In 1664, the King of France decreed in Article 33 of the decree establishing the French West India Company (French: l'Édit d'établissement de la compagnie des Indes occidentales) that the Custom of Paris would serve as the main source of law throughout New France.

Later, authorities went on to add le droit français de la métropole, that is, French law.

The Act's preamble declared: WHEREAS the laws of Lower Canada in Civil Matters are mainly those which, at the time of the cession of the country to the British Crown, were in force in that part of France then governed by the Custom of Paris, modified by the Provincial Statutes, or by the introduction of portions of the Law of England in peculiar cases; and it therefore happens, that the great body of the Laws; in that division of the Province, exist only in a language which is not the mother tongue of the inhabitants thereof of British origin, while other portions are not to be found in the mother tongue of those of French origin and whereas the laws and Customs in force in France, at the period above mentioned, have there been altered and reduced to one general Code, so that the old laws still in force in Lower Canada are no longer reprinted or commented upon in France, and it is becoming more and more difficult to obtain copies of them, or of the commentaries upon them; And whereas the reasons aforesaid, and the great advantages which have resulted from Codification, as well in France as in the State of Louisiana, and other places, render it manifestly expedient to provide for the Codification of the Civil Laws of Lower Canada:The Act authorized the creation of a codification commission, which consisted of three commissioners and two secretaries, all drawn from the Bar of Lower Canada.

The Act authorizing the Code's adoption received royal assent on 18 September 1865,[14][15][16] and it was proclaimed in force on 1 August 1866.

[22]While the 1804 French Civil Code's framework was used in drafting the CCLC, the commissioners had to adapt its provisions to conform to the legal situation in Lower Canada by:[26] In addition, they proposed 217 resolutions for changes to the law, which were accepted by the Legislature with only minor modifications.

[27] As Thomas-Jean-Jacques Loranger observed in his 1873 work, Commentaire sur le Code Civil du Bas-Canada: Four main objects stand out in the new legislation, reflect its spirit and summarize its general design.

[28]There were significant reforms to the previous French law: Unlike the 1804 French Civil Code, with its revolutionary ideals, the Civil Code of Lower Canada reflected the conservative, family-oriented values of the largely rural (and mostly francophone) society of 19th-century Quebec, as well as the economic liberalism of the burgeoning commercial and industrial (and primarily anglophone) élites concentrated in Montreal.

[36] In order to deal with any potential conflicts between the French and English texts, Article 2615 of the Code stated: 2615.

[44][45] The same legislation also provided framework provisions relating to marriage in the Province,[46] that were "to be interpreted as though they formed part of the Civil Code of Québec.