Civil wrong

Not to be confused with Civil offence or Municipal offense.

A civil wrong or wrong is a cause of action under the law of the governing body. Tort,[1] breach of contract[2] and breach of trust[3][4] are types of civil wrong.

Something that amounts to a civil wrong is said to be wrongful.

A wrong involves the violation of a right because wrong and right are complementary terms.[5]

A statement that an act complained of is legally wrongful as regards the party complaining implicitly includes a statement that the act complained of prejudicially affects the party complaining in some legal right.[6]

The law that relates to civil wrongs is part of the branch of the law that is called the civil law.[7]

A civil wrong is capable of being followed by what are called civil proceedings.[8]

It is a misnomer to describe a civil wrong as a "civil offence".[9]

The law of England recognised the concept of a "wrong" before it recognised the distinction between civil wrongs and crimes (which distinction was developed during the thirteenth century).[10]

References

  1. ↑ Glanville Williams. Learning the Law. Eleventh Edition. Stevens. 1982. p. 9
  2. ↑ Glanville Williams. Learning the Law. Eleventh Edition. Stevens. 1982. p. 9
  3. ↑ Glanville Williams. Learning the Law. Eleventh Edition. Stevens. 1982. p. 10
  4. ↑ For more information on breach of trust, which does not yet have an article, see English trusts law#Breach of trust
  5. ↑ Clerk and Lindsell on Torts. Sixteenth Edition. 1989. Sweet and Maxwell. paragraph 1-14 at page 12.
  6. ↑ Rogers v Rajendro Dutt (1860) 13 Moo P C 209, 9 WR 149, 15 ER 78. The text reads: "It is essential to an action in tort that the act complained of should under the circumstances be legally wrongful as regards the party complaining; that is, it must prejudicially affect him in some legal right;"
  7. ↑ Glanville Williams. Learning the Law. Eleventh Edition. Stevens. 1982. p. 2
  8. ↑ Glanville Williams. Learning the Law. Eleventh Edition. Stevens. 1982. p. 3
  9. ↑ Williams, G.L., (1982). "Learning the Law", 11th Ed., London : Stevens, ISBN 0-420-46290-2, p. 4
  10. ↑ O. Hood Phillips, A First Book of English Law, Sweet and Maxwell, 4th ed., 1960, pp. 207, 208, 213