California Civil Code PRELIMINARY PROVISIONS

• Section 2.
  This Code takes effect at twelve o'clock noon, on the first day of January, eighteen hundred and seventy-three.(Enacted 1872.)
• Section 3.
  No part of it is retroactive, unless expressly so declared.(Enacted 1872.)
• Section 4.
  The rule of the common law, that statutes in derogation thereof are to be strictly construed, has no application to this Code. The Code establishes...
• Section 5.
  The provisions of this Code, so far as they are substantially the same as existing statutes or the common law, must be construed as continuations...
• Section 6.
  No action or proceeding commenced before this Code takes effect, and no right accrued, is affected by its provisions.(Enacted 1872.)
• Section 7.
  Holidays within the meaning of this code are every Sunday and such other days as are specified or provided for as holidays in the Government...
• Section 7.1.
  Optional bank holidays within the meaning of Section 9 are:(a) Any closing of a bank because of an extraordinary situation, as that term is defined in...
• Section 9.
  All other days than those mentioned in Section 7 are business days for all purposes; provided, that as to any act appointed by law or...
• Section 10.
  The time in which any act provided by law is to be done is computed by excluding the first day and including the last, unless...
• Section 11.
  Whenever any act of a secular nature, other than a work of necessity or mercy, is appointed by law or contract to be performed upon...
• Section 12.
  Words giving a joint authority to three or more public officers or other persons are construed as giving such authority to a majority of them,...
• Section 13.
  Words and phrases are construed according to the context and the approved usage of the language; but technical words and phrases, and such others as...
• Section 14.
  (a) Words used in this code in the present tense include the future as well as the present; words used in the masculine gender include the...
• Section 17.
  Wherever any notice or other communication is required by this code to be mailed by registered mail, the mailing of such notice or other communication...
• Section 18.
  Notice is:1. Actual—which consists in express information of a fact; or,2. Constructive—which is imputed by law.(Enacted 1872.)
• Section [19.].
  Every person who has actual notice of circumstances sufficient to put a prudent person upon inquiry as to a particular fact has constructive notice of...
• Section 20.
  No statute, law, or rule is continued in force because it is consistent with the provisions of this Code on the same subject; but in...
• Section 21.
  This Act, whenever cited, enumerated, referred to, or amended, may be designated simply as “The Civil Code,” adding, when necessary, the number of the section.(Enacted

Last modified: October 22, 2018