DEFENDANTS - The Law Mind Legal Dictionary

DEFENDANTSAuthored

The Law Mind • 951 words

Definition

Defendants are the parties against whom a legal action is brought. In civil litigation, the defendant is the person or entity named in a complaint, petition, or other initiating pleading who must answer the plaintiff's claims. In criminal proceedings, the defendant is the person formally charged with an offense by the government. The term is the plural of "defendant" and most commonly appears in practice when a suit involves multiple adverse parties.

In civil matters, a defendant is not merely any person named in a suit — they must have a legal interest in the subject matter sufficient to make them proper parties. Courts have long distinguished between necessary defendants (those whose interests are so bound up in the controversy that the suit cannot proceed without them) and permissive defendants (those who may be joined because their presence would promote efficiency or complete relief).

In equity practice specifically, the category of defendants historically extended further than at common law. Equity courts required that all persons with a direct interest in the subject matter be brought before the court, whether or not they were strictly adversarial to the plaintiff. Parties who shared an interest with the plaintiff but refused to join as co-plaintiffs could themselves be realigned as defendants for procedural purposes.

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Common Confusion

The term is sometimes loosely applied to anyone named in litigation, but precision matters in research. A defendant in the strict sense is a party against whom process is prayed or relief is sought — not merely an interested party, a garnishee, or an intervenor. In equity pleading, the line between a co-plaintiff realigned as a defendant and a true adverse defendant was meaningful: the former might share the plaintiff's ultimate interest while occupying the procedural position of defendant solely because they declined to join the suit voluntarily.

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Why It Matters in Research

Understanding who qualifies as a defendant — and who must be made one — is essential when working with historical equity pleadings, where the failure to join necessary defendants was a ground for dismissal or abatement. Bouvier's entries reflect the equity practice rule that all parties with a direct and immediate legal interest must be before the court, a principle that generated extensive satellite litigation over joinder. Researchers working with pre-merger equity records (before the merger of law and equity under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure in 1938) will encounter this doctrine repeatedly.

The distinction between legal and equitable defendants also affects how relief was framed. In equity, defendants could include parties whose interests were aligned with each other but adverse to the plaintiff in a technical sense — for example, co-owners of property who disagreed about a transaction's validity. Modern pleading under notice-pleading regimes absorbs much of this into the compulsory and permissive joinder rules, but the older vocabulary persists in reported opinions and treatises throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Researchers should also note that the identity of the proper defendants in contract actions was governed by the instrument itself: specialty contracts pointed to specific obligors; simple contracts named those expressly or impliedly liable. This distinction between specialty and simple contract defendants carries forward into questions about privity and third-party liability.

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Historical Dictionary Support

Bouvier's treatment of defendants is notably procedure-centered rather than definitional. Rather than offering a clean statement of what a defendant is, Bouvier organizes the entry around who must or may be made a defendant in various classes of suits — contract, tort, and equity. This reflects the pleading culture of the era: the question practitioners faced was not the abstract meaning of the word but the practical rule for assembling parties correctly.

Bouvier consistently emphasizes the equity principle that those who share an interest with the plaintiff but refuse to join must be made defendants — a rule drawn from Chancery practice and illustrated across multiple citation strings in the entry. The underlying rationale was that equity required a complete decree binding all interested parties, and courts could not grant full relief if someone with a stake in the outcome was absent.

For tort defendants specifically, Bouvier follows the general principle that the person who committed the tortious act or asserted the adverse title is the proper defendant, but extends this to acts done through agents and even to owners of mischievous animals — reflecting the vicarious and strict liability doctrines of the period in their early common law formulation.

What Bouvier does not address is the criminal defendant, a usage that became increasingly prominent in the nineteenth century. Historical dictionary sources of this era tend to treat "defendant" primarily through the lens of civil and equity pleading; researchers seeking the procedural rights of criminal defendants must look elsewhere in the corpus.

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Jurisdictional Note

The rules governing who must be named as a defendant — particularly the distinction between necessary and permissive parties — vary between federal and state courts and between law and equity traditions. Federal practice under Rule 19 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure governs required joinder; state courts may apply different standards. In equity-origin proceedings such as trust litigation or contract rescission, state courts may retain older joinder requirements closer to the Bouvier-era rules.

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Encyclopedia Cross-Reference

Remedies & Equity Encyclopedia: "Balancing of Hardships — Disproportionate Burden on the Defendant as a Defense to Equitable Relief"

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DEFENDANTSmain

Bouvier's Law Dictionary • 1928

In general, all persons in- terested in the subject-matter of a suit who cannot be made plaintiffs should be made defendants. They may claim under differ- ent rights if they possess an interest cen- tering in the point in issue; 4 Cow. 682. In order to obtain the rescission of a contract of sale, all of the parties interested in the property involved must be brought before the court; 52 Kan. 227. Bills for discovery need not contain all the parties interested as defendants; 1 M'Cord, Ch. 801; and a person may be joined merely as defendant in such bill; 8 Ala. 214. A person should not be joined as a party to such bill who may be called as a witness on trial; 18 III. 212; 3 Barb. Ch. 482. And see 1 Chandl. 286. Assignor and assignee. An assignor who retains even the slightest interest in the subject-matter must be made a party; 8 Dev. & B. Eq. 395; 1 Green, Ch. 347; 2 Paige 289; 11 Cush. 111; as a covenantee in a suit by a remote assignee; 1 Dana 585; or an assignee in insolvency, who must be made a party; 3 Johns. 543; 1 Johns. Ch. 339; 10 Paige 20; or the original plaintiff in a creditor's bill by the assignee of a judg- ment; 4 B. Monr. 594. A fraudulent assignee need not be joined in a bill by a creditor to obtain satisfaction out of a fund so transferred; 1 Paige 637. The assignee of a judgment must be a party in a suit to stay proceedings; 11 Paige 438. Corporations and associations. A cor- poration charged with a duty should be joined with the trustees it has appointed, in a suit for a breach; 1 Gray 399; 7 Paige 281. Where the legal title is in part of the members of an association, no others need be joined; 1 Gilm. 187. The directors of a corporation may be included as parties de fendant in a bill against the corporation for infringement of a trade-mark; 53 Fed. Rep. 124. When discovery is sought, the officer from whom the information is to be ob- tained should be made a co-defendant with the corporation; 93 Ala. 542. Officers and agents may be made parties merely for purposes of discovery; Beach, Eq. Pr. § 61, n.; 9 Paige 188. Creditors who have repudiated an assign- ment and pursued their remedy at law are properly made parties to a bill brought by the others against the trustee for an ac- count and the enforcement of the trust; 3 Wisc. 367. So, when judgments are im- peached and sought to be set aside for fraud, the plaintiffs therein are indispensa- ble parties to the bill; 20 Ala. 200. To a bill brought against an assignee by a cred- itor claiming the final balance, the pre- ferred creditors need not be made parties; 28 Vt. 465. See, also, 20 How. 94; 1 Md. Ch. 299; 3 Metc. 474; 11 Paige 49. Debtors must in some cases be joined with the executor in a suit by a creditor: though not ordinarily; Story, Eq. Pl. § 227; 1 Johns. Ch. 305. Where there are several debtors, all must be joined; 1 M'Cord, Ch. 301; unless utterly irresponsible; 1 Mich. 446. Judgment debtors must in some cases be joined in suits between the creditor and assignees or mortgagees; 5 Sandf. 271. In an action by judgment creditors for the appointment of a receiver, to take charge of property belonging to their debtor, the payees of unpaid purchase-money notes given for such property are necessary par- ties; 12 So. Rep. (Miss.) 596. Executors and administrators should be made parties to a bill to dissolve a partner- ship; 21 Ga. 6; to a bill against heirs to dis- cover assets; 7 B. Monr. 127; to a bill by creditors to subject lands fraudulently con- veyed by the testator, their debtor, to the satisfaction of their debt: 9 Mo. 304. See, also, 21 Ga. 433; 6 Munf. 520; 7 E. L. & Eq. 54. Foreclosure suits. All persons having an interest, legal or equitable, existing at the commencement of a suit to foreclose mort- gaged premises, must be made parties, or they will not be bound; Tiedm. Eq. Jur. § 441; 4 Johns. Ch. 605; 10 Paige 307; 10 Ala. N. S. 283; 3 Ark. 364; 6 McLean 416; 11 Tex. 526; including the mortgagor with- in a year after the sale of his interest by the sheriff; 4 Johns. Ch. 649; and his heirs and personal representative after his death; 2 Bland 684. But bond-holders for whose ben- efit a mortgage has been made by a corро- ration to a trustee need not be made parties: 5 Gray 162; Jones, Corp. Bonds & Mortg. § 398. A person claiming adversely to mort- gagor and mortgagee cannot be made a de- fendant to such suit; 8 Barb. Ch. 438. Heirs, distributees, and devisees. All the heirs should be made parties to a bill re- specting the real estate of the testator; 8 599. Ν. Υ. 261; 2 Ala. N. s. 571; 4 J. J. Marsh. 231; 5 111. 452; although the testator was one of several mortgagees of the vendee, and the bill be brought to enforce the ven- dor's lien; 6 B. Monr. 74; but need not to & bill affecting personalty; 1 M'Cord, Ch. 280. Where, in a suit to set aside a deed for fraud, one of the heirs did not join as plaintiff, he may be made a party defend- ant, even if he should elect to affirm the deed; 156 Mass. 208. All the devisees are

