Comparative negligence, or non-absolute contributory negligence outside of the United States, is a partial legal defense that reduces the amount of damages that a plaintiff can recover in a negligence-based claim based upon the degree to which the plaintiff's own negligence contributed to cause the injury. When the defense is asserted, the fact-finder, usually a jury, must decide the degree to which the plaintiff's negligence versus the combined negligence of all other relevant actors contributed to cause the plaintiff's damages. It is a modification of the doctrine of contributory negligence which disallows any recovery by a plaintiff whose negligence contributed, even minimally, to causing the damages.
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Famous quotes containing the words comparative and/or negligence:
“The hill farmer ... always seems to make out somehow with his corn patch, his few vegetables, his rifle, and fishing rod. This self-contained economy creates in the hillman a comparative disinterest in the world’s affairs, along with a disdain of lowland ways. “I don’t go to question the good Lord in his wisdom,” runs the phrasing attributed to a typical mountaineer, “but I jest cain’t see why He put valleys in between the hills.””
—Administration in the State of Arka, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“The negligence of Nature wide and wild,
Where, undisguised by mimic art, she spreads
Unbounded beauty to the roving eye.”
—James Thomson (1700–1748)