EQUITIES
Noun
equities
plural of equity
Source: Wiktionary
EQUITY
Eq"ui*ty, n.; pl. Equities. Etym: [F. équité, 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.
Christianity secures both the private interests of men and the public
peace, enforcing all justice and equity. Tillotson.
2. (Law)
Definition: An equitable claim; an equity of redemption; as, an equity to a
settlement, or wife's equity, etc.
I consider the wife's equity to be too well settled to be shaken.
Kent.
3. (Law)
Definition: A system of jurisprudence, supplemental to law, properly so
called, and complemental of it.
Equity had been gradually shaping itself into a refined science which
no human faculties could master without long and intense application.
Macaulay.
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. 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.
Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition