Definition
Taxing masters are judicial officers responsible for reviewing, auditing, and either allowing or disallowing items in bills of costs submitted to a court following litigation. When a party wins a case and becomes entitled to recover costs from the opposing party, the specific amounts claimed must be scrutinized for propriety and reasonableness. That scrutiny is the taxing master's function.
The term originates in English practice. In the English supreme court, taxing masters served as specialized officers whose sole function was the assessment of costs — a process known as "taxation of costs." Their role was quasi-judicial: they heard objections from the paying party, reviewed supporting materials, and issued a formal certificate or allocatur setting the amount the court would enforce.
The function, if not always the title, carried into American practice in various forms, though the office of taxing master as a distinct judicial position never embedded itself as uniformly in the United States as it did in England.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): Defined simply as the plural of taxing master — a court officer who assesses costs in litigation.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): No entry located for this compound term. "Taxing" in general usage referred to the act of imposing a charge or burden; "master" referred to one with authority or control.
The gap here is the word "taxing" itself. In common English, "taxing" is either a verb (imposing a tax) or an adjective meaning burdensome or demanding. In this legal compound, "taxing" carries neither of those meanings — it refers specifically to the process of "taxation of costs," meaning the formal judicial assessment and verification of litigation expenses. A reader encountering this term without legal context would almost certainly misread it.
Common Confusion
Taxing masters should not be confused with special masters broadly. A special master under modern American federal practice (Fed. R. Civ. P. 53) is a court-appointed officer who may perform a wide range of functions — managing discovery, overseeing compliance, conducting hearings, or computing damages. The taxing master is a narrower, historically specific role focused exclusively on cost assessment. The two offices may overlap in function when a special master is appointed to assess costs, but "taxing master" as a distinct institutional title belongs principally to English and Commonwealth court tradition.
Also distinct from a tax master in administrative or revenue contexts, which refers to officers involved in tax administration rather than litigation costs.
Why It Matters in Research
The primary research trap with this term is the word "taxing." Researchers searching historical English or early American sources for this term may initially miscategorize it under tax law rather than civil procedure. Costs and fee-shifting materials are the right corpus.
In English sources, the taxing master's function is central to understanding how costs were handled in Chancery and common law courts through the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Historical treatises on English practice will address taxing masters extensively under "costs" rather than under any entry for the officer title itself.
In American sources, the function exists but the title largely does not. American courts have absorbed the costs-assessment role into clerk's offices, court-appointed special masters, or the judge's own docket. Researchers tracking the American equivalent of the English taxing master should search under "taxation of costs," "bill of costs," "cost allocation," and special master appointments under Rule 53 rather than under this title.
For Law Mind corpus researchers: the Encyclopedia entry at civpro_119 addresses special masters under Rule 53 and is the closest modern American structural analogue. The taxing master's historical function — itemized review of litigation costs — is now most commonly performed by a Rule 53 master when costs are complex, or by the district court clerk for routine matters. Understanding the taxing master's role clarifies the lineage of this modern practice.
Time period matters significantly. English materials from roughly 1850 through the mid-twentieth century will reference taxing masters as active institutional officers. Post-Judicature Acts and subsequent court reforms altered the structure of English courts, and later English materials may use different terminology. Researchers working in Commonwealth jurisdictions (Canada, Australia) may find the title persisted longer than in England itself.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary defines taxing masters as "Officers of the English supreme court, who examine and allow or disallow items in bills of costs." This entry is accurate but deliberately spare. It captures the essential function — examination and allowance of cost items — and correctly situates the office in English court practice.
What Black's does not address: the procedural mechanism by which parties appeared before a taxing master, the standards applied in allowing or disallowing items, the distinction between party-and-party costs and solicitor-and-client costs (each subject to different taxation), or the appellate path from a taxing master's decision. These gaps matter for researchers working in historical English procedural materials, where the nuances of costs taxation could be outcome-determinative in commercial litigation.
Black's also does not address the decline or transformation of the office. The definition reads as a snapshot of a functioning institution without signaling that the role is primarily historical from an American research perspective.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
civpro_119: Receivership and Appointment of Special Masters — Rule 53, The Law Mind Civil Procedure & Evidence Encyclopedia