Definition
An adjective meaning significant in degree, amount, or weight. In legal usage, "considerable" most often appears as a qualifying descriptor — most notably in criminal law, where it describes the threshold of provocation sufficient to reduce a charge from murder to manslaughter, and in contract and tort law, where it signals that something is meaningfully substantial rather than trivial or nominal. The term is not a term of art with a fixed legal definition; it is a descriptive word whose legal significance depends entirely on context and, often, on judicial instruction.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): Significant; worth considering. Large in amount.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1813): Worthy of consideration, borne in mind, or attended to. Of some distinction; noteworthy; influential; respectable. Of importance or value.
The legal and common meanings of "considerable" are not sharply opposed — both carry the idea of meaningful weight or significance. The problem in legal contexts is precision, not divergence: ordinary usage leaves the threshold entirely to the listener's judgment, which is exactly the defect Bouvier identifies. When a court instructs a jury using this word without further definition, each juror applies their own intuitive sense of "considerable," producing inconsistent results. The legal risk is not that the word means something unexpected, but that it means something slightly different to every person who hears it.
Common Confusion
CONSIDERABLE vs. CONSIDERATION: These are not related legal terms despite visual and phonetic similarity. "Consideration" is a foundational doctrine of contract law — the bargained-for exchange that makes a promise enforceable. "Considerable" is an ordinary adjective that may appear in contract, criminal, or tort discussions. No legal doctrine turns on whether something is described as "considerable." The confusion arises most often for new researchers scanning historical contract sources, where sentences like "the consideration was considerable in value" appear and can momentarily look like a legal standard.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers will encounter "considerable" most frequently in two distinct doctrinal contexts, and conflating them will produce confusion.
First, in criminal law — particularly in older treatises and jury charge discussions — "considerable" appears as the standard adjective modifying "provocation." Formulations like "considerable provocation" or "considerable excitement of passion" were common in 19th- and early 20th-century jury instructions for manslaughter. Bouvier flags directly that this usage is "inexact and indefinite." When reading historical case law or treatises on homicide, treat "considerable provocation" as a placeholder for a standard that was still being worked out, not as a defined threshold. Modern formulations have largely replaced it with more structured tests (heat of passion, adequate provocation), but historical sources will use the older language.
Second, in contract and commercial law, "considerable" appears in discussions of consideration — though as an adjective describing value or adequacy, not as a synonym for the doctrine of consideration itself. When a source says a sum is "considerable," it is making a factual or rhetorical claim about sufficiency, not invoking legal consideration as a doctrine. Researchers consulting historical contract sources should watch for this conflation, especially given the visual similarity to "consideration."
A third research trap: "considerable" occasionally appears in tort contexts to describe damages, injury, or interference. Again, no fixed standard attaches to the word itself. If a source uses "considerable damage" as an element, look for accompanying judicial gloss or statutory definition — the word alone carries no independent legal weight.
When indexing or searching historical sources, "considerable" will surface in many non-technical contexts. Filter by surrounding doctrinal language before treating any instance as legally significant.
Historical Dictionary Support
Bouvier's treatment is brief but pointed. He identifies the term as it appears in criminal law textwriting on manslaughter, and his critique is direct: "at best inexact and indefinite, and unless explained by the court, is well calculated to confuse or mislead the jury." Bouvier notes the subjective problem explicitly — what one juror considers considerable, another may not, absent judicial instruction. This is a recurring critique in 19th-century evidence and criminal law commentary, reflecting a broader jurisprudential tension between flexible standards and jury guidance.
Webster's 1913 shows that "considerable" carried a double meaning in general usage: both "worth considering" (a qualitative judgment) and "of importance or value" (a quantitative one). Legal usage drew on both senses simultaneously, which compounded the vagueness Bouvier identifies.
What historical dictionaries miss: neither Bouvier nor Webster's addresses the contract-law adjacent usage, where "considerable" sometimes appears in discussions of adequacy of consideration. Historical legal dictionaries tend to treat "consideration" (the doctrine) thoroughly while leaving "considerable" (the adjective) as a marginal entry. Researchers should not expect historical sources to provide a synthesized account of the word across doctrinal contexts.
Jurisdictional Note
No jurisdiction treats "considerable" as a defined legal term. Its significance is entirely context-dependent. Jurisdictions have varied historically in how much weight they place on jury instruction language involving "considerable provocation" — some appellate courts have reversed manslaughter convictions where instructions used the word without further definition, others have not. Researchers focused on a specific jurisdiction should look to that jurisdiction's pattern jury instructions and appellate treatment of manslaughter instruction language.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
Contracts — Adequacy of Consideration and Nominal Consideration (The Law Mind Contracts & Commercial Law Encyclopedia)
Contracts — Past Consideration and Moral Obligation (The Law Mind Contracts & Commercial Law Encyclopedia)