Intro to Law, pg 46-51

C. Equitable Jurisdiction and the Court of Chancery

1. Equity and Justice

• Equity and common law were rival systems. Equity was associated with the Court of Chancery.

Aristotle, The Nichomachean Ethics

• Justice and equity are neither identical nor generically different. This is weird.
• Equity is essentially just; it's superiority to justice does not stem from their differences.
• Since humans are pretty original when it comes to squabbling, it is impossible to make a general statement that covers all possible specific situations. Equity acknowledges the limits of a general statement and attempts to give justice to the outliers without cancelling in anyway the original general statement.

St. Germain, The Doctor and the Student

• "St. Germain agrees with Aristotle that equity is an exception from the law in cases where the law is deficient because of its generality."
• "And so it appeareth that equity rather followeth the intent of the law, than the words of the law. And I suppose that there be in like wise some like equities grounded on the general rules of the law of the realm."
• A couple of examples are given, one about cattle and the other about bums. The gist is that the law shouldn't have to list all the possible exceptions to an otherwise well crafted rule.

2. The Court of Chancery and the Development of Equity

• Early common law was quite flexible and thus equitable. However that changed as the Chancery lost it's ability to make writs.
• Though the king delegated his power to the common law courts, he also reserved the power to do justice by executive fiat. Thus people could petition the king and his council for relief, not as owed to them by their rights but as given to them by the king's mercy.
• Any suits that were not declared frivolous were referred to the chancellor, who was also a member of the council. At first he was merely a delegate, but over time petitions were decided by the chancellor in his own name. The bureaucracy took hold here, too, but equity retained it's flexible nature anyway.
• At first, the chancellor's jurisdiction was vague and had more to do with the conscience of the man in question than anything else. They certainly didn't attempt to lay down patterns for successive chancellors to follow. However, eventually it was recognized that there were certain types of cases in which the chancellor would provide relief.
• Uses- "If the legal estate in any property was held by A 'to the use' of B, the chancellor would give effect to the 'equitable' rights of B, while fully recognizing that the legal title to the property was in A." Enforcing this over time led to trusts.
• Contracts- if the contract (or other legal transaction) came to being through fraud, mistake or duress, the chancellor would grant much greater redress than the common law was capable of.
• Contracts again- the chancellor would often enforce an obligation created simply by mutual agreement. Common law, by comparison, demanded either a sealed document or a performance by one party to the contracts (covenant and debt). Also, common law would only grant damages, while occasionally the chancellor would issue a decree of specific performance compelling the defendant to fulfill the terms of the the contract. Sometimes the chancellor would award damages as well as compel the fulfilling of the contract.
• If a defendant failed to comply, they would be charged with contempt of court. Indefinite fines or jail terms (civil contempt) were imposed to coerce future compliance, and definite fines or jail terms (criminal contempt) were imposed to punish past violations.
• The chancellor had a lot more freedom to investigate than the judges of the common law courts did, and could pretty well do as he pleased. There were no jury in equity cases.
• The chancellor had a lackey called the master of the rolls. If the MotR heard a case in place of the chancellor, the losing party could appeal to the latter.
• Common law and the chancery were quite bitter rivals. Chancellor Wosley would go as far as to issue decrees preventing parties from appealing to the common law all together, or from having a common law decision enforced.
• The common law courts fought back, of course. Eventually the matter was decided by King James I, in favor of the Chancery.
• After the Commonwealth and the restoration of the monarchy in the 1600s, relations improved. Part of the reason was that it developed rules and precedents that were followed by Chancellors as the equivalents were followed by common law judges. They were still much more flexible and allowed greater discretion to the chancery than common law judges enjoyed.
• Also, after Wosley the chancellor was no longer an ecclesiastic but a secular official. After 1675 they were exclusively lawyers, as well.