Return
Dictionary of Terms and Phrases Used in American or English Jurisprudence · Benjamin Vaughan Abbott · 1879
Dictionary of Terms and Phrases Used in American or English Jurisprudence
1.
In the practice of courts, to return a writ or process is for the sheriff or other officer to bring it back or send it back to the court, with a certificate of what he has done under it; and " a return " or " the return " is the certificate usually indorsed on a writ or process of what has been done. Writs are directed to certain persons, — to sheriffs, for instance, — commanding them to perform certain acts, and, after a certain time, to return the same into the court again, togethet' with a certificate or memorandum, certifying or stating what they have done, in pursuance of such command. This memorandum or certificate is written on the back of the writ, and is now commonly called the return to it; so that, when a writ is directed to a sheriff, commanding him to perform certain acts, and the sheriff in due time returns the writ, together with such a memorandum as above described indorsed thereon, this memorandum is called the sheriff's return.
Browii. Return-day.
The day named in a writ or process, within which the officer is required to bring it back, with an ingiven day; meaning that it ought to be, or is directed to be, returned on that day.
Return irreplevisable
A writ allowed by the statute of Westminster 2, oh. 2, to a defendant who had had judgment upon verdict or demurrer in an action of replevin, or after the plauitifE had, on a writ of second' deliverance, become a second time nonsuit in such action. By this writ, the goods were returned to the defendant, and the plaintiff was restrained from suing out a fresh replevin. Previously to this statute, an unsuccessful plaintiff might bring actions of replevin in infinitum^ in reference to the same matter.
3 Bl. Com. 160. 2.
In England, the election of a member of parliament is called the return of a member; and a man elected to the house of commons is said to be returned, — in allusion to the report or certificate of the officers conducting the election that he is the candidate elected. Other official reports are there called returns; as the returns of the census.
Return-book.
The book containing the list of members returned to the house of commons. May Pari. Pract, Returning of Bcer. The officer to whom a writ is directed, requiring him to proceed to the election of a member or members to serve in parliament. He is generally the sheriff in the case of a county, and the mayor in the case of a borough. (2 Steph. Com. 370, 378; May Pari. Pract. ch. 1.) Mozley ^ W.