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Legal Dictionary of Pakistan

Quick lookup for English, Urdu, and Latin legal terms used in Pakistani jurisprudence.

Green River ordinance.

A local licensing law that protects residents from unwanted peddlers and salespersons, typically by prohibiting doorto-door solicitations without prior consent. ( The ordinance takes its name from Green River, Wyoming, which enacted the first such law in the early 20th century before others came into vogue during the 1930s and 1940s throughout the United States.

municipal ordinance

See ORDINANCE.

ordinance

. An authoritative law or decree; esp., a municipal regulation. ( Municipal governments can pass ordinances on matters that the state government allows to be regulated at the local level. - Also termed bylaw; municipal ordinance. "An ordinance . . . may be purely administrative in nature, establishing offices, prescribing duties, or setting salaries; it may have to do with the routine or procedure of the governing body. Or it may be a governmental exercise of the power to control the conduct of the public - establishing rules which must be complied with, or prohibiting certain actions or conduct. In any event it is the determination of the sovereign power of the state as delegated to the municipality. It is a legislative enactment, within its sphere, as much as an act of the state legislature." 1 Judith O'Gallagher, Municipal Ordinances ยง 1A.01, at 3 (2d ed. 1998).

pending-ordinance doctrine

The principle that a municipality may properly deny an application for a property use that, although it would satisfy existing law, would violate a law that is pending when the application is made. This doctrine was judicially created, mainly to short-circuit landowners' attempts to circumvent a new ordinance by applying for a nonconforming use on the eve of its approval.

zoning ordinance

A city ordinance that regu= lates the use to which land within various parts of the city may be put. ( It allocates uses to the various districts of a municipality, as by allocating residences to certain parts and businesses to other parts. A comprehensive zoning ordinance usu. regulates the height of buildings and the proportion of the lot area that must be kept free from buildings.