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SANCTION

That part of a law which inflicts a penalty for its violation, or bestows a reward for its observance. Sanctions are of two kinds, those which redress civil injuries, called civil sanctions; and those which punish crimes, called penal sanctions. In the original sense of the word, a “sanction” is a penalty or punishment provided aa a means of enforcing obedience to a law. In jurisprudence, a law is said to have a sanction when there is a state which will intervene if it is disobeyed or disregarded Therefore international law has no legal sanction. In a more general sense, a “sanction” has been defined as a conditional evil annexed to a law to produce obedience to that law; and, hi a still wilder sense, a “sanction” means simply an authorization of anything. Occasionally, “sanction” is used (e.g.t in Roman law) to denote a statute, the part (penal clause) being used to denote the whole. Brown. The vindicatory part of a law, or that part which ordains or denounces a penalty for its violation. 1 Bl. Comm. 56.

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