Definition
A second consideration of a cause by the same court that rendered the original decision, initiated by petition of a dissatisfied party. Rehearing gives the court an opportunity to correct errors, reconsider its reasoning, or address arguments inadequately presented at the original hearing — without requiring the matter to proceed to a higher tribunal.
Rehearing is distinct from appeal: the reviewing body remains the same court, not a superior one. It is most commonly sought after a final judgment or decree, before the case is transmitted to a lower court for execution of that judgment.
In modern practice, the mechanism appears in two primary contexts:
1. Trial courts. A party may petition for rehearing of a motion, order, or judgment, typically within a short, rules-governed deadline. Courts have discretion to grant or deny.
2. Appellate courts. After a panel decision, a losing party may petition for rehearing or rehearing en banc (before the full court). Rehearing en banc is an additional, separate mechanism that seeks reconsideration by the full appellate bench rather than the original panel.
Common Language
Wiktionary: present participle and gerund of "rehear" — to hear again.
Webster's 1913: Not separately defined; "rehear" appears as a transitive verb meaning to hear a second time.
The common-English sense — simply listening to something again — misses the procedural specificity of the legal term. In law, rehearing is not a casual second audience but a formal petition-based process with strict deadlines, defined grounds, and a presumption against repetition of arguments already made. The court is not passively "hearing again"; it is reconsidering a legal determination it has already rendered.
Common Confusion
REHEARING vs. APPEAL: Both follow an adverse decision, but appeal removes the matter to a superior court, while rehearing returns it to the same court. Rehearing is typically a prerequisite to certain appeals and must be exhausted first in some jurisdictions.
REHEARING vs. NEW TRIAL: A motion for new trial (in trial courts) and a petition for rehearing (in appellate courts) serve analogous functions but operate under different rules and carry different consequences. "New trial" implies fresh evidentiary proceedings; rehearing generally does not.
REHEARING vs. RECONSIDERATION: Many courts and practitioners use these terms interchangeably, and some rules do too. Where they are formally distinguished, "reconsideration" tends to apply to interlocutory orders while "rehearing" applies to final judgments, but this varies by jurisdiction and court rules.
Why It Matters in Research
Deadline traps. Petitions for rehearing carry among the shortest, hardest deadlines in procedural law — often 14 days in federal appellate courts. Missing the deadline is typically fatal, and unlike many filing deadlines, courts are reluctant to extend them. When tracing a case's procedural history in the corpus, note that a timely-filed petition for rehearing tolls certain appellate deadlines, including the time to petition for certiorari. Missing that linkage can make a case's timeline appear incoherent.
En banc evolution. The phrase "rehearing en banc" is a modern federal development. Historical materials — including all five source dictionaries — treat rehearing as a single-court, usually equity-centered procedure and do not contemplate en banc review. When reading pre-20th century treatises or opinions on rehearing, do not map modern en banc doctrine onto historical usage.
Equity origins. The historical dictionaries treat rehearing as a creature of equity practice. In merged systems (post-adoption of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and equivalent state reforms), the equity/law divide matters less, but the equitable heritage explains why rehearing petitions traditionally emphasized newly discovered evidence or a showing that the court overlooked a controlling point — not a simple second bite at argument.
Supreme Court practice. In the U.S. Supreme Court, a petition for rehearing after denial of certiorari is disfavored and almost never granted. This is a distinct posture from rehearing after a merits decision. Researchers conflating the two will misread the significance of Supreme Court rehearing orders in historical case records.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's (both editions) confine rehearing to equity practice and describe it accurately as a petition-initiated second hearing following a decree the party finds adverse. The 2nd edition adds case citations — Belmont v. Erie R. Co., Emerson v. Davies, and Read v. Patterson — that reflect the doctrine's practical application in late-19th century courts.
Bouvier offers the most substantive treatment: he identifies the court's own doubt as the principal driver of rehearing, and importantly flags a jurisdictional limit that remains good policy today — that rehearing cannot be granted by the Supreme Court after a cause has been remitted below to execute its decree. This principle (that rehearing is unavailable once a mandate has issued and been acted upon) persists in modern federal practice. Bouvier's truncated entry also gestures at the rule governing judges who concurred in the original decision as a condition for rehearing — a procedural nuance worth investigating in primary sources.
Anderson's entry is a bare cross-reference to HEARING, adding nothing. Rapalje & Lawrence's entry appears to be a misfiled reference to re-grants, almost certainly a source-collation error, and should be disregarded for rehearing research.
The collective silence of these dictionaries on appellate rehearing en banc, rehearing after denial of certiorari, and the tolling implications of rehearing petitions reflects their historical moment. None of these doctrines was fully developed when these works were compiled. Researchers should treat the historical definitions as a foundation for understanding rehearing's equity origins, not as complete descriptions of modern practice.
Jurisdictional Note
Federal and state rehearing rules differ substantially in timing, available grounds, and whether denial requires explanation. Some state intermediate appellate courts grant rehearing with relative frequency; federal circuits treat it as exceptional. The U.S. Supreme Court's rules governing rehearing are among the most restrictive, with explicit guidance discouraging petitions that merely reargue the merits.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See Law Mind Encyclopedia: Appellate Procedure; Equity Practice and the Merged Civil System.