Definition
Abridgment of damages is the power of a court to reduce the amount of damages awarded by a jury in certain cases. Where a jury's award is excessive, unsupported by the evidence, or contrary to law, the court may intervene to bring the damages figure within permissible limits. The term describes the judicial act of reduction itself, not a party's motion requesting it.
The mechanism operates through two principal procedural tools: remittitur, by which a court orders a reduction in the jury's award as a condition of denying a new trial; and the court's broader equitable authority to correct damages that are improper as a matter of law regardless of jury finding. In both contexts, the animating principle is the same — the jury's role in assessing damages is not unlimited, and courts retain supervisory authority over the outcome.
Common Confusion
Abridgment of damages is sometimes loosely equated with remittitur, but the two are not identical. Abridgment of damages is the broader concept — the general judicial power to reduce damages — while remittitur is a specific procedural device for exercising that power in the context of a jury verdict. Additionally, abridgment of damages should not be confused with mitigation of damages, which is an obligation imposed on the injured party to take reasonable steps to limit their own loss. Abridgment is something a court does; mitigation is something a plaintiff must do.
Why It Matters in Research
This term appears almost exclusively in older legal sources. Researchers working with nineteenth- and early twentieth-century materials — particularly English common law treatises, early American equity practice, and jury charge literature — will encounter it in contexts where modern sources would use remittitur or simply "reduction of damages." If your research involves tracing the historical development of judicial control over jury verdicts, this is the period-accurate term to search.
The phrase has largely dropped out of modern American legal usage. A search for "abridgment of damages" in contemporary case law will return sparse results, while the same doctrine is extensively litigated under the heading of remittitur. Researchers should cross-search both terms when building a historical picture of how courts have constrained jury damage awards.
One navigational trap: Black's first and second edition entries for this term trail directly into material about "abrogate" — an unrelated concept — due to the dictionary's alphabetical formatting. Both editions provide only a minimal definition and refer readers to Brooke's Abridgment, a sixteenth-century English digest. That reference is useful for tracing the term's English common law roots but will not illuminate American practice.
The doctrine intersects with constitutional questions in American law. The Seventh Amendment's preservation of the right to jury trial has generated significant litigation over how far federal courts may go in reducing jury awards, and the line between permissible abridgment and unconstitutional interference with the jury's function remains contested. State courts have developed varying approaches under their own constitutional frameworks.
Historical Dictionary Support
Both Black's first and second editions define abridgment of damages identically and minimally: "the right of the court to reduce the damages in certain cases," with a citation to Brooke's Abridgment. Neither edition elaborates on the circumstances triggering the power, the procedural mechanism for exercising it, or the limits on the court's authority. The entries reflect the term's status as a received common law concept that Black treated as self-explanatory to a nineteenth-century practitioner.
The reference to Brooke's Abridgment (Sir Robert Brooke's La Graunde Abridgement, published posthumously in 1568) points toward the English origins of the doctrine. That the same citation appears verbatim across editions suggests later editors found nothing to add — the term was already receding from active legal vocabulary by the time Black's later editions appeared.
What the historical dictionaries miss entirely is the constitutional dimension that would come to define this doctrine in American law, and the procedural formalization of the power through remittitur. A researcher relying solely on Black's entries would understand that courts could reduce damages but would find no guidance on when, how, or within what limits.
Jurisdictional Note
Federal courts exercising diversity jurisdiction apply federal procedural standards to remittitur, while state law may govern the substantive question of what damages are recoverable. State courts vary considerably in how they articulate and constrain the judicial power to reduce jury awards, with some states permitting additur (judicial increase of inadequate verdicts) alongside remittitur and others rejecting additur on state constitutional grounds.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
Damages and Remedies in Tort — Nominal Damages in Tort (The Law Mind Torts & Personal Injury Encyclopedia) [torts_172]
Trade Secret Remedies — Injunctions, Damages, and Exemplary Damages (The Law Mind Intellectual Property Encyclopedia) [ip_93]