Legal Definitions - inoperative

Inoperative describes something that is no longer valid, effective, or capable of functioning as intended or described. It means a rule, agreement, or device has lost its power, force, or ability to work, or an invention fails to perform as claimed.

• Imagine a city ordinance that was passed decades ago, requiring all new buildings to include a dedicated stable for horses. If the city's transportation infrastructure has evolved to rely entirely on motor vehicles, and horse-drawn carriages are no longer a common mode of transport, that specific ordinance would likely be considered inoperative. It has lost its practical force and effect because the conditions it was designed to address no longer exist, and enforcing it would be impractical or nonsensical in the modern context.

• Consider a clause in a will that bequeaths a specific, rare antique car to a particular beneficiary. If, before the will-maker's death, the car is completely destroyed in an accident and cannot be replaced, that specific provision in the will becomes inoperative. It cannot be carried out because the subject of the bequest no longer exists, making it impossible to fulfill the instruction as written.

• In the context of patents, an inventor might apply for a patent for a revolutionary new battery technology that claims to power a smartphone for an entire month on a single charge. However, if a working model built precisely according to the patent application's specifications can only power the phone for a day, the invention, as described, would be deemed inoperative. This is because it fails to perform the function or achieve the results claimed in the patent application, meaning it doesn't work as described.