Legal maxims I: the maxims the examiner asks

LUG-105 English and Legal Language, Unit IV: Legal maxims. · LLB · 60 min

What a legal maxim is, why most are Latin, and a four-step method for the two questions every paper sets: "explain the maxim" and "use it in a sentence". Twenty-five maxims are then worked, grouped by the branch of law they belong to, each with its literal meaning, its origin, an Indian statute or case where it operates, and a model sentence.

Objectives

Define a legal maxim and explain its place in Indian law.
Explain each of the twenty-five maxims in this lecture in two or three sentences, with its translation.
Name one Indian statute or case for each maxim.
Use any maxim correctly in a sentence of legal English.
Answer the 2-mark, 3.5-mark and 7-mark forms of the maxim question within time.

Slides

What a legal maxim is, and why it is in Latin
How to answer: explain the maxim, use it in a sentence
Crime: the guilty mind and the two kinds of mistake
Natural justice: hearing, bias, and the court's own mistakes
Rights and remedies: injury with and without damage
Torts: consent, the thing that speaks, and the master who answers
Contract and commerce: buyer, bad cause, delegate
State and public: welfare, free service, and the King who could do no wrong
Procedure and evidence: finality, delay, the lying witness, the dying action
Revision table: twenty-five maxims in one page
How the examiner asks it

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