Towards an Automatic Consolidation of French Law

The life cycle of a legislative or regulatory text begins with the publication of its complete version in the JORF and continues with the possible publication of texts amending it. The full amended text, called its consolidated version, is never published in the JORFandhasno legalvalue: only the initial version andthe suite ofthe ordered modifications of the text are authentic [8]. Since 2008, the French Légifrance [4] website presents most of the legal texts in their original versions as well as in their successive versions, consequences of the modifications brought to these texts over time. The operator of the Légifrance website, the Direction of Legal and Administrative Information(DILA), manually reports the modifications described in natural language in the texts in order to obtain, at each modification date, the complete consolidated version of the text. This convenience of access to the texts in an easier-to-read and easier-to-use version has de facto changed the status of these consolidated versions: they are seen by most users, including legal professionals, as the reflection of the applicable law [7].