Definition
STRIKE OFF carries distinct meanings depending on context. The two principal legal uses are:
1. Auction law. Property is "struck off" when the auctioneer signals — by the fall of a hammer or any other audible or visible announcement — that a particular bidder has been accepted as the buyer and is entitled to the property upon paying the amount bid in accordance with the terms of the sale. The moment of striking off is legally significant: it marks the point at which a binding contract of sale is formed between the auctioneer (acting as the seller's agent) and the successful bidder.
2. Court practice. A court strikes off a case, pleading, or entry when it removes or expunges it from the docket or record. To strike off a case is to dismiss or discontinue it from the court's active list. A pleading may be struck off for procedural defect, noncompliance with court rules, or as a sanction. The effect differs from a judgment on the merits: striking off is typically a procedural disposition, not a ruling on the substance of the claims.
3. Professional discipline (primarily British usage). A licensed professional — most commonly a solicitor or medical practitioner — is "struck off" when removed from the statutory register required to practice, rendering the individual legally prohibited from continuing in that profession. This usage is functionally equivalent to disbarment in the American legal context.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): To remove from a list or register; to sever by a blow; to void an obligation or deduct; to print a work hurriedly; to be forbidden from practicing a regulated profession by removal from a statutory register.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): To erase or cancel; to separate by a blow or stroke; in printing, to produce copies by impression.
The gap between common and legal meaning is one of specificity and consequence. Ordinary usage treats "strike off" as a generic removal or deletion. In legal contexts, each application carries precise procedural or transactional significance: in auction law, it marks the moment a contract is formed; in court practice, it is a formal procedural disposition with defined effects on the record; in professional regulation, it constitutes the most severe sanction available to a licensing body. The casual sense of erasure substantially understates what is at stake in each legal application.
Common Confusion
STRIKE OFF is sometimes used interchangeably with STRIKE OUT, but the terms are not always synonymous. Striking out typically refers to the removal of specific language, allegations, or matter from a pleading — a surgical correction. Striking off more commonly refers to removal of the entire case, action, or entry from the court's list or docket. Researchers encountering either term in historical sources should read carefully: the distinction between striking out a pleading and striking off a case affects whether any rights or obligations survive the court's action.
In professional discipline contexts, American sources rarely use "strike off" — preferring disbarment (for attorneys) or revocation (for other licenses). British, Commonwealth, and Scottish legal sources use "strike off" for solicitors in precisely the way American sources use "disbarment" for attorneys. The terms are functionally parallel but should not be conflated when researching cross-jurisdictional standards.
Why It Matters in Research
The auction-law meaning is the dominant usage in 19th-century American legal sources and case law. Researchers working with historical commercial disputes, sheriff's sales, foreclosure proceedings, or chattel auctions will encounter "struck off" as a technical marker of contract formation. The cited case in both Black's editions — Sherwood v. Reade, 7 Hill (N.Y.) 439 — grounds this definition in New York common law and signals that auction rules were not uniform nationally; researchers should check the governing jurisdiction's treatment of when precisely a bid ripens into a binding obligation.
In court practice, "struck off" appears frequently in docket entries and procedural orders in both state and federal records from the 18th century forward. The phrase does not always signal a final disposition. Some jurisdictions permitted cases struck off to be reinstated; others treated the striking off as a permanent removal. Researchers should not assume that a case "struck off the docket" was adjudicated on the merits or that it necessarily bars later refiling — jurisdictional rules varied considerably.
The professional discipline sense becomes relevant primarily when researching attorney conduct, bar discipline, or regulatory history in British and Commonwealth jurisdictions. It is largely absent from American legal dictionaries of the 19th century, reflecting the different regulatory structures governing the legal profession on each side of the Atlantic. Researchers using Law Mind materials focused on English, Scottish, Irish, Canadian, or Australian legal history will encounter this usage with considerably greater frequency.
Historical Dictionary Support
Both editions of Black's Law Dictionary give substantially identical treatment to the term, presenting the auction-room meaning first and then beginning — but not completing, at least in the excerpted text — the court-practice meaning. The reference to Sherwood v. Reade, 7 Hill (N.Y.) 439, appears only in the second edition, reflecting Black's practice of adding case citations in later editions to ground definitions in authority. Neither edition addresses the professional discipline sense, consistent with the American focus of Black's and the relative underdevelopment of formal bar discipline machinery in 19th-century American law. The historical dictionaries are silent on the printing sense (to strike off copies), which appears in general usage but was never prominent enough in legal practice to warrant separate treatment in legal reference works.
Jurisdictional Note
The auction-law meaning is broadly consistent across American common law jurisdictions, though the precise moment at which "striking off" creates a binding contract has been litigated and the answer may depend on whether the sale was subject to conditions or reserve. The professional discipline meaning ("struck off the roll") is a term of art in England, Wales, Scotland, and Commonwealth jurisdictions; American researchers should translate this to "disbarred" for domestic equivalents, while recognizing that the disciplinary procedures and standards are not identical.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
For labor-law uses of the word "strike" in a wholly different sense, see: Strikes, Lockouts, and Economic Weapons (The Law Mind Employment & Labor Law Encyclopedia). Note that that entry addresses concerted work stoppages and has no substantive overlap with the procedural and auction-law meanings of STRIKE OFF addressed here.