equity
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 349 U.S. 294 - Brown v. Board of Education · 1955Most cited · 3,695 citing opinions
Traditionally, equity has been characterized by a practical flexibility in shaping its remedies and by a facility for adjusting and reconciling public and private needs.
How the Supreme Court has restated “equity”
Each Supreme Court definition of “equity,” sized by how often later courts cited it. “Change” is measured by wording overlap with earlier definitions — a rough signal, not a semantic judgment.
How often courts cite the cases defining “equity”
Court decisions citing the 4 opinions that defined “equity” — 5,109 in all, by decade. Counts are citations to the defining cases as a whole, not verified uses of the term. The dip in the most recent years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the latest years.
All 4 definitions, chronological · 1809–1955
- ORIGINAL
In equity, interest goes with the principal, as the fruit with the tree.
interest follows principal as fruit follows tree
We are aware of no rule which converts a court of equity into an instrument for the punishment of simple torts.… If the appellees, the plaintiffs below, had sustained an injury to their legal rights, the courts of law were open to them for redress, and in those courts they might, according to a practice, which however doubtful in point of essential right, it now too inveterate to be called in question, have claimed not compensation merely, but vengeance, for such injury as they could show that they had sustained. But before a tribunal which refuses to listen even to any, save those whose acts and motives are perfectly fair and liberal, they cannot be permitted to contravene the highest and most benignant principle of the being and constitution of that tribunal. There they will be allowed to claim that which, ex aequo et bono , is theirs, and nothing beyond this.
not an instrument of punishment
equity' is defined as 'the value of a property * * * above the total of the liens
property