MARTIAL

8 definitions found across Law Mind sources

MARTIALAuthored
The Law Mind • 1182 words
Definition
As a legal adjective, martial denotes that which pertains to military authority, military tribunals, or the law of armed forces — as distinguished from civil authority and civil courts. It appears almost exclusively in compound constructions. Standing alone, martial has little independent legal force; its significance lies in what it modifies. The two primary legal compounds are: 1. Martial law — The displacement of civil authority by military authority over a territory or population, typically in conditions of war, invasion, or civil insurrection. Martial law is not a fixed legal code but a condition: the suspension or subordination of ordinary civilian legal processes to military command. Its scope, duration, and limits are contested both historically and doctrinally. 2. Court-martial — A tribunal of military jurisdiction convened to try members of the armed forces (and certain other persons subject to military law) for offenses under the Uniform Code of Military Justice or its predecessors. The term is a compound noun; its plural is courts-martial, not court-martials. Less commonly encountered: martial music, martial bearing, and similar uses appear in historical legal instruments and recitals but carry no independent legal significance.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): Of, relating to, or suggestive of war; warlike. Connected with armed forces or military life. Characteristic of a warrior; soldierly. Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): Of, pertaining to, or suited for war; military. Practiced in or inclined to war; warlike; brave. Belonging to war or to an army and navy, as opposed to civil. The gap between common and legal meaning is not one of conflict but of precision. In common usage, martial is a broad descriptive adjective — heroic, warlike, soldierly. In legal usage, it functions almost entirely as a modifier creating specific jurisdictional and institutional categories. A researcher encountering martial in a legal instrument should immediately ask what compound it is part of, because the adjective alone carries no operative legal weight.
Common Confusion
Martial and military are often used interchangeably in non-legal writing and in older statutes. In legal analysis, however, military typically refers to the permanent institutional apparatus of armed forces and their law (military law, military justice), while martial more specifically signals the exercise of military authority in displacement of or alongside civil authority (martial law), or the specifically constituted tribunal structure (court-martial). Bouvier's treatment under the MILITARY heading reflects this overlap — the two concepts share substantial terrain in historical sources and must be disaggregated when researching specific legal claims. Martial law should not be confused with military law. Military law is the permanent body of rules governing armed forces personnel. Martial law is the extraordinary condition in which military authority supplants civil governance over a population or territory. The distinction matters enormously in constitutional research: military law has a settled jurisdictional basis; martial law's constitutional legitimacy has been contested since the founding era.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers working with martial in the Law Mind corpus face two distinct challenges depending on which compound they are tracking. For martial law: The term's meaning has shifted considerably across American legal history. In founding-era and antebellum sources, martial law often referred narrowly to the internal discipline of armies. By the Civil War era, it had expanded to describe broad military governance of civilian populations, and the legal controversies of Reconstruction — including the Supreme Court's treatment in Ex parte Milligan — sharpened the constitutional debates that remain live today. Historical sources in the corpus will use the term in ways that do not map cleanly onto modern constitutional doctrine. Read period sources in context; the same phrase carried different freight in 1820, 1865, and 1920. For court-martial: The institutional structure has changed significantly. Researchers using pre-UCMJ sources (pre-1950) will encounter Articles of War, not the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Procedural rights — including rights against self-incrimination and the role of defense counsel — were substantially different. The corpus reflects this layering. Do not assume that a historical description of courts-martial procedure maps onto modern practice. Jurisdictional trap: Courts-martial have long been treated as outside the Article III judicial framework. The scope of civilian court review of courts-martial has evolved — from very narrow collateral review, to expanded habeas jurisdiction, to modern frameworks under Schlesinger v. Councilman and its progeny. Historical sources will understate the degree of civilian judicial oversight now available. Cross-corpus connection: Entries touching martial intersect with the constitutional law corpus on separation of powers and individual rights, with the military law corpus on jurisdiction and procedure, and with the historical corpus on wartime governance. A complete research picture requires navigating all three.
Historical Dictionary Support
Bouvier's is the most direct: the entry simply cross-references MILITARY, signaling that Bouvier treated martial as a descriptor rather than an independent legal concept, with substance residing in the compound terms. This is historically sound but unhelpful for researchers who need the distinction between martial law and military law drawn explicitly — a gap Bouvier leaves largely unaddressed. Rapalje & Lawrence and Anderson's both address MARSHAL (the officer) rather than MARTIAL (the adjective) in the excerpted material available — a reminder that historical dictionaries organized entries by spelling proximity in ways that can frustrate modern corpus searching. Researchers searching for martial in historical dictionaries should check entries under MARSHAL, MILITARY, COURT-MARTIAL, and MARTIAL LAW as separate headings, as alphabetization and editorial choices varied considerably across editions. None of the three historical dictionaries provides a comprehensive treatment of martial law as a constitutional concept. For that analysis, researchers must move to treatise literature and case law rather than the dictionary shelf.
