Legal status explained

Legal status is the status or position held by an entity as determined by the law.^{[1] [2] [3]} It includes or entails a set of privileges, obligations, powers or restrictions that a person or thing has as encompassed in or declared by legislation.^[4]

Jack Balkin has defined the term by writing, "In law, status is generally a characteristic of an individual that has some legal consequences. Examples are being a servant, a woman, or a minor. Sometimes legal status refers to a characteristic wholly created by law, such as being a Social Security recipient." Thus, legal status is "a feature of individuals and their relationships to the law."^[5] Tiffany Graham added to Balkin's definition: "legal status refers to a set of characteristics that define an individual's membership in an official class, as a consequence of which rights, duties, capacities and/or incapacities are acquired."^[6]

Notes and References

1. Web site: Legal Status Law and Legal Definition . USLegal, Inc. . en-US. 2017-02-26. 2018-04-15. https://web.archive.org/web/20180415063419/https://definitions.uslegal.com/l/legal-status/. live.
2. Web site: What is STATUS? definition of STATUS . Black's Law Dictionary . 7 November 2011. en-US. 2017-02-27. 2018-07-14. https://web.archive.org/web/20180714131806/https://thelawdictionary.org/status/. live.
3. News: legal status - Dictionary Definition. Vocabulary.com. 2017-02-27. 2018-04-14. https://web.archive.org/web/20180414234256/https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/legal%20status. live.
4. Recognition of unmarried cohabitation as a legal status worthy of protection, 1 N.C. Family Law Practice § 1:5
5. Balkin . Jack . 1997 . The Constitution of Status . Yale Law Journal . 106 . 2313 .
6. Graham . Tiffany . 2009 . Exploring the Impact of the Marriage Amendments: Can Public Employers Offer Domestic Partner Benefits to Their Gay and Lesbian Employees? . Virginia Journal of Social Policy and the Law . 17 . 83 .