Reform

To correct; to make anew; to rectify. Reformation: reforming; the making a thing to be what it ought. The chief technical use of these terms is with reference to judicial correction of contracts, deeds, and other instruments between parties. When, by accident or mistake, an instrument does not express the intent of parties, a suit intent, and the justice of the case in view of that intent. The differences in meaning between "reform" and "amend" seem to be two. One is, that reform presents more strongly the ideas of an intention or standard which was not expressed or reached by the original instrument, and of a making the instrument anew (forming it again), to conform it to the true design; while " amend " may suggest the idea of improving the instrument from and beyond its original inception; not stigmatizing it as defective at the outset so much as implying that it is capable of improvement. Again, "amend" is more appropriate to judicial proceedings; reform, to instruments inter partes. See Amend. Etymologically, reform seems to mean to construct or make anew; but its technical sense is hardly as strong as this. The decisions generally disavow that the courts will, in the exercise of the power to reform instruments, make new contracts for parties: the power is confined to the correction of defects; to making the instrument correspond to the actual contract as proved. If it may be said to mean make anew, it must, in this sense, be confined to the document or paper, not extended to the transaction embodied.

Reform act

A name bestowed on the Stat. 2 Wm. IV. ch. 45, passed to amend the representation of the people in England and Wales; which introduced extended amendments into the system of electing members of the house of commons. Reform school; reformatory. These names have been adopted for institutions where juvenile delinquents are confined and taught, partly by way of punishment and partly in hope of their improvement. Thus, in England, under the Stat. 29 & 30 Vict. ch. 117, § 14, where a juvenile (i.e. a person, to appearance, under sixteen years of age) is convicted, whether on indictment or in a summary manner, of an offence punishable with penal servitude or imprisonment, and is sentenced to be imprisoned for the period of ten days or longer, he may be sent to a reformatory