CASE

In law, primarily a cause, that is, an action or suit taken as a whole. The word is used in this general sense in the United States Constitution, Which extends the judicial power of the United States to "cases in law and equity, cases affecting ambassadors, etc."

In a more limited sense, a case is one side of a suit or action, the body of evidence and law presented by one of the parties. The word is also used to denote a decided cause of action already recorded and cited in argument; thus the phrase case law is used to designate the species of legal argument founded on the examination and citation of decided cases; hence also the phrase leading cases, meaning cases in which the decisions have a wide application and set forth general principles which may govern many subsequent decisions.

 In the United States the term 'case' is often used in brief for case on appeal, meaning the statement laid before a court of appeal by an appellant, presenting the record and the entire evidence of the original trial, or a resume of it. This allows the appellate court to review the findings of the jury as well as the law points involved, and in this the case differs from the bill of exceptions, which presents only the matters of law to the court of appeal. Case agreed on, or case stated, is a statement in which parties to a suit unite in laying before the court the facts of the case upon which they agree for a decision on the points of law involved. Case reserved is a statement drawn by counsel and certified to by the judge, to be used as a basis for argument on law points before a full bench of the court.

Action On The Case

A very important form of action is sometimes called case, in brief for action on the case, or still more fully, action of trespass on the case. This action did not exist at early common law, but was introduced by the Statute of Westminster II., in the reign of Edward I. (1286). It was designed to remedy certain defects in the common-law practice which failed to provide an adequate remedy for some classes of injuries by means of the common-law action of trespass. The phrase 'action on the case' is really equivalent to 'action on the circumstances,' and this form of suit avails when it is sought to recover damages for personal injuries not caused by an assault, or where the wrongful act was of such a kind that the injury was indirect or consequential. Actions to recover damages for libel or slander, for the conversion of personal property, for negligence, are examples of actions on the case. Assumpsit originated as a form of action on the case. In Great Britain the Judicature Acts have so classified injuries for which damages may be sought as in general to make this form of action obsolete; and in the United States the codes of civil procedure adopted in many States have generally abolished this and other special forms of action. Consult the authorities referred to under PLEADING and PRACTICE.

CHALLENGE

In criminal law, a request or demand to fight with deadly weapons. No set phrase or form of words is necessary to constitute a challenge. Any language which, when connected with the circumstances of a quarrel and the conduct of the parties, shows an intention to invite or solicit a meeting in order to fight with deadly weapons, amounts to a challenge. Giving a challenge, or knowingly bearing one, or even inciting to a challenge, is a criminal offense at common-law. The tendency of modern statutes is to subject all persons connected with a challenge to severe criminal punishment, and to disqualify them from holding public office thereafter.

In civil procedure, a challenge is a formal exception taken to one or more jurors. When exception is taken to the entire panel, it is called a challenge to the array, or to the panel, or a motion to set aside the panel, or to quash the array. A challenge is said to be for cause, when it is based upon a state of facts which, if established, renders the juror incompetent, as that he is pecuniarily interested in the case, or disqualified by reason of age, sex, or mental condition. A challenge is said to be to the favor, when founded on a charge that the juror is biased or subject to some improper influence. A peremptory challenge is one for which no reason need be assigned. The number of peremptory challenges, and the criminal cases in which they are allowed, are regulated by statute. Challenges are to be made after the appearance of the jurors and before they are sworn.

CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE

Evidence of facts and circumstances which surround, and are connected with, the particular facts to be proved, and which, taken together, the court and jury may reasonably considered as tending to prove or negative the particular facts sought to be established in the case before them. Circumstantial evidence is most frequently called for in criminal cases; especially where the crime is secretly committed, as murder by poison sent by mail, in which case there is generally little positive and direct evidence that the accused committed the act with which he is charged. The circumstances precedent to and connected with a crime may so associate the accused with the crime that an inference of guilt would be the only one that could reasonably be drawn from such circumstances; in which case there may be a conviction, even though there is no one who can testify, from actual knowledge, that the accused committed the act. See EVIDENCE.

CITATION

A mandate of a court of competent jurisdiction, commanding the person or persons named therein to appear in that court for some purpose specified briefly in the citation.

It was originally the process by which a suit was begun in the English ecclesiastical courts, which formerly had jurisdiction over orphans, decedents' estates, and divorce proceedings.

CIVIL ACTION

Any judicial proceeding involving a controversy between individuals in regard to their private matters, distinguished from proceedings where public interests are concerned, as in a criminal prosecution. Civil actions include the procedure in a court of chancery or equity, and also those cases in which the State submits to an action by an individual.

CIVIL-DAMAGE ACTS

Statutes which have been passed in many of the United States, giving to those who sustain an actual injury by or through any intoxicated person, as a result of the intoxication, a right of action against the person who sold or gave away the liquor which caused the intoxication. In some States, this liability has been extended to the owner of the premises where the liquor was dispensed; and it is immaterial whether the liquor business is lawful in the particular jurisdiction or not. These statutes include injuries to person or property of any one, and loss of support, by wife or child, of a drunkard. Exemplary or punitive damages are allowed in some cases, but actual injury must also be proved. Where one in any way helps to bring about the intoxication, he cannot recover.

These statutes have been held constitutional, being within the 'police power' of the States under which the liquor traffic is regulated.

CIVIL DEATH

The status of a living person who is deprived by law of his legal and civil rights.

