precedent

Pluralprecedents

Formsprecedents, precedenting, precedented

1. 1
   nouncountable

   An earlier action used as an example to help decide the outcome of similar situations in the future.

   The committee worried that approving one late application would establish a precedent for future requests.

   Granting extra funding to a single department set a costly precedent across the organization.

   Similarexample, pattern, standard, model, benchmark

   Note

   Every sense of the word grows from a Latin participle: praecēdēns, from praecēdere, "to precede." A precedent is literally what went before. In everyday use it is something one sets or establishes, often as a warning that one exception invites the next. Richard Hooker, writing in 1594–1597, already marked its limits: examples "can but direct as precedents only."

2. 2
   nouncountable

   A decided case cited or used as an example to justify a judgment in a later case.

   The appellate court relied on a 1970s precedent to overturn the conviction.

   Without a clear precedent, the trial judge had to reason from first principles.

   Similarauthority, ruling, decision

   Note

   Law turns the general idea into a working rule. A court facing a new dispute looks for an earlier decided case on similar facts and cites it to justify its judgment. A precedent set by a higher court in the same jurisdiction binds the court. One from elsewhere only persuades. Lawyers cite, follow or distinguish precedents, and a question no earlier case has settled is said to be without precedent.

3. 3
   nouncountable

   A habit or custom that has become established through repeated practice.

   Morning meetings became a precedent that no one questioned anymore.

   The village kept a long precedent of welcoming travelers with food and shelter.

   Similarcustom, tradition, convention, practice, habit

4. 4
   adjective

   Occurring earlier in time than something else; previous or preceding.

   Disputes left open by precedent agreements were finally settled in the new treaty.

   Precedent generations had cleared the forest for farmland.

   Similarprevious, preceding, antecedent, prior

   Oppositesubsequent, following, later, succeeding

5. 5
   nouncountable

   The earlier version of something; the one that came before the current one.

   Each edition improved on its precedent in subtle but useful ways.

   The updated contract kept most of the clauses from the precedent.

   Similarpredecessor, forerunner, antecedent

   Oppositesuccessor

6. 6
   verbtransitive

   To provide precedents for something, such as a legal ruling.

   A handful of nineteenth-century decisions precedent the modern rule on liability.

   Statutes from that era precedent much of today's commercial law.

   Note

   A legal verb with regular forms: precedents, precedenting, precedented. Its subject is a body of authorities, a run of earlier decisions that together supply the grounds for a later rule. That is where it parts from its single-case partner, whose subject is one controlling decision. Outside legal writing, set a precedent for is the safer construction.

7. 7
   verbtransitive

   To be a precedent for something; to serve as the example that later cases follow.

   The 1954 decision precedents nearly every desegregation case since.

   Foundational rulings precedent the legal standards courts apply today.

   Similarguide, shape, underpin

   Note

   Courtroom shorthand that turns the noun into a verb: a landmark ruling precedents the line of cases that follows it. The noun usually carries this meaning, so the verb reads as compressed, specialist jargon. In general prose, served as the precedent for says the same thing more plainly and will not puzzle a lay reader.

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