Legal Term: CIVIL

Definition: This word has various significations. 1. It is used in contradistinction to barbarous or savage, to indicate a state of society reduced to order and regular government; thus we speak of civil life, civil society, civil government, and civil liberty 2. It is sometimes used in contradistinction to criminal, to indicate the private rights and remedies of men, as members of the community, in contrast to those which are public and relate to the government; thus we speak of civil process and criminal process, civil jurisdiction and criminal jurisdiction.

3. It is also used in contradistinction to military or ecclesiastical, to natural or foreign; thus we speak of a civil station, as opposed to a military or ecclesiastical stationa civil death as opposed to a natural death; a civil warasopposed to a foreign war. Story on the Const. 789; 1 Bl. Coin. 6, 125, 251; Montesq. Sp. of Laws, B 1, c. 3; Ruth. Inst. B. 2, c. 2; Id. ch. 3Id. ch. 8, p. 359; Hein. Elem. Jurisp. Nat. B. 2, ch. 6.

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