Legal Notice
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Notice is the legal concept describing a requirement that a
party A party is a gathering of people who have been invited by a Hospitality, host for the purposes of socializing, conversation, recreation, or as part of a festival or other commemoration or celebration of a special occasion. A party will oft ...
be aware of
legal process Legal process (sometimes simply process) is any formal notice or writ by a court obtaining jurisdiction over a person or property. Common forms of process include a summons, subpoena, Mandate (criminal law), mandate, and warrant (law), warrant. ...
affecting their rights, obligations or duties. There are several types of notice:
public notice A public notice is a form of notice given to the general public, public regarding certain types of legal proceedings. __TOC__ By government Public notices are issued by a government agency or legislative body in certain rulemaking or lawmaking p ...
(or legal notice), actual notice,
constructive notice Constructive notice is the legal fictionThe phrase "legal fiction" should not be construed to mean that the concept of constructive notice is legally invalid. that signifies that a person or entity should have known, as a reasonable person would ha ...
.


Service of process

At
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 ...
, notice is the fundamental principle in
service of process Each legal jurisdiction has rules and discrete terminology regarding the appropriate procedures for serving legal documents on a person being sued or subject to legal proceedings. In the U.S. legal system, service of process is the procedure ...
. In this case, the service of process puts the
defendant In court proceedings, a defendant is a person or object who is the party either accused of committing a crime in criminal prosecution or against whom some type of civil relief is being sought in a civil case. Terminology varies from one juris ...
"on notice" of the
allegation In law, an allegation is a claim of an unproven fact by a party in a pleading, charge, or defense. Until they can be proved, allegations remain merely assertions. Types of allegations Marital allegations There are also marital allegations: m ...
s contained within the
complaint In legal terminology, a complaint is any formal legal document that sets out the facts and legal reasons (see: cause of action) that the filing party or parties (the plaintiff(s)) believes are sufficient to support a claim against the party ...
, or other such
pleading In law as practiced in countries that follow the English models, a pleading is a formal written statement of one party's claims or defenses in response to another party's complaint(s) in a civil action. The parties' pleadings in a case define t ...
. Since notice is fundamental, a court may rule a
pleading In law as practiced in countries that follow the English models, a pleading is a formal written statement of one party's claims or defenses in response to another party's complaint(s) in a civil action. The parties' pleadings in a case define t ...
defective if it does not put the defendant on notice. In a
civil case A lawsuit is a proceeding by one or more parties (the plaintiff or claimant) against one or more parties (the defendant) in a civil court of law. The archaic term "suit in law" is found in only a small number of laws still in effect today. T ...
, personal jurisdiction over a defendant is obtained by service of a
summons A summons (also known in England and Wales as a claim form or plaint note, and in the Australian state of New South Wales as a court attendance notice (CAN)) is a legal document issued by a court (a ''judicial summons'') or by an administrative ag ...
.
Service Service may refer to: Activities * Administrative service, a required part of the workload of university faculty * Civil service, the body of employees of a government * Community service, volunteer service for the benefit of a community or a ...
can be accomplished by personal delivery of the summons or subpoena to the person or an authorized agent of the person. Service may also be made by substitute means; for example, in many jurisdictions, service of a summons can be made on a person of suitable age and discretion at the residence or place of business of the defendant. Jurisdiction over corporations can often be obtained through a government body authorized to receive such process.


Due process issues (United States)

In the
United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
, the right to receive notice before the government deprives an individual of a protected interest is guaranteed, along with the opportunity to be heard, by the
Due Process Clause A Due Process Clause is found in both the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, which prohibit the deprivation of "life, liberty, or property" by the federal and state governments, respectively, without due proces ...
s in the Fifth and Fourteenth amendments. The Sixth Amendment also specifically guarantees the right of a criminal defendant to be notified of the charges and their grounds. If a court bases
personal jurisdiction Personal jurisdiction is a court's jurisdiction over the ''parties'', as determined by the facts in evidence, which bind the parties to a lawsuit, as opposed to subject-matter jurisdiction, which is jurisdiction over the ''law'' involved in the ...
over an out-of-state or foreign defendant on a long-arm statute, the court must carefully select a means of notifying the defendant, to comply with the notice requirement of due process. Sometimes this is done by serving agents of the defendant located within the state. Because out-of-state defendants cannot always be located easily, some state or local laws may allow for service by publication. An example of this would be printing a notice of the lawsuit in a newspaper published where the defendant is believed to reside. Because the failure of a defendant to appear in court results in a
default judgment Default judgment is a binding judgment in favor of either party based on some failure to take action by the other party. Most often, it is a judgment in favor of a plaintiff when the defendant has not responded to a summons or has failed to app ...
against him, such measures must be sufficiently calculated to give actual notice to the defendant to satisfy due process. In '' Mullane v. Central Hanover Bank & Trust Co.'', the core case setting forth constitutional notice requirements, the
U.S. Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that turn on question ...
held that notice must be "reasonably calculated, under all the circumstances, to apprise interested parties of the pendency of the action and afford them an opportunity to present their objections". Moreover, defendants must be notified by the "best practical means" available.


Notice and knowledge

Many
statutes A statute is a law or formal written enactment of a legislature. Statutes typically declare, command or prohibit something. Statutes are distinguished from court law and unwritten law (also known as common law) in that they are the expressed wil ...
include that the accused ''knowingly'' have acted in violation. When a party is "put on notice" that they are in violation, continued action in violation may be sufficient to evidence knowledge.


Types of notices

* Actual notice *
Constructive notice Constructive notice is the legal fictionThe phrase "legal fiction" should not be construed to mean that the concept of constructive notice is legally invalid. that signifies that a person or entity should have known, as a reasonable person would ha ...
* Funding Opportunity Announcement *
Judicial notice Judicial notice is a rule in the law of evidence that allows a fact to be introduced into evidence if the truth of that fact is so notorious or well-known, or so authoritatively attested, that it cannot reasonably be doubted. This is done upon the ...
*
Notice of proposed rulemaking A notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) is a public notice that is issued by law when a U.S. federal agency wishes to add, remove, or change a rule or regulation as part of the rulemaking process. The notice is an important part of US administrat ...
(administrative law) *
Previous notice In parliamentary procedure, a motion is a formal proposal by a member of a deliberative assembly that the assembly take a particular action. These may include legislative motions, budgetary motions, supplementary budgetary motions, and petitionary ...
(parliamentary procedure) *
Public notice A public notice is a form of notice given to the general public, public regarding certain types of legal proceedings. __TOC__ By government Public notices are issued by a government agency or legislative body in certain rulemaking or lawmaking p ...
* Resign


References


Further reading

* {{cite book, last1=Pomeroy, first1=John Norton, last2=Symons, author-link=John Norton Pomeroy, first2=Spencer W, title=A Treatise on Equity Jurisprudence, publisher=Bancroft-Whitney, location=San Francisco, edition=5th, no-pp=y, page=ยง 592, volume=2, oclc=1558400, chapter=Knowledge and Notice Distinguished Civil procedure