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n. 1) donation to a charity or political campaign. 2) the sharing of a loss by each of several persons who may have been jointly responsible for injury to a third party, who entered into a business which lost money or who owe a debt jointly. Quite often this arises when one responsible party pays more than his share and then demands contribution from the others in proportion to their share of the obligation. Example: three partners own equal shares in a building from which a cornice falls and injures Bobby Hardhat. One partner pays the demand of $9,000 for Hardhat's injury; he is entitled to a contribution of $3,000 from each of his partners.