HISTORY OF NATIONAL STATE AND LAW: SUBJECT-AND-BRANCH METHOD OF INTERPRETATION
The article analyzes the contemporary approach to studying public and legal phenomena in the history of the national state and law. It is pointed out that the common approach to state law does not consider it an individual subject of researches on the history of law, unlike other branches of law - civil, criminal, etc. Though state law is «embedded» in the history of the development of society and state, the questions of the time of its origin, key stages of its evolution, and, most importantly, its regularities and development prospects have not been answered; and the answers to these questions would make studies on history and law practically important. It is also noted that history of state and law rarely uses theoretical and legal structures, such as the form of government, the form of state structure, etc. The author suggests switching from the chronological method of studying state and legal phenomena to the subject-and-branch method, which involves observing the origin and establishment of a particular branch of law and analyzing its development during several centuries up to the present.