Publication Date
12-2011
Document Type
Special Contribution
Abstract
Georgia has become the forty-fourth state to model its new evidence rules on the Federal Rules of Evidence. The new code will go into effect on January 1, 2013, 150 years from when Georgia's first legal code was published. Passage of the 2013 Georgia Evidence Code did not come easy, but was a product of years of debate, compromise, and vetting from legislators, the judiciary, academia, and members and groups of the practicing bar. The new code is largely derived from the Federal Rules of Evidence, but Georgia has retained a significant amount of evidence rules from its prior code and rejected certain provisions of the Federal Rules of Evidence. This Article reviews the history of Georgia's evidence rules and the efforts to amend them, summarizes the changes between the current Georgia Evidence Code and the 2013 Georgia Evidence Code, and explains the notable differences between the 2013 Georgia Evidence Code and the Federal Rules of Evidence.
Recommended Citation
Dreyer, David N.; Howard, F. Beau; and Leitch, Amy M.
(2011)
"Dancing with the Big Boys: Georgia Adopts (most of) the Federal Rules of Evidence,"
Mercer Law Review: Vol. 63:
No.
1, Article 2.
Available at:
https://digitalcommons.law.mercer.edu/jour_mlr/vol63/iss1/2