Meaning
A sham or illegitimate tribunal that goes through the motions of legal process while the outcome is decided in advance, usually against the accused. It is used of unauthorized tribunals set up by prisoners, vigilantes, or regimes, and more loosely of any proceeding so biased that fairness is impossible. Strongly negative; implies contempt for the legitimacy of the proceeding. Regional use: General English.
Origin
Despite the Australian animal, the earliest known evidence is American: an 1841 article in the New Orleans Daily Picayune, quoting the Concordia Intelligencer, refers to lynchings carried out on charges instituted by a 'Kangaroo court'. The Phrase Finder's earliest citation for the exact phrase is Philip Paxton's A Stray Yankee in Texas (1853). The term is not attested in Australia before these American uses, and the derivation is genuinely unknown. Suggested explanations include courts that 'jump up' suddenly, a pouch metaphor implying the court is in someone's pocket, a link to Gold Rush justice against claim-jumpers (often repeated but widely regarded as folk etymology), or simply the comical sound of the word. A parallel 19th-century term was 'mustang court', suggesting a pattern of wild-animal names for rough or fake institutions.
Research Sources
References used to check this entry’s meaning, history, or documented forms.
Variants
- hold a kangaroo court
- kangaroo courts
- kangaroo trial
Usage Examples
- The disciplinary panel was a kangaroo court: the verdict had been circulated before any evidence was heard.
- Prisoners who inform on gang members face an improvised kangaroo court that leaves no avenue for appeal.
- Critics called the referendum a kangaroo court exercise designed to confirm a decision already taken.