CITES BY TOPIC:  special law

Black's Law Dictionary, Sixth Edition, pp. 1397-1398, 0-314-76271-X

special law.  One relating to particular persons or things; one made for individual cases or for particular places or districts; one operating upon a selected class, rather than upon the public generally.  A private law.  A law is "special" when it is different from others of the same general kind or designed for a particular purpose, or limited in range or confined to a prescribed field of action or operation.  A "special law" relates to either particular persons, places, or things or to persons, places, or things which, though not particularized, are separated by any method of selection from the whole class to which the law might, but not such legislation, be applied.  Utah Farm Bureau Ins. Co. v. Utah Ins. Guaranty Ass'n, Utah, 564 P.2d 751, 754.  A special law applies only to an individual or a number of individuals out of a single class similarly situated and affected, or to a special locality.  Board of County Com'rs of Lemhi County v. Swensen, Idaho, 80 Idaho 198, 327 P.2d 361, 362.  See also Private bill; Private law.  Compare General law; Public law.

[Black's Law Dictionary, Sixth Edition, pp. 1397-1398, 0-314-76271-X]