Equities

1 definition found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Equity \Eq"ui*ty\, n.; pl. {Equities}. [F. ['e]quit['e], L.
     aequitas, fr. aequus even, equal. See {Equal}.]
     1. Equality of rights; natural justice or right; the giving,
        or desiring to give, to each man his due, according to
        reason, and the law of God to man; fairness in
        determination of conflicting claims; impartiality.


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              Christianity secures both the private interests of
              men and the public peace, enforcing all justice and
              equity.                               --Tillotson.
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     2. (Law) An equitable claim; an equity of redemption; as, an
        equity to a settlement, or wife's equity, etc.
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              I consider the wife's equity to be too well settled
              to be shaken.                         --Kent.
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     3. (Law) A system of jurisprudence, supplemental to law,
        properly so called, and complemental of it.
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              Equity had been gradually shaping itself into a
              refined science which no human faculties could
              master without long and intense application.
                                                    --Macaulay.
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     Note: Equitable jurisprudence in England and in the United
           States grew up from the inadequacy of common-law forms
           to secure justice in all cases; and this led to
           distinct courts by which equity was applied in the way
           of injunctions, bills of discovery, bills for specified
           performance, and other processes by which the merits of
           a case could be reached more summarily or more
           effectively than by common-law suits. By the recent
           English Judicature Act (1873), however, the English
           judges are bound to give effect, in common-law suits,
           to all equitable rights and remedies; and when the
           rules of equity and of common law, in any particular
           case, conflict, the rules of equity are to prevail. In
           many jurisdictions in the United States, equity and
           common law are thus blended; in others distinct equity
           tribunals are still maintained. See {Chancery}.
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     {Equity of redemption} (Law), the advantage, allowed to a
        mortgageor, of a certain or reasonable time to redeem
        lands mortgaged, after they have been forfeited at law by
        the nonpayment of the sum of money due on the mortgage at
        the appointed time. --Blackstone.
  
     Syn: Right; justice; impartiality; rectitude; fairness;
          honesty; uprightness. See {Justice}.
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