DEFENDANTSmain

Bouvier's Law Dictionary • 1928

Generally, all who are able to sue may be sued in equity. To con- stitute a person defendant, process must be prayed against him; 2 Bland, Ch. 106; 4 Ired. Eq. 175; 5 Ga. 251; 1 A. K. Marsh. 594. Those who are under incapacity may be made defendants, but must appear in a peculiar manner. One, or more, interested with the plaintiff, who refuse to join may be made defendants; 2 Bland, Ch. 264; 3 Des. 31; 10 Ill. 534; 15 id. 251; 156 Mass. 203. A court of equity even after a final hearing on the merits, and on appeal to the court of last resort, will compel the joinder of necessary parties defendant; 89 Mo. 284. One cannot be made a defendant on his own application, against the objec tion of the complainant; 15 So. Rep. (Miss.) 33; 2 Tenn. Ch. 140. See INTERVEN-

DEFENDANTSmain

Bouvier's Law Dictionary • 1928

All persons having a direct and immediate legal interest in the subject-matter of the suit are to be made parties. The proper defendants to a suit on a specialty are pointed out by the instrument. In case of simple contracts, the person made liable expressly by its terms; 3 Bingh. N. C. 732; or by implication of law, is to be made defendant; 2 Bla. Com. 443. See 6 Mass. 253; 1 Chitty, Pl. 24. Where there are several persons parties, if the liability be joint, all must be joined as defendants, either on specialties: 1 Wms. Saund. 154; or simple contracts; Chitty, Contr. 99. If it be joint and several, all may be joined; 1 Wms. Saund. 154, n. 4; or each sued separately; 1 Wms. Saund. 191, c.; Com. Dig. Obligations (G); 3 Term 782; 1 Ad. & E. 207; if it be several, each must be sued separately; 1 East 226. The presumption is, in such case, that a written agreement is joint; 2 Campb. 640; 3 id. 49, 51, n.; otherwise of verbal contracts; 1 Ad. & Ε. 691; 3 B. & Ald. 89. Alien enemies may be sued; Broom, Part. 18; 1 W. Bla. 30; Cro. Eliz. 516; 4 Bingh. 421; Com. Dig. Abatement (E3); see 18 Wall. 99; 66 Ill. 288; 30 Md. 512; and, of course, alien friends. Assignees of a mere personal contract cannot, in general, be sued; of covenants running with the realty may be, for breach after assignment; 2 Saund. 304, n. 12; Woodf. Landl. & T., 1st Am. ed. 260; 7 Term 312; 1 Dall. 210; but not after an assign- ment by him; Bac. Abr. Covenant (E4). Assignees of bankrupts cannot be sued as such at law; Cowp. 134; Chitty, Pl. 11, n. (f). Bankrupts after discharge cannot be sued. An insolvent after discharge may be sued on his contracts, but his person is not liable to arrest in a suit on a debt which was due at the date of his discharge; Dougl. 93; 8 East 311; 1 Saund. 241, n. 5. See CONFLICT OF LAWS; BANKRUPTCY;

defendantsnoun

Wiktionary (English) • 2026

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plural of defendant

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