A learned treatise, in the

law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior, with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been variously described as a science and as the ar ...

evidence Evidence for a proposition is what supports the proposition. It is usually understood as an indication that the proposition is truth, true. The exact definition and role of evidence vary across different fields. In epistemology, evidence is what J ...

, is a text that is sufficiently authoritative in its field to be admissible as evidence in a

court A court is an institution, often a government entity, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between Party (law), parties and Administration of justice, administer justice in Civil law (common law), civil, Criminal law, criminal, an ...

in support of the contentions made therein. Under the

common law Common law (also known as judicial precedent, judge-made law, or case law) is the body of law primarily developed through judicial decisions rather than statutes. Although common law may incorporate certain statutes, it is largely based on prece ...

, such evidence was at one time considered

hearsay Hearsay, in a legal forum, is an out-of-court statement which is being offered in court for the truth of what was asserted. In most courts, hearsay evidence is Inadmissible evidence, inadmissible (the "hearsay evidence rule") unless an exception ...

- a statement made out of court being introduced to prove the truth of the statement - and was not admissible ''except'' to rebut the testimony of an opposing

expert witness An expert witness, particularly in common law countries such as the United Kingdom, Australia, and the United States, is a person whose opinion by virtue of education, training, certification, skills or experience, is accepted by the judge as ...

. There were four ways to introduce such evidence: # Adduce testimony that the opposing expert witness actually used that text to reach his conclusions; # Adduce testimony by the opposing expert admitting that the text is an authority in the field; # Have a friendly expert witness testifying against the opposing expert witness attest to the authoritativeness of the text. # Have the

judge A judge is a person who wiktionary:preside, presides over court proceedings, either alone or as a part of a judicial panel. In an adversarial system, the judge hears all the witnesses and any other Evidence (law), evidence presented by the barris ...

take judicial notice of the text, if it is sufficiently notable that the average person would know that it is an authority (for example, ''

Gray's Anatomy ''Gray's Anatomy'' is a reference book of human anatomy written by Henry Gray, illustrated by Henry Vandyke Carter and first published in London in 1858. It has had multiple revised editions, and the current edition, the 42nd (October 2020 ...

''). Under the

Federal Rules of Evidence First adopted in 1975, the Federal Rules of Evidence codify the evidence law that applies in United States federal courts. In addition, many states in the United States have either adopted the Federal Rules of Evidence, with or without local v ...

803 (18), either party can introduce a learned treatise as evidence, irrespective of whether it is being used to rebut the opposing party. Such texts are now considered an exception to hearsay, with two limitations: # For the learned treatise to be introduced, there must be an expert witness on the stand; # Like a

recorded recollection A recorded recollection (sometimes referred to as a prior recollection recorded), in the law of evidence, is an exception to the hearsay rule which allows witnesses to testify to the accuracy of a recording or documentation of their own out-of-co ...

, the actual learned treatise does not go to the jury, but instead comes into evidence only by being read to the jury.

References

{{reflist Evidence law Hearsay