Legal Term Dictionary

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  • MISDIRECTION
    In practice. An error made by a judge in instructing the Jury upon the trial of a cause.
  • MISE
    The issue in a writ of right When the tenant in a writ of right pleads that his title is better than the demandant's, he is said to join the mise on the mere right Also expenses; costs; disbursements in an action. -Mise-money. Money paid by way of contract or More...
  • MISERABILE DEPOSITUM
    Lat. In the civil law. The name of an involuntary deposit, made under pressing necessity; as, for instance, shipwreck, fire, or other inevitable calamity. Poth. Proc. Civile, pt. 5, c. 1, | 1; Code La. 2935.
  • MISERERE
    The name and first word of one of the penitential psalms, being that which was commonly used to be given by the ordinary to such condemned malefactors as were allowed the benefit of clergy; whence it is also called the "psalm of mercy." Wharton.
  • MISERICORDIA
    Lat. Mercy; a fine or amerciament; an arbitrary or discretionary amercement -Misericordia communis. In old English law. A fine set on a whole county or hundred.
  • MISFEASANCE
    A misdeed or trespass. The doing what a party ought to do improperly. 1 Tidd, Pr. 4. The improper performance of some act which a man may lawfully do. 3 Steph. Comm. 460. And see Bell v. Josselyn, 3 Gray (Mass.) 309, 63 Am. Dec. 741; Illinois Cent. R. Co. More...
  • MISFEAZANCE
    See MISFEASANCE.
  • MISFORTUNE
    An adverse event, calamity, or evil fortune, arising by accident, (or without the will or concurrence of him who suffers from it,) and not to be foreseen or guarded against by care or prudence. See 20 Q. B. Div. 816. In its application to the law of homicide, this term More...
  • MISJOINDER
    See JOINDER.
  • MISKENNING
    In Saxon and old English law. An unjust or irregular summoning to court; to speak unsteadily in court; to vary In one's plea. Cowell; Blount; Spelman.
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