The term is of feudal origin, and was introduced into the English law after the Norman Conquest. At that time civil death was one of the consequences of treason, banishment from the realm, abjuration of the realm (by which a criminal escaped other punishment by leaving the country forever), felony, and the act of entering upon a monastic life as a monk or nun; and in all of these cases, except felony, there was a total extinction of all civil rights, including loss of real and personal property, as if the person were physically dead. To avoid the effect of this, conveyances frequently made grants of estates for the 'natural life' of a person; and this phrase is used today in creating life estates, although the original reason for inserting the word 'natural' has ceased. Treason and abjuration of the realm involved forfeiture of property to the Crown as a penalty; but one taking monastic vows could make a will and appoint an executor to administer his estate. In the United States, generally, civil death can occur only as the result of a sentence of imprisonment for life; but the doctrine is modified, so that there is only a partial extinction of the convict's rights, as in the New York statute providing that a sentence of life imprisonment shall operate as an absolute divorce of the felon from wife or husband; and in no case does his property descend to his heirs, as under the early law of England. The English law has also been greatly modified by statutes and decisions. For an annotation on civil death in the United States, consult Davis vs. Laning, 18 Law Rep. Annot., 1882.

In some of the countries of Europe, the ancient doctrine is still applied in cases of persons entering a monastic life.

CIVIL PROCEDURE

Legal procedure, the process whereby legal rights are protected and enforced, and violations of private or public rights punished. As commonly employed in English and American law, however, the term 'civil' refers to private as distinguished from public rights, and civil procedure would not include the processes of the tribunals in protecting the peace and vindicating the dignity of the State, i.e. criminal procedure. Neither does it cover any administrative process of the State, nor diplomatic or other action for the purpose of protecting the interests of citizens or subjects in foreign lands.

CLIENT

In law, one who consults or retains an attorney or counselor-at-law for advice, or to prosecute, manage, or defend an action at law, or to represent him in any proceedings or business matters. The client's relations with the attorney are in the highest degree confidential, and the client is protected by the most stringent rules of law in making disclosures of his private affairs to his legal adviser. See ATTORNEY; PRIVILEGED COMMUNICATION.

CONFESSION AND AVOIDANCE

Pleadings are said to be in confession and avoidance, in common-law practice, when they expressly or by a reasonable implication admit the allegations of the pleading to which they are interposed, and show some justification or excuse which will deprive them of the legal effect of supporting the plaintiff's claim of a right to recover. The admission must be sufficiently comprehensive to give color to the matter adversely alleged, that is, must show it to be prima facie, or apparently, true. Any pleading after the declaration may be by way of confession and avoidance of the last pleading of the opposite party. Thus, if the defendant should plead a release by plaintiff, the latter might in his replication admit that he gave a release, but allege that it was obtained from him by coercion or fraud. This might be denied by the opposite party, and then the cause would be at issue. See PLEADING.

CONFESSION OF JUDGMENT

A method of allowing judgment to be entered against a person upon his acknowledgment in proper form that a claim is, or is about to become, due and owing to another, and consenting that the latter may enter judgment for the amount named. A judgment thus obtained is equally valid and binding as though it had been secured by legal process. While the weight of advantage is with the person obtaining the judgment, in the saving of the time and expense of litigation, this device may also be of advantage to the debtor in saving him the annoyance and costs of suit involved in the ordinary process. It is commonly resorted to in cases where the debtor desires to prefer a certain creditor and give him the priority over other creditors and the additional security which a judgment affords.

It differs from cognovit in the fact that it may be made without the institution of an action, and in the further fact that it is generally limited to debts, in the usual sense of that term, and is not available for the liquidation of claims founded on torts. However, as intimated above, a confession of judgment may be equally valid for a claim not yet accrued, as for future advances.

In a few of the States of the United States it is customary to give a promissory note at the time of its inception the form and character of a confession of judgment, whereby the holder of the note is authorized at maturity, or at a specified time thereafter, to enter up judgment thereupon without further process. This extension of the principle is not, however, generally favored.

CROSS-EXAMINATION

The examination of a witness on behalf of the party against whose interest he has been called and has given testimony. The object is to test the correctness of the testimony given, to disclose any prejudice, lack of intelligence, weakness of memory, or untruthfulness that may exist, and to break in any proper way the force of the direct examination. Greater latitude is allowed to counsel in cross-examination of an adverse witness than in adducing direct testimony for his own client. Thus, 'leading questions', that is, those which in their form suggest or indicate the answer desired are allowed in cross but not in direct examination. In the United States generally it is held that cross-examination should be limited to inquiry into matters drawn out on the direct examination, and if counsel asks questions as to new matter he thereby makes the witness his own, and, as to such questions, vouches for the truthfulness of his testimony.

Counsel must confine the questions to material and relevant matters; but the determination of whether the facts sought to be shown my be considered such is in the discretion of the court, and, when occasion seems to demand it, this is exercised, especially in cases of cross-examination of expert witnesses, where it is necessary to show the standing and ability of the expert. Previous mistakes in collateral matters not connected in any way with the cause in issue have been allowed to be shown on this point.

The right to cross-examination should be exercised immediately after the examination-in-chief; but it is in the discretion of the court, upon good reason shown, to allow the privilege at a later state of the trial. See EVIDENCE; EXAMINATION; TESTIMONY; WITNESS; TRIAL.