5 exercises — practise formal justification with "on the grounds that/of".
0 / 5 completed
1 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses "on the grounds that" plus a finite clause to justify rejecting a pull request?
"The reviewer rejected the pull request on the grounds that it introduced a breaking change without a migration path" correctly uses the full fixed phrase "on the grounds that" with the plural "grounds" and both articles. Option B incorrectly uses the singular "ground". Option C drops the required article "the" before "grounds". Option D omits "that", which is required before the finite clause in this formal register.
2 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses the noun-phrase variant "on the grounds of" followed by a noun phrase rather than a clause?
"The vendor's proposal was declined on the grounds of insufficient data residency guarantees" correctly follows "on the grounds of" with a noun phrase, not a full clause. Option B incorrectly uses "that" (which requires a finite clause) after "grounds of". Option C incorrectly combines both "of" and "that". Option D incorrectly uses the singular "ground" instead of "grounds".
3 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses "on the grounds that" in an RFC to justify a technical recommendation with multiple reasons?
"The committee recommends Postgres over MongoDB on the grounds that it offers stronger consistency guarantees for this workload" is correct, with the plural "grounds", the article "the", the connector "that", and a full clause with its own subject "it". Option B drops "that" and has a subject-verb agreement error ("it offer"). Option C drops "the" and lacks a subject in the clause. Option D uses the singular "ground" and also lacks a subject.
4 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses "on the grounds that" in the passive voice to describe a formally documented rejection reason?
"The request was denied on the grounds that the payload exceeded the configured size limit" correctly follows "on the grounds that" with a full finite clause in the past tense. Option B incorrectly uses a gerund ("exceeding") instead of a finite verb. Option C incorrectly substitutes "for" in place of "on" in the fixed phrase. Option D incorrectly splits the passive auxiliary "was" away from the past participle "denied".
5 / 5
Which sentence correctly negates the justified action while keeping "on the grounds that" intact, describing an appeal against a rejected proposal?
"The architecture proposal was not approved on the grounds that it lacked a rollback strategy" correctly places "not" with the auxiliary "was" to negate the main verb, leaving the justification clause itself affirmative and accurate. Option B misplaces "not", implying the justification itself is being denied rather than the approval. Option C incorrectly adds a second negator inside the justification clause. Option D misorders "not" before "was".