declinatory

1. historicalnot comparableobsoletelawContaining or involving a declination or refusal, as of submission to a charge or sentence.

   Declinatory exceptions do not tend to defeat the demand, but only to decline the jurisdiction of the judge before whom it is brought.

   1901, Henry Lastrapes Garland, editor, Code of Practice of Louisiana: With Annotations of Henry L. Garland

   2 more examples

   […] that the prisoner should first be arraigned, and might either then claim his benefit of clergy, by way of declinatory plea, or after conviction by way of arresting judgment.

   1765, Sir William Blackstone, The Student's Blackstone: Commentaries on the Laws of England, in Four Books, published 1865

   That case, like the present one, involved a declinatory exception by the respondent State when it was sued for fees for legal services and for an accounting.

   2014, John O. Haley, Fundamentals of Transnational Litigation: The United States, Canada, Japan, and The European Union

plural declinatories

1. historicalobsoletelawA declination or refusal.
2. Synonym of declinator (“instrument for measuring declination”).

   Synonyms: declinator