Fix definition of hasJurisdiction

[rjyounes]

"when laws and contracts are meeted out"

1. Definition seems wrong altogether
2. "meted" not "meeted"

[rjyounes]

Dictionary definitions of "jurisdiction":

Google:
"The official power to make legal decisions and judgements."

Merriam-Webster:
"The power, right, or authority to interpret and apply the law."
"the authority of a sovereign power to govern or legislate"
"the power or right to exercise authority"
"the limits or territory within which authority may be exercised"

Cambridge:
"the official authority to make (esp. legal) decisions and judgments"

Wikipedia:
"the practical authority granted to a legal body to administer justice within a defined field of responsibility...Colloquially it is used to refer to the geographical area to which such authority applies, e.g. the court has jurisdiction over all of Colorado. The legal term refers only to the granted authority, not to a geographical area."

[rjyounes]

Recommendation:

skos:definition: "The legal body has been granted the practical authority to administer justice within a defined field of responsibility."
skos:scopeNote: "While colloquially 'jurisdiction' is used to refer to the geographical area to which such authority applies, e.g. the court has jurisdiction over all of Colorado, the legal term refers only to the granted authority, not to a geographical area."

[rjyounes]

This issue originally applied only to the definition, but after further thought I also recommend the property name be changed to hasJurisdictionOver; the label would then be "has jurisdiction over".

[uscholdm]

It turns out the concept of jurisdiction is multifaceted. In 2010, Dave and I read a 20-page paper describing this, authored by Lexis Nexis. Jurisdiction can be over a region, but also a subject. A police department has jurisdicion over drugs but not prostitution, say. Id be careful about restictiong the domain or range.

[rjyounes]

Agree completely.

[rjyounes]

Creating new issue for the spelling error, leaving this issue for the definition, local name, and label. These may be subsumed under broader issues.

[marksem]

+1

I agree the definition should change, and I'm good with the local name change as well.

[rjyounes]

@uscholdm There's no domain or range stated - though possibly we could define an appropriate domain. If you're referring to my proposed scope note, that can be reworded:

"While colloquially 'jurisdiction' is sometimes used in relation to geographic areas, such as jurisdiction over all of Colorado, legal jurisdiction pertains to the administrative area rather than the geographic one."

• The United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York has federal jurisdiction over the counties of Kings, Nassau, Queens, Richmond, and Suffolk.
• The FDA Office of Criminal Investigations has jurisdiction over the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA) and the Federal Anti-Tampering Act (FATA).

[uscholdm]

It seems there are three things going on.

1. who has the power, authority or is responsible. Normally it would be a legal body, but not necessarily. Also, I could imagine a person rather than an organization having the authority.
2. what is authorized -- typically the right to enforce laws and administer justice, but maybe the right to make policies or regulations. There could be a number of things.
3. the context in which the authority holds. Often a geographic region. Could be a particular law or a general topic for which many laws apply (e.g. illegal drugs).

So maybe Jurisdiction is really a ternary relationship that we want to stuff into a binary property by combining the latter two things? A binary property would not allow a nice way to capture the commonality between:

• O1 hasJuristiction over LAW 1 in Oregon
• O2 hasJuristiction over LAW 1 in Texas
• O3 hasJuristiction over LAW 2 in Texas

Its not often one comes up with a genuine ternary relation. The only other commercially interesting example I know of is a material having particular purpose when used in a given product (from P&G). For example:

• M1 used as a emulsifier in P1
• M2 used as a emulsifier in P2
• M3 used as a solvent in P2

[rjyounes]

@uscholdm I like this analysis. The ternary relationship sounds good to me.