Thursday, February 09, 2006

Cumbersome German Legal Term of the Day

Waffenungleichheit: Literally, inequality of weapons. Used to describe a fight/confrontation that is not well-matched.

In German law, used to describe a situation were the prowess of one side's counsel far exceeds the skill of the opposing side.

1 comment:

Andy said...

Since I know you're hungry for more German legalisms, here are a few:

Landgericht (LG) — The main German court of general jurisdiction. Not to be confused with a German court of petty jurisdiction (Amtsgericht).

Oberlandesgericht (OLG) — The first German appellate instance court. Judges on the OLG sit in three-judge panels.

Bundesgerichtshof (BGH) — The German federal supreme court for non-constitutional law.

Bundesverfassungsgericht — The German supreme constitutional court.

All of these are taken from The German Advantage in Civil Procedure (52 U. Chi. L. Rev. 823), an article by John Langbein encouraging changes to the US legal system using the then-West German legal system as a model.

The linked names all direct you to translated versions of the relevant wikipedia.de pages. Apply salt liberally.