Oklahoma injunctions: two words on the summons can be the order

Oklahoma procedure · Last verified August 17, 2026

Oklahoma's injunction sections predate the Rules of Civil Procedure most states copied, and they still work mechanically rather than by direction to the court. Two of those mechanics decide when an injunction actually starts to bite, and neither is where a practitioner from another state would look.

The clerk may write it on the summons

Section 1386:

The order of injunction shall be addressed to the party enjoined, shall state the injunction, and shall be issued by the clerk. Where the injunction is allowed at the commencement of the action, the clerk shall endorse upon the summons "Injunction allowed," and it shall not be necessary to issue the order of injunction, nor shall it be necessary to issue the same where notice of application therefor has been given to the party enjoined. The service of the summons so endorsed, or the notice of an application for an injunction, shall be notice of its allowance.

Read the middle sentence twice. In two situations no separate order of injunction need issue at all: where the injunction is allowed at the commencement of the action, and where notice of the application was given to the party to be enjoined.

In the first, the clerk endorses two words on the summons. Service of that summons "shall be notice of its allowance" — that is the injunction, delivered.

The practical consequence is for the defendant. A summons that arrives with "Injunction allowed" endorsed on it is not a warning that an application is coming. It is notice that one has been granted.

Where the injunction is allowed during the litigation and without notice, section 1387 sends it out through the sheriff, who "shall forthwith serve the same upon each party enjoined, in the manner prescribed for serving a summons, and make return thereof without delay."

It binds on notice — and not before the undertaking is executed

Section 1388 is one sentence with two conditions:

An injunction binds the party from the time he has notice thereof, and the undertaking required by the applicant therefor is executed.

Both have to be satisfied. Notice alone does not bind; an executed undertaking without notice does not bind.

That is the applicant's trap. An order can be granted, served and disobeyed without consequence if the undertaking has not been executed. Getting the bond in place is not paperwork to be finished later — it is part of what makes the injunction operate.

Refused once, and the door closes

Section 1389 forecloses the second attempt in two directions:

No injunction shall be granted by a judge, after a motion therefor has been overruled on the merits of the application, by his court; and where it has been refused by the court in which the action is brought, or a judge thereof, it shall not be granted to the same applicant, by a court of inferior jurisdiction, or any judge thereof.

A judge whose court has overruled the motion on the merits cannot grant it. And a court of inferior jurisdiction cannot grant what the court where the action is brought has refused.

Note the qualifier "on the merits of the application." An application denied for a curable defect is a different matter from one refused on its merits, and the distinction is worth preserving in the order.

The court has to find the notice efforts reasonable

Section 1384.1(A) is short: "No temporary injunction shall be issued without notice to the adverse party."

For a restraining order, subsection (B) adds a step other states leave out. The applicant's attorney certifies the efforts made to give notice and the reasons notice should not be required —

and the court determines that the efforts of the applicant to give notice, if any, were reasonable under the circumstances.

Most versions of this rule stop at the certificate. Oklahoma requires the court to make a determination about it. So the affidavit should describe what was actually attempted, in enough detail to support a finding, rather than reciting that efforts were made.

Moving against the order — including for an undertaking

Section 1384.1(D) carries the familiar duty to press the application, and then adds an option:

On two (2) days' notice to the party who obtained the temporary restraining order without notice or on such shorter notice to that party as the court may prescribe, the adverse party may appear and move its dissolution, modification, or require the posting of an undertaking, and in that event the court shall proceed to hear and determine the motion as expeditiously as the ends of justice require.

Three forms of relief on one motion. A restrained party that expects the order to survive can still ask the court to require an undertaking — which, read with section 1388, is also the moment the order becomes binding.

The same subsection dissolves an order the applicant does not pursue: at the hearing "the party who obtained the temporary restraining order shall proceed with the application for a temporary injunction and, if the party does not do so, the court shall dissolve the temporary restraining order."

Damages, with fees, if it should not have been granted

Section 1384.2:

If a temporary restraining order is granted, the party restrained may recover the damages he sustained, including reasonable attorney's fees, if it be finally decided that the restraining order ought not to have been granted.

Attorney's fees are named in the statute, which is not the case in most states. And the trigger is a final decision that the order "ought not to have been granted" — a question about the order, not about who wins the case.

What can be enjoined, and by whom

Section 1381 defines the remedy narrowly: "The injunction provided by this code is a command to refrain from a particular act." It may be a final judgment or a provisional remedy, and "The writ of injunction is abolished."

Section 1382 lists the grounds, including one aimed squarely at asset dissipation:

And when, during the pendency of an action, it shall appear, by affidavit, that the defendant threatens or is about to remove or dispose of his property with intent to defraud his creditors, or to render the judgment ineffectual, a temporary injunction may be granted to restrain such removal or disposition.

Section 1383 supplies a substitute when the district judge cannot act. The injunction may be granted "by the district court, or the judge thereof, or, in his absence from the county or disqualification, by the county judge."

Family and juvenile matters sit outside the restraining-order section entirely. Section 1384.1(E) makes it inapplicable to "actions for a divorce, alimony without a divorce, separate maintenance, an annulment, custody, or similar matters, guardianship or juvenile proceedings, or to proceedings brought pursuant to special statutes that provide alternate procedures."

A short checklist

If you are applying:

Execute the undertaking promptly. Until it is executed the injunction does not bind.
Describe your notice efforts in detail — the court has to find them reasonable, not just note them.
Ask the clerk to endorse the summons where the injunction is allowed at the commencement of the case.
Do not reapply after a refusal on the merits, and do not go to an inferior court.
Press the temporary injunction application at the hearing or the restraining order is dissolved.
Check whether your matter is carved out — family, guardianship and juvenile proceedings are.

If you are restrained:

Read the summons. "Injunction allowed" endorsed on it is the order.
Ask whether the undertaking has been executed. Without it the order does not bind you.
Move on two days' notice — and consider asking for an undertaking as well as dissolution.
Keep your fees recorded. Section 1384.2 makes them recoverable if the order ought not to have issued.

Where these rules live

This page explains what the rules say. It isn't legal advice, and the special statutes that supply their own injunction procedures are not all carried on this site.

How this guide is sourced. Every procedural statement here is drawn from the text of the rules named above, each of which is reproduced verbatim on its own page on this site. Quoted rule language appears in quotation marks or block quotes; everything else is original writing. Last verified August 17, 2026.

This page explains what the rules say. It is legal information, not legal advice, and it cannot tell you how a rule applies to your situation. Deadlines are often short and some are not extendable — if the outcome matters, talk to a lawyer or your court’s self-help center.