What is a "lawsuit" bass?
 

Many apologies for the stupid question, but I'm genuinely ignorant and curious. I could guess that it has to do with imports, tariffs, and the like, but if someone could shed some light on it, that'd be great. Thanks!

Copies, identical in most cases, of one brand, usually Fender or Gibson, made my Japanese companies decades ago, before they got sued and forced to stop or modify their designs.

It generally refers to basses which are direct copies of american instruments made in japan in the 70s. Companies like ibanez, greco, aria, yamaha, univox and a host of others copied gibson, rickenbacker, fender, mosrite designs and sold them as their own. The term lawsuit comes from gibson suing the companies over their headstock shape and rickenbacker over their whole body shape and design. Fender did not actively pursue the copies as far as im concerned.

Some people use the term narrowly to mean only specific models that were actually named in a real lawsuit. Some people use it to mean any Japanese copy from that era.

Thanks! Very helpful answers.