Jurisdictional Note
Martial law as a domestic legal concept is shaped primarily by federal constitutional law in the United States, but its application has historically been invoked by state governors as well as federal authorities. State-declared martial law raises distinct questions about federalism and the scope of gubernatorial power that federal martial law doctrine does not resolve. Researchers working on state-level episodes of martial law — labor disputes, natural disasters, civil unrest — should not assume federal precedents directly govern.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
Courts-Martial — Types (Summary, Special, General), Convening Authority, and Panel Selection (The Law Mind Military, Veterans & Admiralty Law Encyclopedia) Courts-Martial Procedure — Investigation (Article 32), Arraignment, Trial, and Sentencing (The Law Mind Military, Veterans & Admiralty Law Encyclopedia) Civil War Amendments and Military Justice — Courts-Martial and Service Members' Rights (The Law Mind Constitutional Law Encyclopedia)
Related Terms
Court-martial | Martial law | Military law | Military justice | Uniform Code of Military Justice | Articles of War | Military tribunal | Law of war | Civil authority | Habeas corpus | Ex parte Milligan | Summary court-martial | Special court-martial | General court-martial | Convening authority | Judge Advocate General
MARTIALmain
Rapalje & Lawrence • 1883
(800) to make an abstract of secretary. He is not a permanent officer, out such a direction, the legacy would neither is he continuously employed. He has abate in the proportion of the impure to to swear the grand jury, and or note for the judge of the nature of the actions tried before him. Second Report of Legal Dep. Comm. (1874) 21. the pure personalty. Robinson v. Geldert, 3 Macn. & G. 735; Wats. Comp. Eq. 55. See ABATEMENT, 24; MORTMAIN. 3. Admiralty marshal. The mar3. Mortgages.--The doctrine of marshal of the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty shaling also applies to mortgages. Thus, Division in admiralty matters is entrusted if the owner of two estates mortgages with the following duties: Execution of them both to one person, A., and then one all warrants issued by the court; appraiseof them to another, B., without B. having ment and sale of condemned ships and cargoes; removal of ships, sub judice, from port to port on removal being ordered; receipt and subsequent payment into court of all money arising out of execution of process; ascertaining the sufficiency or otherwise of bail, and the custody of embargoed ships. Second Report of Legal notice of A.'s mortgage, B. may insist that A.'s debt shall be satisfied out of the other estate (the one not mortgaged to B.) so far as it will extend. 2 Fish. Mort. 704. MARSHALING OF ASSETS.-See MARSHALING, 22 1, 2.
MARTIALmain
Anderson's Dictionary of Law • 1890
And so as to all persons who assist him in the performance of his official duty. 1 The marshal, in preserving arrested property, acts as a bailee, and is responsible to parties interested for its proper care. In the absence of a statute or rule of court, he should be paid his fees when he delivers the property to the person entitled to it.2 The clerks employed by the marshal to keep his accounts are not officers of the court, and so are entitled to fees and mileage if used as witnesses for the Government. Unless a deputy marshal, who is an officer, be actually engaged in waiting upon the court, he is entitled to per diem and mileage if summoned as a witness for the Government.3 See CosTs; EXECUTION, 3; FEE, 2, Docket; JURISDICTION, 2, Concurrent; SHERIFF. (3) In the western and southwestern States, an officer of the peace, appointed by authority of a city or borough, who holds himself in readiness to answer such calls as fall within the general duties of a constable or sheriff. "The marshal elected for the county of St. Louis shall have the same power, be subject to the like proceedings, and incur the same liabilities, on all process placed in his hands, as the sheriff of the county has, and is subject to, in similar cases."" Such marshal is elected in the same manner as the sheriff of that county, for a term of two years. He gives bond to the State. He attends on the criminal and the probate courts, and executes all processes issued by them, or by a judge or clerk thereof, or by the county court of St. Louis. 