- separation of powers
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separation of powers1: the constitutional allocation of the legislative, executive, and judicial powers among the three branches of government2: the doctrine under which the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of government are not to infringe upon each other's constitutionally vested powers see also nondelegation doctrine
Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of Law. Merriam-Webster. 1996.
- separation of powers
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n.The division of the U.S. government and many state governments into three branches — executive, legislative, and judicial — each of which wields a particular set of powers unique to it and not shared by the other branches, and that the other branches are not permitted to use.
The Essential Law Dictionary. — Sphinx Publishing, An imprint of Sourcebooks, Inc. Amy Hackney Blackwell. 2008.
- separation of powers
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the doctrine, derived from Locke and Montesquieu, that power should not be concentrated but separated. The traditional separation is between the legislature, the executive and the judiciary. A complete separation is unwieldy. In the UK it is nothing like complete, with the Lord Chancellor, the highest judicial officer, and the Lord Advocate, the highest judicial officer in Scotland, sitting in Parliament. Indeed, the Lord Chancellor sits in Cabinet. Members of Parliament sit in the government, and 'the government' in the sense of appointed members of the government extends usually to a very large number of Members of Parliament.In the USA, the theory was carried to its most practically perfect. Executive power lies in the President, legislative power in the Congress and judicial power is in the Supreme Court. However, the need to function and coordinate is achieved by a series of checks and balances that also serve to prevent either of the three organs gaining the ascendancy. The Supreme Court can strike down legislation, but its members can be impeached or its membership extended with presidential appointments while these appointments themselves may not be confirmed by the Senate.A similar situation can be seen in the European Communities, where the Council, the Commission and the Parliament are linked in a series of relationships that are even more sophisticated than the system in the USA because they have flexibility built into their structure, for example, to allow the Parliament to acquire more and more power as it becomes ever more representative of the peoples of Europe.
Collins dictionary of law. W. J. Stewart. 2001.
- separation of powers
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The principle that the three branches of government — legislative, executive, and judicial — have separate and distinct functions and should not operate in each other's realms.Category: Small Claims Court & Lawsuits
Nolo’s Plain-English Law Dictionary. Gerald N. Hill, Kathleen Thompson Hill. 2009.
- separation of powers
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n. The separation of the power of the states from that of the federal government and the division of the federal government into three branches (executive, legislative, and judicial), each of which has specific powers upon which neither of the others can usurp. These checks and balances are given large credit for the prevention of a tyrant ever seizing power in this country.
Webster's New World Law Dictionary. Susan Ellis Wild. 2000.
- separation of powers
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The division of state and federal government into three independent branches.
Dictionary from West's Encyclopedia of American Law. 2005.
- separation of powers
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The division of state and federal government into three independent branches.
Short Dictionary of (mostly American) Legal Terms and Abbreviations.
