this or that: CONCURRING OPINION vs DISSENTING OPINION

this or that: CONCURRING OPINION vs DISSENTING OPINION

CONCURRING OPINION – “I agree but for a different reason”, a written opinion by one or more judges of a court which agrees with the decision made by the majority of the court, but states different (or additional) reasons as the basis for his or her decision (uzasadnienie wspierające)

DISSENTING OPINION – “I don’t agree ”, a written opinion by one or more judges of a court which disagrees with the decision made by the majority of the court (zdanie odrębne, opinia odmienna)

MAJORITY OPINION – “What most members agree with” a judicial opinion agreed to by more than half of the members of a court (zdanie większości, orzeczenie sądowe mające poparcie większości sędziów)

JUDICIAL OPINION – a form of legal opinion written by a judge or a judicial panel that provides the decision reached, the facts of the case and an analysis of the law used to arrive at the decision (uzasadnienie orzeczenia sądowego, opinia sędziego)

(1) As a practical matter, concurring opinions are slightly less useful to lawyers than majority opinions. Having failed to receive a majority of the court's votes, concurring opinions are not binding precedent and cannot be cited as such.

BINDING – wiążący (must be followed)

A PRECEDENT – precedens (a principle or rule established in a previous legal case)

TO CITE – powoływać się (to refer to a decision in another case to support an argument)

(2) In some courts, such as the Supreme Court of the United States, the majority opinion may be broken down into numbered or lettered parts, and then concurring justices may state that they join some parts of the majority opinion, but not others, for the reasons given in their concurring opinion.

THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES (SCOTUS) – Sąd Najwyższy Stanów Zjednoczonych (the highest federal court of the United States)

(3) Occasionally, a judge will use a concurring opinion to signal that he or she is open to certain types of test cases that would facilitate the development of a new legal rule, and in turn, such a concurring opinion may become more famous than the majority opinion in the same case. A well-known example of this phenomenon is Escola v. Coca-Cola Bottling Co. (1944).

A TEST CASE – powództwo wytaczane na próbę, które, w razie pozytywnego dla nas wyniku ustanowi nowy precedens (a legal action whose purpose is to set a precedent)

IN TURN – z kolei (as a result)

ESCOLA V. COCA-COLA BOTTLING CO. (1944) – a case in California involving a serious hand injury caused by an exploding bottle of Coca-Cola; important in the development of product liability; Escola is the name of the waitress who sued the producer; the jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff, following the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur; in his concurring opinion Roger Traynor argued that instead of deciding the case on grounds of negligence, a rule of strict liability /absolute legal responsibility for an injury that can be imposed on the wrongdoer without proof of carelessness or fault/ should be imposed on manufacturers whose products cause injury to consumers.

http://idiglegalenglish.blogspot.com/2017/07/legal-word-of-day-res-ipsa-loquitur.html

(4) In the mid-20th century, it became customary for the members of the U.S. Supreme Court and many state supreme courts to end their dissenting opinions with a variation on the phrase "I respectfully dissent."

(5) The dissenting opinions rendered in the jurisprudence of the International Court of Justice have played a remarkable role in the development of international law. The importance of dissents before international courts, particularly the ICJ, is due to the public nature of the proceedings and the fact that such decisions often address novel issues over which no solid body of jurisprudence has yet developed.

THE INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE (ICJ)/ THE HAGUE – Międzynarodowy Trybunał Sprawiedliwości (the court of the United Nations that decides disputes between member states and gives advisory opinions on legal questions referred to it by authorized UN organs and specialized agencies)

PROCEEDINGS –  postępowanie sądowe (action taken in a court to settle a dispute)

A BODY – zbiór (a collection)

JURISPRUDENCE – orzecznictwo (case law, the legal decisions which have developed and which accompany statutes in applying the law)