Also known as: vested rights · vested legal rights · vested right
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
A fixed property or legal interest that the law protects against subsequent impairment or revocation.
Viola Volkov has operated a mobile home park on her land for forty years under the original zoning. After the city rezones the area for luxury condos, she continues the park without interruption. The city cannot force immediate closure because her established use created a vested legal right protected against abrupt elimination.
Victor Vargas obtained a valid building permit and spent over eight hundred thousand dollars installing infrastructure for new units on his property. The city later rezones the area and revokes the permit. His substantial expenditures in good-faith reliance on the prior permit create a vested legal right that prevents the revocation from defeating his expectations.
Select any source to read its text and confirm it supports the definition.
Violet Vidal receives a signed and sealed commission for a five-year federal office under a statute that makes the position nonremovable at will. The President attempts to withhold the commission after the appointment. The completed appointment gives her a vested legal right that the law must protect against executive revocation.
Vito Villarreal sues a former president for damages arising from official acts taken years earlier. The former president claims absolute immunity bars the suit. The plaintiff's vested legal right to seek a remedy for the alleged injury survives because immunity does not retroactively destroy an already accrued cause of action.
Vivian Vaughn holds a contract right to supply materials under a city program that later imposes a new minority set-aside requirement. The city applies the requirement to her existing contract. Her vested legal right under the original agreement prevents the retroactive imposition of the new condition without compensation.
Valerie Viera obtains a final judgment against a defendant in a contract dispute. Congress later enacts a statute that would reopen the judgment and alter the outcome. The vested legal right embodied in the final judgment prevents the new statute from operating retroactively to disturb the adjudication.
A landowner acquires a vested right to continue a nonconforming use when the use was lawful when established. The right protects the owner against immediate elimination by later zoning changes. The right can be lost only through abandonment, statutory discontinuance, or a reasonable amortization period.
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Substantial good-faith expenditures or other changes in position made in reliance on a valid permit or existing zoning create the right. Jurisdictions differ on whether substantial construction is required or whether a balancing test applies. The right prevents a later rezoning from defeating those reasonable expectations.
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A purely contingent interest does not create a vested legal right until the contingency is satisfied and the interest becomes fixed. Courts distinguish between interests that have ripened through reliance or final action and those that remain conditional on future events.
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A final judgment embodies a vested legal right that later statutes cannot retroactively alter. Separation of powers principles prevent Congress from reopening concluded cases and changing their outcomes.
…the office gave the officer a right to hold for five years independent of the Executive, the appointment was not revocable and vested legal rights protected by the laws. To withhold his commission is therefore an act not warranted by law and violative of a vested legal right. Second, if he has a right and that right has been violated…