“Shocks the conscience” refers to situations that seem grossly unjust to the observer. Courts often use this phrase as a test to determine which situations are so unjust or wrong that the court must intervene. If some event shocks the conscience of the court, the court will look for some remedy to fix the problem.
A showup is a pretrial identification procedure where a witness is shown only the suspect and asked if that person was the perpetrator. This procedure has been criticized as subject to error.
Contrast with pretrial lineup.
A signal is a word or phrase briefly indicating the relevance of one or more cited sources. In formal legal writing, a signal often appears at the start of a citation sentence.
See order of signals for an index of different signals and their definitions.
The Simplified Network Application Process Redesign (SNAP-R) is an online filing system administered by the U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS).
The slayer rule prevents a murderer from retaining a property interest in their victim’s estate. The slayer rule is found in trust and estates law and was designed to prevent people from committing murder to receive their inheritance.
Solemnization is the formal requirement of the performance of a marriage ceremony, and the professional class that may marry a couple. Who may perform such a ceremony varies depending on the particular laws of the state. For example, in one state, a mayor, magistrate, county clerk, city clerk, judge, or justice may perform the solemnization.
The sources of international law are set by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in Article 38 of the Statute of the ICJ in a hierarchical order:
Sovereignty is a political concept that refers to a dominant power or supreme authority. In a monarchy, supreme power resides in the sovereign, such as a king or queen. In modern democracies, sovereign power rests with the people and is exercised through representative bodies such as Congress or Parliament.
A speaking objection is a type of objection made during a legal proceeding, usually a deposition or trial, where the attorney provides more information or commentary than is necessary to state the basis of the objection.
