- published: 05 Mar 2016
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In law, a judgment is a decision of a court regarding the rights and liabilities of parties in a legal action or proceeding. Judgments also generally provide the court's explanation of why it has chosen to make a particular court order.
The phrase "reasons for judgment" is often used interchangeably with "judgment," although the former refers to the court's justification of its judgment while the latter refers to the final court order regarding the rights and liabilities of the parties. As the main legal systems of the world recognize either a common law, statutory, or constitutional duty to provide reasons for a judgment, drawing a distinction between "judgment" and "reasons for judgment" may be unnecessary in most circumstances.
Judgment is considered a "free variation" word, and the use of either judgment or judgement (with an e) is considered acceptable. This variation arises depending on the country and the use of judgment in a legal or non-legal context.
British, American, and Canadian English generally use judgment when referring to a court's formal ruling.Judgement is commonly used in the United Kingdom when referring to a non-legal decision.
Judgement (or judgment) is the evaluation of evidence to make a decision. The term has four distinct uses:
Law is a system of rules that are enforced through social institutions to govern behavior. Laws can be made by a collective legislature or by a single legislator, resulting in statutes, by the executive through decrees and regulations, or by judges through binding precedent, normally in common law jurisdictions. Private individuals can create legally binding contracts, including arbitration agreements that may elect to accept alternative arbitration to the normal court process. The formation of laws themselves may be influenced by a constitution, written or tacit, and the rights encoded therein. The law shapes politics, economics, history and society in various ways and serves as a mediator of relations between people.
A general distinction can be made between (a) civil law jurisdictions (including Catholic canon law and socialist law), in which the legislature or other central body codifies and consolidates their laws, and (b) common law systems, where judge-made precedent is accepted as binding law. Historically, religious laws played a significant role even in settling of secular matters, which is still the case in some religious communities, particularly Jewish, and some countries, particularly Islamic. Islamic Sharia law is the world's most widely used religious law.