litigation
    n 1: a legal proceeding in a court; a judicial contest to
         determine and enforce legal rights [syn: litigation,
         judicial proceeding]

Litigation \Lit`i*ga"tion\, n. [L. litigatio, fr. litigare to
   dispute, litigate; lis, litis, dispute, lawsuit (OL. stlis) +
   agere to carry on. See Agent.]
   The act or process of litigating; a suit at law; a judicial
   contest.
   [1913 Webster]

LITIGATION. A contest authorized by law, in a court of justice, for the 
purpose of enforcing a right. 
     2. In order to prevent injustice, courts of equity will restrain a 
party from further litigation, by a writ of injunction; for example, after 
two verdicts on trials at bar, in favor of the plaintiff, a perpetual 
injunction was decreed. Str. 404. And not only between two individuals will 
a court of equity grant this relief, as in the above case of several 
ejectments, but also, when one general legal right, as a right of fishery, 
is claimed against several, distinct persons, in which case there would be 
no end of bringing actions, since each action would only bind the particular 
right in question, between the plaintiff and defendant in such action, 
without deciding the general right claimed. 2 Atk. 484; 2 Ves. jr. 587. Vide 
Circuity of Actions. 

LITIGATION, n.  A machine which you go into as a pig and come out of
as a sausage.