Definition
In law, "vacation" carries two distinct meanings that operate in largely separate contexts.
1. COURT VACATION. The interval between the end of one term of court and the beginning of the next. During vacation, courts are not open for ordinary proceedings, but urgent matters — injunctions, emergency orders, extensions of time — may be handled by a judge sitting at chambers. Vacation is distinct from adjournment: adjournment ends a session within a term, while vacation is the gap between terms entirely.
2. VACATING AN ORDER, JUDGMENT, OR INSTRUMENT. The act of annulling, setting aside, or rendering legally void a prior order, judgment, or other legal act. A court vacates a judgment when it withdraws the judgment's legal force — typically because it was entered in error, obtained by fraud, or rendered without proper jurisdiction. Parties may also move to vacate for newly discovered evidence or excusable neglect. The term also appears in ecclesiastical law to describe the condition of a church or benefice when it is without an incumbent — the living is said to be "in vacation" or "vacant" upon death or resignation of the holder.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): An extended trip or journey away from home for rest or pleasure; an extended period of leisure away from work or school.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): Intermission of a stated employment, procedure, or office; a period of intermission; rest; leisure. Also: the act of vacating, making void or of no force.
The gap between common and legal meaning is real but partially bridged by the Webster's definition. In modern everyday speech, "vacation" means a holiday trip. In legal contexts, the word never means a personal holiday. Researchers who encounter "vacation" in historical legal sources should resist the modern leisure-travel sense entirely: the word refers either to a formal court recess or to the act of annulling something. The second legal meaning — vacating a judgment — has almost no counterpart in modern common usage at all, creating a trap for readers encountering phrases like "motion to vacation" or "vacation of the decree."
Common Confusion
VACATION vs. CONTINUANCE vs. ADJOURNMENT. These three terms describe different interruptions to court business and are not interchangeable. A continuance postpones a specific proceeding to a future date within or across terms. An adjournment ends a session of court, either temporarily or permanently for that sitting. Vacation is the structural gap between terms — it is a calendar status, not a procedural act. Conflating vacation with adjournment is a recurring error in reading older opinions.
VACATING A JUDGMENT vs. REVERSING A JUDGMENT. A judgment is vacated by the court that issued it, typically on motion, to nullify the judgment at the trial level. A judgment is reversed by an appellate court as a result of an appeal. Vacatur leaves the case open for further proceedings; reversal carries its own appellate mandate. Both terms appear frequently in post-judgment motion practice, and the distinction matters for what happens next procedurally.
Recognized Forms
/SUBTYPES
Court vacation encompasses what English practice organized into named periods — Hilary, Easter, Trinity, and Michaelmas terms with intervening recesses — while American practice generally uses statutory terms with vacation defined as the time between. In modern federal and most state courts, continuous session practice has largely replaced fixed terms, making "vacation" in the court-recess sense an artifact of older procedural structure.
Vacating orders takes several recognized procedural forms: vacatur by stipulation of parties, vacatur on motion (often under rules equivalent to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b)), vacatur as appellate remedy, and vacation of a default judgment for excusable neglect or improper service.
Why It Matters in Research
The two meanings of vacation require researchers to parse context carefully in any historical source. An opinion from the 19th century that says "this order was entered during vacation" means something procedurally specific — the court was not in regular session, the order was issued at chambers, and its validity may be subject to distinct rules about what business could lawfully be done outside term. Those rules varied significantly across states and periods; some jurisdictions required that vacation orders be confirmed at the next term to have full effect.
The motion-to-vacate meaning is alive and active in modern practice, but terminology has shifted. Older sources use "vacation of judgment" as a noun; modern practice tends toward "vacatur" (especially in appellate contexts) or "motion to vacate" (in trial court practice). Researchers searching historical digests under "vacation" may retrieve entries on both meanings simultaneously, requiring careful sorting.
The ecclesiastical use — a benefice in vacation — appears in English sources through the 19th century and in American colonial records. It is largely obsolete in American secular legal practice but may appear in property disputes involving church lands or in historical research touching religious institutions.
In English practice documented by Rapalje & Lawrence, vacation judges were formally assigned to handle urgent matters during term breaks, creating a distinct body of vacation practice. American courts did not uniformly adopt this structure; in many states, the judge's chambers jurisdiction during vacation was less clearly defined and was the subject of litigation over whether vacation orders had the same force as term orders.
Historical Dictionary Support
The historical sources agree almost entirely on the court-recess meaning: vacation is the time between terms. Burrill is the most precise, defining it as "intermission of judicial proceedings; the recess of courts; the time during which courts are not held" and grounding it in Blackstone and Spelman. Bouvier and both editions of Black's track the same definition with minor variation. Anderson adds the useful practical note that all American courts have both terms and vacations, and that term commencement is fixed by statute while term end is determined by the court's final adjournment — a distinction that helps clarify where vacation begins.
Rapalje & Lawrence provides the most detailed treatment of the English vacation practice, including the role of vacation judges handling injunctions and time extensions. This is the only source in the shelf that addresses how courts actually functioned during vacation rather than simply defining the period.
None of the historical sources give substantial treatment to "vacation" in the sense of vacating a judgment, despite Webster's 1913 flagging that meaning. The act-of-voiding sense appears primarily in how those dictionaries treat related headwords (VACATE, VACATUR) rather than under VACATION itself. Researchers looking for historical doctrine on setting aside judgments should follow those cross-references rather than expecting full treatment under this headword.
Jurisdictional Note
The court-recess meaning of vacation is largely historical in federal courts, which have operated on a continuous session basis for decades. Many state courts retain statutory terms and vacations, particularly in older court systems, but the practical significance has diminished with modern docket management. The motion-to-vacate doctrine is live in every American jurisdiction but is governed by rules and standards that vary by court level and state.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See Law Mind Encyclopedia: Court Terms and Sessions; Post-Judgment Motions; Vacatur.