The Blip Blop Blog (Team Entity)

2) Equity follows the law i.e. it works to mitigate and tamper the harshness of the law. Equity does not overrule common law judgments or decisions but rather acts in personam i.e. its decisions effect only those who are party to it and does not affect others. In Re Diplock (1948) for example, the rightful beneficiary was entitled to trace monies that were wrongfully paid to a charity. Despite the fact that the transfer was legal, the beneficiary had an equitable right to it and therefore the beneficiary was allowed to trace (tracing allows the rightful owner to recover property and monies that were wrongly given to another or transferred without the consent of the rightful owner) the monies. Copyright © 2019 by Dyarne Jessica Ward

Following the passing of the Judicature Acts of 1873 – 1875, cases were decided by a single court system, on the basis that in case of conflict between common law and equity, equity will prevail. Since the inception of equity, as an adjudicating mechanism, a series of rules had evolved to facilitate its workings and to help others, especially litigants, understand its more salient features. These rules became known as equitable maxims and below are some of the more commonly known equitable maxims: - 1) Equity varies with the length of the Lord Chancellor's foot. This maxim simply means that equity does not operate on a system of binding precedent and a court of equity does not decide like cases in like manner but rather decides each case on its facts, keeping in mind or taking into account what is fair and just. Therefore, there is always the possibility with regards to equitable decisions, that even if the facts were the same in two cases, the decision might be differe

Despite the merits of having a dual court system, i.e. an additional or a higher court, where a genuinely aggrieved litigant could have his or her concerns addressed, it nonetheless did create a certain amount of confusion. The law as far as possible has to be transparent and every citizen, where possible, should be aware of his or her rights, and should a matter go to trial, the litigants should be able to some degree predict the outcome. To remedy the shortcomings of the dual system and to create some form of uniformity, parliament passed the Judicature Acts of 1873 and 1875. Under the 1873 Act the old higher courts were abolished and a new Supreme Court of Judicature was created consisting of the High Court of Justice and the Court of Appeal. The High Court was divided into five specialist divisional courts based on the old central courts (King’s Bench, Common Pleas, Exchequer, and Chancery), with the addition of the new Probate, Divorce and Admiralty division. Equity wa