2, v. To arrange or rank in order. Marshaling assets, funds, mortgages, securities. Such arrangement of different funds, under administration, as will enable all the parties having equities thereon to receive their due proportions, notwithstanding the intervening interests, liens, or other claims of particular persons to prior satisfaction out of a portion of the funds.5 The principle is that he who has a right to resort to two funds, in one of which alone another party has a subsidiary lien, shall be compelled to exhaust the one to which the other cannot resort, before coming upon the one in which both have an interest.6 Davis v. South Carolina, 107 U. S. 600 (1882). As to his duties and responsibilities, see Lammon v. Feusier, 111 id. 17 (1884); Covell v. Heyman, ib. 176 (1884); 3 Wall. 334; 10 id. 308; 109 U. S. 216, 219. The Georgeanna, 31 F. R. 405 (1887). • Exp. Burdell, 32 F. R. 681 (1887); United States v. Meigs, 95 U. S. 748 (1877). Missouri Statutes, sec. 26. [1 Story, Eq. §§ 558, 633. The equitable principle that where a creditor has a lien on two funds in the hands of the same debtor, and another creditor has a lien only on one of the funds, the former may be compelled to levy his debt out of the fund to which the latter cannot resort; or, what is tantamount thereto, if the former takes his money out of the fund in which alone the latter has a lien, he may, to that extent, be subrogated to the rights of the former as against the other fund. Both funds must be in the hands of the common debtor of both creditors.1 See Marshaling Liens. Marshaling boundaries. See BOUND- Belonging to war, or to an army or a navy. Court-martial. A tribunal which has jurisdiction of offenses against the law military by soldiers in the army, navy, or militia. In the strictest sense, a court of justice, organized in pursuance of statutory regula1 Exp. Kendall, 17 Ves. *523 (1811), Eldon, Ld. C. See also Aldrich v. Cooper, 8 Ves. 308 (1803): 1 Lead. Cas. Eq. *78-111: 2 White & T. id. 228-358, cases; 25 Cent. Law J. 228-31 (1887), cases; 11 Biss. 294; 15 F. R. 170; 32 Pa. 103; 77 Va. 248; 1 Story, Eq. §§ 558-64, 633-45; Bisph. Eq. § 341; 1 Pomeroy, Eq. §§ 410, 396; 3 id. § 1414. 2 [2 Story, Eq. § 1180 a. See Philanthropic Society v. Kemp, 4 Beav. 581 (1841). 3 Nat. Savings Bank v. Creswell, 100 U. S. 640-43 Nat. Savings Bank v. Creswell, 100 U. S. 641 (1879), (1879), cases. Miller, J. L. mars, god of war.
MARTIALcrossref
Bouvier's Law Dictionary • 1928
See MILITARY
MARTIALa.
Websters Unabridged Dictionary (1913) • 1913
Of, pertaining to, or suited for, war; military; as, martial music; a martial appearance. "Martial equipage." Milton. Practiced in, or inclined to, war; warlike; brave. But peaceful kings, o'er martial people set, Each other's poise and counterbalance are. Dryden. Belonging to war, or to an army and navy; -- opposed to civil; as, martial law; a court-martial. Pertaining to, or resembling, the god, or the planet, Mars. Sir T. Browne. Pertaining to, or containing, iron; chalybeate; as, martial preparations. [Archaic] Martial flowers (Med.), a reddish crystalline salt of iron; the ammonio-chloride of iron. [Obs.] -- Martial law, the law administered by the military power of a government when it has superseded the civil authority in time of war, or when the civil authorities are unable to enforce the laws. It is distinguished from military law, the latter being the code of rules for the regulation of the army and navy alone, either in peace or in war.
martialadj
Wiktionary (English) • 2026
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Of, relating to, or suggestive of war; warlike. | Connected with or relating to armed forces or the profession of arms or military life. | Characteristic of or befitting a warrior; having a military bearing; soldierly. | Pertaining to the astrological influence of the planet Mars. | Of or relating to the planet Mars; Martian. | Containing, or relating to, iron (which was symbolically associated with the planet Mars by alchemists); chalybeate, ferric, ferrous.
martialnoun
Wiktionary (English) • 2026
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A soldier, a warrior. | A celestial object under the astrological influence of the planet Mars. | Synonym of Martian (“inhabitant of the planet Mars”).
Martialname
Wiktionary (English) • 2026
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A male given name from Latin, narrowly applied to certain historic persons (but some of its foreign cognates are modern given names). | An Anglicized cognomen or given name of the Roman poet Marcus Valerius Martialis, born in Spain in the first century AD and noted for his epigrams.

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