burden of proof

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• noun The duty of presenting a certain amount of evidence in order to meet the legal requirements for establishing the entitlement of the party in a case to the outcome sought.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

• noun law The duty of a party in a legal proceeding to prove an assertion of fact; it includes both the burden of production and the burden of persuasion; the onus probandi

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

• noun the duty of proving a disputed charge