opposed to those sitting in equity.
(''Black's Law Dictionary'' 8th ed., © 2004 West Publishing)

Public nuisance theory has its foundation in twelfth-century English '''common law''' as a tort-based crime for infringing on the rights of the Crown.  The King, through a sheriff and later an attorney general, could bring suit to stop an infringement and force the offending party to repair any damage to the King’s property.  In the fourteenth century, English courts extended the principle of public nuisance beyond the rights of the Crown to include rights common to the public,  such as “the right to safely walk along public highways, to breathe unpolluted air, to be undisturbed by large gatherings of disorderly people and to be free from the spreading of infectious diseases.” The Crown prosecuted violators for committing a criminal offense. ''The Law of Public Nuisance: Maintaining Rational Boundaries on a Rational Tort'', [45 Washburn L.J. 543, 544 (2006)]

The tort of public nuisance has developed over nine centuries of English and American '''common law'''. ''The Law of Public Nuisance: Maintaining Rational Boundaries on a Rational Tort'', [45 Washburn L.J. 541, (2006)]