Law
In law, it is a term of art used to identify a legal classification that exists independently of other categorizations because of its singularity or due to the specific creation of an entitlement or obligation. For example, a court's contempt powers arise sui generis and not from statute or rule. The New York Court of Appeals has used the term in describing cooperative apartment corporations, mostly because this form of housing is considered real property for some purposes and personal property for other purposes.
When citing cases and other authorities, lawyers and judges may say a sui generis case, or a sui generis authority, meaning it is a special one confined to its own facts, and therefore may not be of broader application. This is the modern view courts are holding when deciding judgments based on oil and gas leases.
Read more about this topic: Sui Generis
Famous quotes containing the word law:
“I was not born to be forced. I will breathe after my own fashion. Let us see who is the strongest. What force has a multitude? They can only force me who obey a higher law than I.... I do not hear of men being forced to live this way or that by masses of men. What sort of life were that to live?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“For centuries the death penalty, often accompanied by barbarous refinements, has been trying to hold crime in check; yet crime persists. Why? Because the instincts that are warring in man are not, as the law claims, constant forces in a state of equilibrium.”
—Albert Camus (1913–1960)
“You’ve just fulfilled the first role of law enforcement. Make sure when your shift is over you go home alive.”
—David Mamet, U.S. screenwriter, and Brian DePlama. Jimmy Malone (Sean Connery)