9,901 articles
Provincial family law in Canada
Provincial family law in Canada: provincial and territorial statutes, courts, and services governing separation, parenting, property, and support, shared with the federal Divorce Act; Quebec's civil code, superior court jurisdiction, and the March 2021 parenting-terminology reforms distinguish it.
Provisional application of treaties
Provisional application of treaties, under VCLT Article 25, lets States apply a treaty before entry into force; codified in the ILC's 2021 Guide to Provisional Application of Treaties.
Provisional Constitution of 1950
The Provisional Constitution of 1950, or UUDS 1950, was Indonesia's third constitution, in force from 1950 to 1959 and replacing the federal 1949 constitution with a unitary parliamentary republic.
Proximate cause
Proximate cause in law: an actual cause also legally sufficient for liability, limiting responsibility for remote consequences of conduct. Covers cause in fact, foreseeability and directness tests, superseding causes, eggshell plaintiff, and Restatement reform.
Proxy marriage
Proxy marriage: a wedding at which one or both parties are absent and a written-authorized stand-in consents for them. Allowed in a few U.S. states (Montana double proxy) and some countries; U.S. immigration requires consummation.
Prudential Assurance Co Ltd v London Residuary Body
Prudential Assurance Co Ltd v London Residuary Body [1992] 2 AC 386, English House of Lords land law case holding that a lease until road widening was void for uncertainty, creating only a yearly tenancy, and overruling Midland Railway and Ashburn Anstalt.
Pruno
Pruno, also called hooch, prison wine, or toilet wine, is illicit alcohol inmates ferment from fruit, sugar, and water in sealed bags; its anaerobic, low-acid fermentation enables Clostridium botulinum toxin and has caused multiple US prison botulism outbreaks since 2004.
Pskov standoff and double suicide
Pskov standoff and double suicide: Denis Muravyov and Katya Vlasova, two 15-year-olds from Pskov, Russia, barricaded themselves in Strugi Krasnye on 14 November 2016, livestreamed firing at police on Periscope, and were found dead before the SOBR entry.
Psycho Samrat (সাইকো সম্রাট)
Psycho Samrat (সাইকো সম্রাট), alias Sabuj Sheikh, was a suspected Bangladeshi serial killer accused of six to seven murders in Savar in 2025-2026, arrested 18 January 2026, confessed to six murders, died in custody 23 March 2026 before trial.
Psychological torture
Psychological torture is the intentional infliction of severe mental pain or suffering, also called mental torture, using methods such as solitary confinement, sleep deprivation, and sensory manipulation, defined under UNCAT Article 1 and documented via the Istanbul Protocol.
Public access to the Supreme Court of the United States
Public access to the Supreme Court of the United States covers free visits to the building, seats at oral arguments, opinion announcements, and Courtroom Lectures.
Public Citizen Litigation Group
Public Citizen Litigation Group is the litigating arm of the consumer advocacy organization Public Citizen, founded in 1972, which has argued 68 cases before the US Supreme Court.
Public defender
Public defender: government- or nonprofit-employed lawyer representing indigent criminal defendants, also called indigent defense counsel. Rooted in Gideon v. Wainwright (1963); distinct from private assigned counsel; defined by caseload standards, oversight commissions, and chronic underfunding.
Public domain
The public domain is creative material not restricted by copyright, either because protection never applied or expired, so anyone may use it without permission or payment.
Public domain in the United States
Public domain in the United States: material free of copyright, including expired-term works (pre-1931 publications; 95-year maximum terms), US government works under 17 USC 105, and dedicated works; shaped by the 1998 CTEA and Eldred v. Ashcroft.
Public enemy
Public enemy: a person seen as a menace to the public, especially a wanted criminal; older sense, a nation at war with one's own. Known from the 1930s Chicago Crime Commission list and FBI labels on Capone and Dillinger.
Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act, 2024
The Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act (2024) is a central Indian statute criminalizing organized cheating and fraud, carrying penalties of up to ten years since its enactment.
Public execution
Public execution: capital punishment carried out before public spectators, the default for millennia until 19th-20th century reforms (Britain 1868, last US case 1936, France 1939) moved killings behind prison walls; now restricted under international law.
Public executions in Iran
Public executions in Iran (اعدام در ملاء عام) are state hangings at dawn in public squares, often from truck-mounted cranes. Discretionary rather than legally required, they numbered 59 in 2013, 4 in 2024, and at least 10 in 2025.
Public holiday
Public holiday: a legally designated nonworking day, also called bank holiday, statutory holiday, or federal holiday. Median 13 per country (2026); UK has 8-10 bank holidays; no automatic day-off right in the UK.
Public humiliation
Public humiliation: deliberate exposure of a person to scorn before witnesses, historically as judicial punishment (stocks, pillory, rege ribaldum, walk of shame) and today studied for mental health effects.
Public interest litigation in India
Public interest litigation in India, or PIL, is constitutional litigation where any public-spirited person may sue on behalf of those unable to reach the courts, without showing personal injury.
Public intoxication
Public intoxication: an offense covering intoxication in a public place, also called public drunkenness or drunk and disorderly. Varies from criminal misdemeanor in Texas and Pennsylvania to abolition under the Uniform Alcoholism Act and health-led reform in Victoria, Australia.
Public law
Public law is the branch of law governing the state and its relations with individuals, covering constitutional, administrative, and criminal law. Rooted in Ulpian's Roman definition, it is an organizing principle in civil law systems but only implicit in common law.
Public Morals (2015 TV series)
Public Morals is a 2015 American period police drama created by Edward Burns for TNT, set in early 1960s New York City, canceled after one season.
Public nuisance
Public nuisance is a common-law doctrine, both crime and tort, covering unreasonable interference with a right shared by the general public, from medieval English origins to modern US opioid and climate litigation.
Public Prosecution Service of Northern Ireland v. Liam Adams
PPS NI v. Liam Adams (R v Liam Dominic Adams [2015] NICA 24): prosecution of Gerry Adams' brother for raping and abusing his daughter Áine, 1977-1983; 2013 conviction on ten counts, 16-year sentence, appeal dismissed 2015.
Public trustee
Public trustee: statutory office or government agency in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, Kenya, and Singapore that administers deceased estates, trusts, wills, and finances of people lacking capacity, as a public alternative to private trustees.
Publius Clodius Pulcher
Publius Clodius Pulcher (c. 92–52 BC), born a patrician Claudius, adopted into the plebs, radical tribune of 58 BC, author of free grain law and revived collegia, exiled Cicero, killed by Milo at Bovillae.
Puffery
Puffery, or puffing: exaggerated sales or advertising statements treated legally as opinion rather than fact. Spans Carlill (1892), FTC, Lanham Act, securities, and UK CAP Code Rule 3.2.