fictitious actions

FICTITIOUS ACTIONS, Practice. Suits brought. on pretended rights.
     2. They are sometimes brought, usually on a pretended wager, for the 
purpose of obtaining the opinion of the court on a point of law. Courts of 
justice were constituted for the purpose of deciding really existing 
questions of right between parties, and they are not bound to answer 
impertinent questions which persons think proper to ask them in the form of 
an action on a wager. 12 East, 248. Such an attempt has been held to be a 
contempt of court; and Lord Hardwicke in such a case committed the parties 
and their attorneys. Rep. temp. Hardw. 237. See also Comb. 425; 1. Co. 83; 6 
Cranch, 147-8. Vide Feigned actions. 
     3. The court of the king's bench fined an attorney forty pounds for 
stating a special case for the opinion of the court, the greater part of 
which statement was fictitious. 3 Barn. & Cr. 597; S. C. 10 E. C. L. R. 193.