Legal Dictionary of Pakistan

express color

A feigned matter pleaded by the defendant in an action of trespass, from which the plaintiff seems to have a good -•laim while in truth the plaintiff has only the appearance of one. 0 This pleading was abolished by the Common-Law Procedure Act of 1852, 15 & 16 Vict., ch. 76, § 64."Express color is a fictitious allegation, not traversable, to give an appearance of right to the plaintiff, and thus enable the defendant to plead specially his own title, which would otherwise amount to the general issue. It is a licensed evasion of the rule against pleading contradictory matter specially." Benjamin J. Shipman, Handbook of Common-Law Pleading § 202, at 351 (Henry Winthrop Ballantine ed., 3d ed. 1923).