Definition
"Of a quo warranto" is a historical heading or abbreviated cross-reference term used in legal dictionaries and procedural indices to direct readers toward the doctrine and writ of quo warranto — a proceeding brought against a person or entity unlawfully exercising a franchise, public office, or corporate privilege to which they have no legal right. The phrase is not an independent legal term of art but rather a classificatory label, functioning as a subject heading under which quo warranto proceedings were catalogued in older legal reference works. Its substantive content is wholly coextensive with quo warranto itself.
Common Confusion
"Of a quo warranto" should not be treated as a distinct legal doctrine separate from quo warranto. Researchers encountering this phrase in historical indices, digests, or dictionary tables of contents should read it as pointing to the full quo warranto entry, not as a modified or subsidiary form of the writ. The "of a" construction is an artifact of older indexing conventions — comparable to digest headings such as "of a mandamus" or "of an injunction" — and carries no independent legal significance.
Why It Matters in Research
The primary research value of this phrase is navigational. Pre-twentieth-century legal dictionaries, digests, and practice manuals frequently organized their tables of contents and running heads using the construction "of a [writ or proceeding]," clustering procedural entries under that formula. A researcher working through Bouvier's, Black's early editions, or contemporaneous practice guides may encounter "of a quo warranto" as a heading rather than a defined term and should follow the cross-reference to the full quo warranto entry rather than treating the phrase as substantively meaningful on its own.
Because both Black's and Bouvier's entries for this phrase are pure cross-references — offering no definition beyond "a proceeding against the usurper of a franchise or office" — any substantive research into the writ, its procedural requirements, its constitutional foundations, or its modern statutory equivalents must be pursued under QUO WARRANTO directly. Researchers who index-search historical corpora and retrieve hits on "of a quo warranto" should account for the probability that those hits reflect heading conventions rather than substantive discussion.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary and Bouvier's Law Dictionary are in complete agreement on this entry: both offer an identical one-line description — "a proceeding against the usurper of a franchise or office" — and both immediately redirect to QUO WARRANTO. The uniformity is itself informative: it confirms that neither dictionary treated this phrase as independently significant. The entry exists solely as an index artifact. Neither source provides elements, subtypes, or procedural detail here, reserving all substantive treatment for the parent entry. Researchers should note that the phrase does not appear in later editions of Black's as a standalone entry, having been absorbed entirely into the main quo warranto entry as dictionary organization modernized.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See Law Mind Encyclopedia: Quo Warranto