LEGAL ACTION

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does legal action mean? 

• LEGAL ACTION (noun)
  The noun LEGAL ACTION has 1 sense:

1. a judicial proceeding brought by one party against another; one party prosecutes another for a wrong done or for protection of a right or for prevention of a wrong

  Familiarity information: LEGAL ACTION used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• LEGAL ACTION (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A judicial proceeding brought by one party against another; one party prosecutes another for a wrong done or for protection of a right or for prevention of a wrong

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

action; action at law; legal action

Hypernyms ("legal action" is a kind of...):

legal proceeding; proceeding; proceedings ((law) the institution of a sequence of steps by which legal judgments are invoked)

Domain category:

jurisprudence; law (the collection of rules imposed by authority)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "legal action"):

antitrust case (a legal action brought against parties who are charged with limiting free competition in the market place)

civil action (legal action to protect a private civil right or to compel a civil remedy (as distinguished from criminal prosecution))

counterclaim (a claim filed in opposition to another claim in a legal action)

custody case (a legal action to determine custody (usually of children following a divorce))

lis pendens (a pending lawsuit)

criminal prosecution; prosecution (the institution and conduct of legal proceedings against a defendant for criminal behavior)

test case; test suit (a representative legal action whose outcome is likely to become a precedent)

 Context examples 

A removal or correction by manufacturer or owner of a marketed product that the FDA considers to be either no violation or in minor violation of the laws it administers, and against which the agency would not initiate legal action.

(Market Withdrawal, NCI Thesaurus)