Legal Term Dictionary

Search our free database of thousands of legal terms. The easiest-to-read, most user-friendly guide to legal terms.This dictionary is from the early 20th century and is not to be construed as legal advice.

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  • BEAMS AND BALANCE
    Instruments for weighing goods and merchandise.
  • BEAR
    To support, sustain, or carry; to give rise to, or to produce, something else as an incident or auxiliary. -Bear arms. To carry arms as weapons and with reference to their military use, not to wear them about the person as part of the dress. Aymette v. State, 2 Humph. More...
  • BEAST
    An animal; a domestic animal; a quadruped, such as may be used for food or In labor or for sport. -Beasts of the chase. In English law. The buck, doe, fox, martin, and roe. Co. Litt. 233a.-Beasts of the forest. In English law. The hart, hind, hare, boar, and wolf. More...
  • BEAT
    v. In the criminal law and law of torts, with reference to assault and battery, this term includes any unlawful physical violence offered to another. See BATTERY. In other connections, it is understood in a more restricted sense, and includes only the infliction of one or more blows. Regina v. More...
  • BEAT
    n. In some of the southern states (as Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina) the principal legal subdivision of a county, corresponding to towns or townships in other states; or a voting precinct Williams v. Pearson, 38 Ala. 30S.
  • BEAU-PLEADER
    (to plead fairly.) In English law. An obsolete writ upon the statute of Marlbridge, (52 Hen. III. c. 11.) which enacts that neither in the circuits of the justices, nor in counties, hundreds, or courts-baron, any fines shall be taken for fair-pleading, i. e, for not pleading fairly or aptly More...
  • BED
    1. The hollow or channel of a water-course ; the depression between the banks worn by the regular and usual flow of the water. "The bed is that soil so usually covered by water as to be distinguishable from the banks by the character of the soil, or vegetation, or More...
  • BEDEL
    In English law. A crier or messenger of court, who summons men to appear and answer therein. Cowell. An officer of the forest, similar to a sheriffs special bailiff. Cowell. A collector of rents for the king. Plowd. 199, 200. A well-known parish officer. See BEADLE.
  • BEDELARY
    The jurisdiction of a bedel, as a bailiwick is the jurisdiction of a bailiff. Co. Litt. 2346; Cowell.
  • BEDEREPE
    A service which certain tenants were anciently bound to perform, as to reap their landlord's corn at harvest Said by Whishaw to be still in existence in some parts of England. Blount; Cowell; Whishaw.
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