Final judgment
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 302 U.S. 211 - Berman v. United States · 1937Most cited · 1,342 citing opinions
criminal
Final judgment in a criminal case means sentence. The sentence is the judgment. The judgment is final for the purpose of appeal when it terminates the litigation between the parties on the merits and leaves nothing to be done but to enforce by execution what has been determined.
How the Supreme Court has restated “Final judgment”
Each Supreme Court definition of “Final judgment,” sized by how often later courts cited it. “Change” is measured by wording overlap with earlier definitions — a rough signal, not a semantic judgment.
How often courts cite the cases defining “Final judgment”
Court decisions citing the 19 opinions that defined “Final judgment” — 7,125 in all, by decade. Counts are citations to the defining cases as a whole, not verified uses of the term. The dip in the most recent years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the latest years.
All 20 definitions, chronological · 1848–1963
- 1848·47 U.S. 31 - The President Directors and Company of the Bank of the United States v. Henry K William[p71]· cited 112×ORIGINAL
A mere error in law, of any kind, supposed to have been rendered in a judgment of a court at a previous term, is never a sufficient justification for revising and annulling it, at a subsequent term, in this summary way, on motion.
power of court at subsequent term
a judgment cannot be regarded as final, in the sense of the act, until entered in a court from which execution can issue.
Appellate jurisdiction of this court in writs of error, under the twenty-second section of the Judiciary Act, is confined to final judgments by the express words of the section... Such an order is not a final judgment in any sense within the meaning of the twenty-second section of the Judiciary Act.
But the judgment rendered in that court is not final either in form or substance. It reverses the judgment in the district court, vacates the commissioners' award, and requires that the compensation be ascertained anew through a trial by jury. Thus, it puts at large the principal matter in controversy, and refers it to the district court for solution in the mode indicated. It is therefore essentially interlocutory, and cannot be the subject of a writ of error from this court.
interlocutory order distinguished
In the absence of statute providing otherwise, the general principle obtains that a court cannot set aside or alter its final judgment after the expiration of the term at which it was entered, unless the proceeding for that purpose was begun during that term.
- 1916·240 U.S. 564 - Detroit Mackinac Railway Company v. Michigan Railroad Commission[p17]· cited 36×
All judgments and decrees which determine the particular cause are final in the sense of the statute. This view has prevailed through a century of practices in reviewing judgments and decrees dismissing causes for want of jurisdiction or for other reasons not decisive of the merits.
In a criminal case final judgment means sentence; and a void order purporting permanently to suspend sentence is neither a final nor a valid judgment.
criminal case
If a judgment has been entered which terminates the action with respect to such a claim, it is final for purposes of appeal under § 128 of the Judicial Code. Those two claims arose out of wholly separate and distinct transactions or engagements.
the test is not whether under local rules of practice the judgment is denominated final ... but rather whether the record shows that the order of the appellate court has in fact fully adjudicated rights and that the adjudication is not subject to further review by a state court
the judgment is final for the purpose of appeal 'when it terminates the litigation * * * on the merits' and 'leaves nothing to be done but to enforce by execution what has been determined.
criminal
Final it must be in two senses: it must be subject to no further review or correction in any other state tribunal; it must also be final as an effective determination of the litigation and not of merely interlocutory or intermediate steps therein. It must be the final word of a final court.
a judgment directing immediate delivery of physical property is reviewable and is to be deemed dissociated from a provision for an accounting even though that is decreed in the same order. In effect, such a controversy is a multiple litigation allowing review of the adjudication which is concluded because it is independent of, and unaffected by, another litigation with which it happens to be entangled.
the test is not whether under local rules of practice the judgment is denominated final * * * but rather whether the record shows that the order of the appellate court has in fact fully adjudicated rights and that that adjudication is not subject to further review by a state court.
It established legal rights and relationships. It told the employer, subject to judicial review, with whom he could not refuse to negotiate without risk of sanctions. The character of the certification was therefore such as to make it reviewable under the appropriate standards for exercise of the federal judicial power.
state labor board certification
- 1952·344 U.S. 206 - Federal Trade Commission v. Minneapolis-Honeywell Regulator Co.[p17]· cited 647×
Only when the lower court changes matters of substance, or resolves a genuine ambiguity, in a judgment previously rendered should the period within which an appeal must be taken or a petition for certiorari filed begin to run anew. The test is a practical one. The question is whether the lower court, in its second order, has disturbed or revised legal rights and obligations which, by its prior judgment, had been plainly and properly settled with finality.
certiorari timeliness
a 'judgment' or 'decision' is final for the purpose of appeal only 'when it terminates the litigation between the parties on the merits of the case, and leaves nothing to be done but to enforce by execution what has been determined.
Final judgment in a criminal case means sentence. The sentence is the judgment.
criminal
another order of absolute dismissal after expiration of the time allowed for amendment is required to make a final disposition of the cause; an order granting leave to amend does not direct 'that all relief be denied' but leaves the suit pending for further proceedings
that small class which finally determine claims of right separable from, and collateral to, rights asserted in the action, too important to be denied review and too independent of the cause itself to require that appellate consideration be deferred until the whole case is adjudicated
collateral order