Sign
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sign
v. 1) to write one's signature on a document, including an "X" by an illiterate or physically impaired person, provided the mark is properly witnessed in writing as "Eddie Jones, his mark." An attorney-in-fact given authority to act for another person by a power of attorney may sign for the one giving the power, but should identify the signature as "by his attorney-in-fact, George Goodman." 2) to communicate by sign language. (See: mark, subscribe)
SIGN, contracts, evidence. A token of anything; a note or token given
without words.
2. Contracts are express or implied. The express are manifested viva
voce, or by writing; the implied are shown by silence, by acts, or by signs.
3. Among all nations find and at all times, certain signs have been
considered as proof of assent or dissent; for example, the nodding of the
head, and the shaking of hands; 2 Bl. Com. 448; 6 Toull. D. 33; Heinnec.,
Antiq. lib. 3, t. 23, n. 19; silence and inaction, facts and signs are
sometimes very strong evidence of cool reflection, when following a
question. I ask you to lend me one hundred dollars, without saying a word
you put your hand in your pocket, and deliver me the money. I go into a
hotel and I ask the landlord if he can accommodate me and take care of my
trunk; without speaking he takes it out of my hands and sends it into his
chamber. By this act he doubtless becomes responsible to me as a bailee. At
the expiration of a lease, the tenant remains in possession, without any
objection from the landlord; this may be fairly interpreted as a sign of a
consent that the lease shall be renewed. 13 Serg. & Rawle, 60.
4, The learned author of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, in
his 44th chapter, remarks, "Among savage nations, the want of letters is
imperfectly supplied by the use of visible signs, which awaken attention,
and perpetuate the remembrance of any public or private transaction. The
jurisprudence of the first Romans exhibited the scenes of a pantomime; the
words were adapted to the gestures, and the slightest error or neglect in
the forms of proceeding was sufficient to annul the substance of the fairest
claim. The communion of the marriage-life was denoted by the necessary
elements of fire and water: and the divorced wife resigned, the bunch of
keys, by the delivery of which she had been invested with the government of
the family. The manumission of a son, or a slave, was performed by turning
him round with a gentle blow on the cheek: a work was prohibited by the
casting of a stone; prescription was interrupted by the breaking of a
branch; the clenched fist was the symbol of a pledge or deposits; the right
hand was the gift of faith and confidence. The indenture of covenants was a
broken straw; weights and, scales were introduced into every payment, and
the heir who accepted a testament, was sometimes obliged to snap his
fingers, to cast away his garments, and to leap and dance with real or
affected transport. If a citizen pursued any stolen goods into a neighbor's
house, he concealed his nakedness with a linen towel, and hid his. face with
a mask or basin, lest he should encounter the eyes of a virgin or a matron.
In a civil action, the plaintiff touched the ear of his witness seized his
reluctant adversary by the neck and implored, in solemn lamentation, the aid
of his fellow citizens. The two competitors grasped each other's hand, as if
they stood prepared for combat before the tribunal of the praetor: he
commanded them to produce the object of the dispute; they went, they
returned with measured steps, and a clod of earth was cast at his feet to
represent the field for which they contended. This occult science of the
words and actions of law, was the inheritance of the pontiffs and
patricians. Like the Chaldean astrologers, they announced to their clients
the days of business and repose; these important trifles wore interwoven
with the religion of Numa; and, after the publication of the Twelve Tables,
the Roman people were still enslaved by the ignorance of judicial
proceedings. The treachery of some plebeian officers at length revealed the
profitable mystery: in a more enlightened age, the legal actions were
derided and observed; and the same antiquity which sanctified the practice,
obliterated the use and meaning, of this primitive language."
SIGN, measures. In angular measures, a sign is equal to thirty degrees. Vide Measure.
SIGN, mer. law. A board, tin or other substance, on which is painted the
name and business of a merchant or tradesman.
2. Every man has a right to adopt such a sign as he may please to
select, but he has no right to use another's name, without his consent. See
Dall. Dict. mot Propriete Industrielle, and the article Trade marks.
TO SIGN. To write one's name to an instrument of writing in order to give
the effect intended; the name thus written is called a signature.
2. The signature is usually made at the bottom of the instrument but in
wills it has been held that when a testator commenced his will With these
words;, "I, A B, make this my will," it was a sufficient signing. 3 Lev. 1;
and vide Rob. on Wills, 122 1 Will. on Wills, 49, 50; Chit. Cont. 212 Newl.
Contr. 173; Sugd. Vend. 71; 2 Stark. Ev. 605, 613; Rob. on Fr. 121; but this
decision is said to be absurd. 1 Bro. Civ. Law, 278, n. 16. Vide Merl.
Repert. mot Signature, for a history of the origin, of signatures; and also
4 Cruise, Dig. h.t. 32, c. 2, s. 73, et seq.; see, generally, 8 Toull. n.
94-96; 1 Dall. 64; 5 Whart. R. 386; 2 B. & P 238; 2 M. & S. 286.
3. To sign a judgment, is to enter a judgment for want of something
which was required to be done; as, for example, in the English practice, if
he who is bound to give oyer does not give it within the time required, in
such cases, the adverse party may sign judgment against him. 2 T. R. 40;
Com. Dig. Pleader, P 1; Barnes, 245.