waiver
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 304 U.S. 458 - Johnson v. Zerbst · 1938Most cited · 20,650 citing opinions
A waiver is ordinarily an intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a known right or privilege. The determination of whether there has been an intelligent waiver of right to counsel must depend, in each case, upon the particular facts and circumstances surrounding that case, including the background, experience, and conduct of the accused.
How the Supreme Court has restated “waiver”
Each Supreme Court definition of “waiver,” 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 “waiver”
Court decisions citing the 5 opinions that defined “waiver” — 25,961 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 5 definitions, chronological · 1872–1945
- ORIGINAL
A party may waive any provision, either of a contract or of a statute, intended for his benefit.
a waiver is not a contract, and the provision requiring the Commissioner's signature was inserted for purely administrative purposes and not to convert into a contract what is essentially a voluntary, unilateral waiver of a defense by the taxpayer
tax
an accused, in the exercise of a free and intelligent choice, and with the considered approval of the court, may waive trial by jury, and so likewise may he competently and intelligently waive his Constitutional right to assistance of counsel
constitutional right
The showing should be unmistakable that the Commissioner has in fact been fit to dispense with his formal requirements and to examine the merits of the claim. It is not enough that in some roundabout way the facts supporting the claim may have reached him. The Commissioner's attention should have been focused on the merits of the particular dispute. The evidence should be clear that the Commissioner understood the specific claim that was made even though there was a departure from form in its submission.