Definition
A case for motion is a procedural document filed in English divorce and probate practice that a party was required to submit when seeking a ruling from the court by motion. The document served as a self-contained packet of information for the court, comprising three components: (1) an abstract of the proceedings in the suit or action to date; (2) a statement of the circumstances on which the motion was founded; and (3) the prayer, meaning the specific relief or decree sought.
The case for motion was not the motion itself but rather the supporting paper that gave the court and opposing parties sufficient context to evaluate the motion without needing to review the entire file independently. It functioned as a procedural prerequisite to the motion being heard.
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Common Confusion
The case for motion should not be confused with the modern motion brief, motion memorandum, or notice of motion used in American and contemporary English practice. Those modern documents combine argument and procedural framing in a single filing. The case for motion was a narrower, more formalized document — descriptive rather than argumentative — drawn from the specific procedural regime of the English ecclesiastical and probate courts and later the Divorce Court established by the Matrimonial Causes Act 1857.
The term also bears no relationship to the "case within a case" doctrine in legal malpractice, which is an entirely distinct concept sometimes called a "case for the plaintiff" in that specialized context.
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Why It Matters in Research
This term is almost exclusively a term of historical English practice. Researchers will encounter it in primary and secondary sources from the nineteenth century dealing with English divorce procedure (particularly post-1857 Divorce Court practice) and ecclesiastical or civil probate proceedings. It will not appear in American practice materials except as a historical reference or comparative note.
The key navigational intelligence: if you encounter "case for motion" in a Victorian-era English treatise or case record, it refers to this specific filing, not to a general description of a party's position or argument on a motion. Confusion between those senses can cause a researcher to misread procedural history.
Both Black's and Rapalje & Lawrence cite Browne's works on divorce and probate practice as the authoritative sources for this term. Researchers working in this area of historical English procedure should go directly to those treatises. Rapalje & Lawrence additionally cites the Divorce Rules of 1866, which is the regulatory instrument that governed the procedural requirements of the English Divorce Court during the period when this term was in active use.
There is no modern American equivalent that carries this label. If you are researching contemporary motion practice, this dictionary entry is a historical reference point only.
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Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary and Rapalje & Lawrence are in complete agreement on this term — their definitions are substantively identical, and both draw on the same primary sources: Browne on Divorce (at page 251) and Browne on Probate Practice (at page 295). Rapalje & Lawrence adds the Divorce Rules (1866) at rule 147, providing a more precise regulatory anchor.
Neither source provides historical depth beyond the mid-to-late Victorian English procedural context, which is appropriate — this appears to be a term whose usage was confined to that context. Neither dictionary notes the subsequent fate of the requirement, whether it was abolished, modified, or absorbed into other procedural rules as English civil procedure was reformed in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Researchers tracing the procedural lineage should consult the English Rules of the Supreme Court (post-1875 Judicature Acts) to determine whether the case for motion survived the consolidation of the English courts.
The historical dictionaries do not address how strictly courts enforced the requirement or what consequences followed from a defective or omitted case for motion — a practical gap that researchers examining actual court records may need to fill from primary sources or period commentaries.
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Jurisdictional Note
This term is specific to historical English practice in the Divorce Court and probate courts. It has no recognized counterpart in American federal or state procedure and does not appear in civil procedure frameworks derived from the Field Code or the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.
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Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
For modern motion practice context: Pretrial Motions — Motion to Dismiss (The Law Mind Criminal Law Encyclopedia, criminal_200); Pretrial Motions — Motion to Suppress Evidence (The Law Mind Criminal Law Encyclopedia, criminal_199). Note that these entries address contemporary American pretrial motion procedure, which differs substantially from the historical English framework in which "case for motion" arose. Useful for comparative orientation only.
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