nominal damages
- noun
- /ˈnɑːmɪnəl ˈdæmɪdʒɪz/
- Formal
:
daños nominales
- A weaker approach would permit courts to provide partial recognition of the promisee's rights by awarding only nominal damages, yet refusing to award full expectation damages or specific performance.
- only nominal damages
Examples
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Permitting nominal damages against governments, when individual immunities block damages against the city's agents, has a few potential advantages.
Academic text (2016) -
Plaintiffs seek declaratory and injunctive relief, nominal damages, costs, and attorneys' fees.
Blog text (9) -
He argued that when a plaintiff only seeks nominal damages (say, for example, $1), qualified immunity should not stand as a barrier to suit against governmental officials.
Academic text (2016) -
The lawsuit resulted in an award of nominal damages for the violation of her rights.
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The jury decided to grant nominal damages to the plaintiff, recognizing the breach of contract.
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Even though they proved their case, the judge only awarded nominal damages due to the lack of substantial harm.
Antonyms
- Formal
26
8.8
Money a court orders someone to pay that is more than payment for a loss to punish deliberate harmful acts
How Much
Surface Forms
Morphology
A learner who knows 'damages' (financial compensation) and a common sense of 'nominal' (small or token amount) can partially infer that this refers to a small or symbolic money award, so the relation is somewhat predictable. However, 'nominal' has multiple senses and the legal nuance — that such damages recognize a rights violation even without substantial harm — is specialized and may not be apparent to a B1 learner, making the expression only partially transparent.
Etymology
The legal term nominal damages comes from the idea of 'in name only': nominal means only in name and old courts would give a tiny coin to show a right had been broken even when there was no real loss. So, nominal damages means a very small payment given just to show that a right was broken, not to pay for real harm.