Also known as: genera · kind · class
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
A general class comprising several species or divisions. In legal usage the terms genus and species invoke taxonomic classification to group related doctrines or offenses under a broader category while distinguishing narrower instances within it.
Gloria Green confronted her spouse after discovering an affair and immediately struck him with a nearby object, causing death. Her attorney argued that the killing belonged to the species of voluntary manslaughter within the genus of homicide because the provocation would overwhelm an ordinary person's self-control. The court accepted the classification and reduced the charge accordingly.
Giselle Guerrero and other borrowers sued a lender for improper interest calculations and sought class treatment. Their counsel classified the claims as falling within the genus of common questions that predominate over individual interests in separate actions. The court applied the predominance test and certified the class.
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Gregory Gates was injured when a contractor ignored a safety regulation requiring harnesses on elevated work. His lawyer classified the regulation as protecting the genus of worker safety interests against the precise harm that occurred. The court adopted the statutory standard as the duty of care.
Gina Griffin filed a diversity class action for small interest recoveries that state law would bar from class treatment. Counsel classified the dispute as governed by the genus of federal procedural rules that control certification without altering substantive rights. The court held that the federal rule governed.
Gareth Glover signed a supply contract in the partnership name for goods regularly purchased by the firm. The other partners later claimed the act fell outside the genus of ordinary-course transactions that bind the entity. The court classified the signing as apparent authority and held the partnership liable.
Greenleaf Farms sought to import agricultural workers under a congressional restriction that expired after a fixed date. Counsel classified the provision as belonging to the genus of time-limited powers that Congress could not extend without constitutional amendment. The court enforced the cutoff.
In law the term functions as a classification tool that groups related legal doctrines or offenses under a single broad category while allowing narrower species to be identified within it.
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The distinction helps identify whether a particular killing belongs to the genus of homicide and then whether it falls into the species of murder or the mitigated species of voluntary manslaughter once adequate provocation is shown.
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Older sales cases used genus to refer to fungible goods that are interchangeable by kind rather than by specific identity, contrasting them with species that are unique individual items.
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…by a writ of mandamus and others by a writ of prohibition. There must then be a jurisdiction somewhere competent to issue that kind of process; where are we to look for it but in that court which the Constitution and laws have made supreme? Blackstone defined mandamus as a command issuing in the king's name from the…