Blacks Law Dict. 1st ed

725

LIS MOTA

LITERAL PROOF

tiff from taking proceedings in another court against the same defendant for the same ob ject and arising out of the same cause of action. Sweet. LIS MOTA. A controversy moved or begun. By this term is meant a dispute which has arisen upon a point or question which afterwards forms the issue upon which legal proceedings are instituted. After such controversy has arisen, (post litem motam,) it is held, declarations as to pedigree, made by members of the family since deceased, are not admissible. See 4 Gamp. 417; 6 Car. & P. 560. LIS PENDENS. A suit pending; that legal process, in a suit regarding land, which amounts to legal notice to all the world that there is a dispute as to the title. In equity the filing of the bill and serving a subpoena cre ates a lis pendens, except when statutes re quire some record. Stim. Law Gloss. In the civil law. A suit pending. A suit was not said to be pending before that stage of it called "litis contestatio," [q. v.) Mackeld. Bom. Law, § 219. Calvin. LIST. A docket or calendar of causes ready for trial or argument, or of motions ready for hearing. LISTED. Included in a list; put on a list, particularly on a list of taxable persons or property. LISTERS. This word is used in some of the states to designate the persons appointed to make lists of taxables. See Rev. St. Vt. 538. LITE PENDENTE. Lat. Pending the suit. Fleta, lib. 2, c. 54, § 23. LITEM SUAM FACERE. Lat. To make a suit his own. Where a judecc, from partiality or enmity, evidently favored either of the parties, he was said litem suam faeere. Calvin. LITEUA. Lat. A letter. The letter of a law, as distinguished from its spirit. See LETTER. LITERA PISANA. The Pisan letter. A term applied to the old character in which the copy of the Pandects formerly kept at Pisa, in Italy, was written. Spelman. LITERS. Letters. A term applied in old English law to various instruments in writing, public and private. LITERS DIMISSORI^J. Dimissory letters, (g. o.)

LITERiE HTJMANTORES. A tefoi in cluding Greek, Latin, general philology, logic, moral philosophy, metaphysics; the name of the principal course of study in the University of Oxford. Wharton. LITEfiiE MORTIL&J. Dead letters; fulfilling words of a statute. Lord Bacon observes that "there are in every statute cer tain words which are as veins, where the life and blood of the statute cometh, and where all doubts do arise, and the rest are literat mortuce, fulfilling words." Bac. St. Uses, (Works, iv. 189.) LITERS PATENTES. Letters patent; literally, open letters. Liters patentes regis non erunt va OU8B. 1 Bulst. 6. The king's letters patent shall not be void. LITERS! PROOURATORL2E. In old English law. Letters procuratory; letters of procuration; letters of attorney. Bract, fols. 40,43. LITERS! RECOGNITIONS. la maritime law. A bill of lading. Jac. Sea Laws, 172. Liter® scriptse manent. Written words last. LITERS! SIGILLATiE. In old En glish law. Sealed letters. The return of a sheriff was so called. Fleta, lib. 2, c. 64, §19. LITERAL. According to language; fol lowing expression in words. A literal con struction of a document adheres closely to its words, without making differences for ex trinsic circumstances; a literal performance of a condition is one which complies exactly with its terms. LITERAL CONTRACT. In Romaa law. A species of written contract, in which the formal act by which an obligation was superinduced on the convention was an entry of the sum due, where it should be specifically ascertained, on the debit side of a ledger. Maine, Anc. Law, 320. A contract, the whole of the evidence of which is reduced to writing, and binds the party who subscribed it, although he has re ceived no consideration. Lee. £1. Dr. Rom. §887. LITERAL PROOF. In the civil iaw. Written evidence.

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