Latin for Lawyers

PENDENS, PENDENT

performance. The courts distinguish between penalty clauses and clauses for liquidated damages. The former penalize the obligor in a fixed amount regardless of the injury to the obligee; the latter are a best estimate by the par ties at the time of agreement of the damages which an obligee will actually sustain upon default by the obligor. Penalty clauses are not usually enforced; liquidated damages clauses are. PENDENS, PENDENT [L. pendere , to hang down, to weigh upon] Pending, during, while awaiting. Remaining open or undetermined. Unre solved. PENDENTE LITE [L. pendere / to hang down + lis / a legal controvery or law suit] Suspended while the lawsuit lasts. Awaiting the outcome of the action. Pend ing the lawsuit. A matter pendente lite is contingent on the outcome of litiga tion. The appointment of a guardian pendente lite is an appointment which lasts during, and terminates upon the end of, a law suit. See LITE PENDENTE PENDENT JURISDICTION Authority in the federal courts, in actions involving a federal question, to hear and determine state claims between the same parties. Prior to the Judicial Improvement Act of 1990, pendent jurisdiction was the name given to the right of a federal court with jurisdiction over a federal question claim between two parties, to hear and adjudicate a state-created claim between the same parties (though it would not have had jurisdiction over that claim with out the federal claim). The 1990 Act combined pendent jurisdiction with ancillary jurisdiction to create what is now called supplemental jurisdiction . PENITENTIARY [L. paeniteo, paenitere / to repent, regret, be sorry for] A prison or place of confinement to which felons are consigned after convic tion and sentence. PENOLOGY [L. poena / a penalty or punishment] A branch of criminology dealing with the care and treatment of prisoners and the administration of prisons. PENSION [L. pensio (from pendere ) / a weighing out, a reckoning; hence, a payment, an accounting of sums due] A payment or payments, generally periodic, by a government or business enterprise in recognition of an employee’s past services. Deferred compensa tion for past services as distinguised from wages or salary for current ser vices. A plan under which employees are provided with a systematic scheme

280