rule of the floating subtrahend. The common-law doctrine that a plaintiff whose damage was not caused entirely by the defendant must prove the amount of damage that is not attributable to the defendant (the subtrahend) or else recover nothing. • The reasoning behind the rule is that damage is an essential element of a tort […]
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Contracts. The common-law principle that a writing intended by the parties to be a final embodiment of their agreement cannot be modified by evidence of earlier or contemporaneous agreements that might add to, vary, or contradict the writing. • This rule usu. operates to prevent a party from introducing extrinsic evidence of negotiations that occurred
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first-blush rule. The common-law principle that allows a court to set aside a verdict as excessive because the verdict causes the mind to immediately conclude that it resulted from passion or prejudice on the part of the jury. [Cases: Federal Civil Procedure 2345; New Trial 77(2).C.J.S. New Trial §§ 101, 103.]
legal-unities doctrine. Hist. The common-law rule that a wife had no separate existence from her husband. — Also termed doctrine of legal unities; unities doctrine of marriage. See MARRIED WOMEN’S PROPERTY ACTS; SPOUSAL-UNITY DOCTRINE.
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spousal-unity doctrine. Hist. 1. Family law. The common-law rule that a husband and wife were a legal unity. • Under the spousal-unity doctrine, the husband had all rights to the possession, management, control, and alienation of property. The wife had no interests in property. — Also termed doctrine of spousal unity. See MARRIED WOMEN’S PROPERTY
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infant, n. 1. A newborn baby. 2. MINOR(1). “An infant in the eyes of the law is a person under the age of twenty-one years, and at that period (which is the same in the French and generally in the American law) he or she is said to attain majority; and for his torts and
ad coelum doctrine. The common-law rule that a landowner holds everything above and below the land, up to the sky and down to the earth’s core, including all minerals. • This rule governs ownership of “hard” (immovable) minerals such as coal, but not “fugacious” (volatile) minerals such as oil and gas. Cf. RULE OF CAPTURE.
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coparcenary (koh-pahr-s[schwa]-ner-ee), n. An estate that arises when two or more persons jointly inherit from one ancestor, the title and right of possession being shared equally by all. • Coparcenary was a form of coownership created by common-law rules of descent upon intestacy when two or more persons together con-stituted the decedent’s heirs. Typically, this
single-source requirement. Under the common-law tort of false advertising, the necessity to show that the plaintiff is the only supplier of the genuine goods in question and that buyers would have bought the plaintiff’s goods if the true nature of the defendant’s goods had been known. Ely–Norris Safe Co. v. Mosler Safe Co., 7 F.2d
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Nullum Tempus Act (n[schwa]l-[schwa]m tem-p[schwa]s akt), n. [Latin] Hist. English law. The Crown Suits Act of 1769 (amended in 1862) that limited the Crown’s time to sue, in land and other specified matters, to 60 years. • The statute altered the common-law rule of nullum tempus aut locus occurrit regi (“no time or place affects