america's favorite f-words: "founding fathers"

[rone]

Amendment VII

In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise reexamined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

The question i have is, what does twenty 1789 dollars come out to be in today's currency?

Oh, and another question: why twenty dollars?

Comments

[rwx.livejournal.com]

i'd guess that it'd be about 450USD.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Is that an educated guess or PFA?

[rwx.livejournal.com]

educated guess. I'M A LIBERRIAN.

Althought it should be noted that there are like 10 or so different ways to compare the value of money and that's one of the common ones (consumer price index.)

If you did it through something like relative income of an average person, you'd probably get a wildly different number, probably between 8K - 10K due to the fact that most americans lived on farmishes and grew their own foodish at that point.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

I salute your work, sir.

[schwa242.livejournal.com]

Oh, and another question: why twenty dollars?

I'm not biting.

[tomscud.livejournal.com]

Not from a clocktower.

[cheesetruck.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure that's where you draw the line of 'not really worth filling up the courts with small items' - i.e. small claims vs other courts.

But, given how lawyers can't deal with things that aren't 'exact' I'm surprized it wasn't amended or revised to read 'twenty dollars of value, or the equivalent with inflation to the date of trial' or something.

But I hate lawyers and law anyway.

[dr-strych9.livejournal.com]

You have, of course, read the Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seventh_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution) article, yes?

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Heavens to Betsy, Wikipedia you say? What will the Internet wiz kids think of next?

I hadn't read it, no. And now that i have, it is of no help to my inquiries. Of course, now i'm wondering if my interpretation, that the FRCP has essentially invalidated the 7th Amendment, is at all valid.

[dr-strych9.livejournal.com]

No, just muddled the distinction between matters of common law and equity. The twenty dollars figure is a kinda vestigial thing in the law now. The thing you care about now is what the figure has to be for you to get out of small claims court.

Why is this burning a hole in your hat?

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Just idly pondering the scads of legacy code we have in our Constitution. Or not even legacy code so much as driver code for a device that was EOLed decades ago.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

I've often thought that in the technology of the modern democratic republic we suffer somewhat from early adopter troubles.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

More like modern democratic republics suffer from second-system effect...

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

Some of that too.

[eejitalmuppet.livejournal.com]

You have early adopter troubles with your democracy (I'm cheerfully ignoring the "republic" part)? Try having an unelected second chamber.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

I'll admit that not even the current US administration has seriously proposed anything this scary. (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1072-2049791,00.html)

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

...on the other hand, they do have the strange tendency to insist that the President's status as commander-in-chief of the armed forces somehow makes all checks on executive power inoperative.

[eejitalmuppet.livejournal.com]

Indeedy, and I have to confess that this one had slipped under my own radar until now. It seems further confirmation, if any were needed [1], that we are heading for a certain creek, without a certain implement.

[1] In a similar-but-different "oh shit" vein, the other day saw the strange and scary experience of Tony Blair citing his religious faith when defending the war in Iraq. I know that certain US politicians like to invoke some bloke in the sky at every opportunity, to justify any number of heinous activities (if he does support half the things he is claimed to be in favour of, I'm all for impeachment of deities), but such God references are a genuine rarity over here.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

That article does explain the origins of some features of US civil trials that I hadn't thought much about before, such as the way that judges will hand down court orders on their own authority after the jury gives a verdict.

Amendment VII

[infrogmation.livejournal.com]

$20 USA = 1 ounce of gold until the devaluation in the Great Depression.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Aha. Which, when one compares rwx's estimate of $450 to today's price of gold ($570)... well, maybe i had a point there. No, never mind, it's just the sleep deprivation.

[vampyrecat.livejournal.com]

Um, no.

First, that applies only in federal court, not state court.
To read more, go here: http://www.ajs.org/jc/juries/jc_right_overview.asp

Second, federal subject matter jurisdiction over civil cases is a bit more complex than the amendment suggests. Concerning subject matter jurisdiction granted to federal courts the amount in controversy now must be $75,000, unless they changed it when I wasn't looking.

To read more, go here: http://www.west.net/~smith/smjuris.htm

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

Hmm, it looks like it says the minimum is $75,000 just for "diversity jurisdiction", that is, federal jurisdiction arising from the fact that the parties live in different states; whereas a federal suit over something that inherently has to do with federal law could happen over less.

In any event, it does look as if the twenty-dollar specification doesn't mean much any more.

[vampyrecat.livejournal.com]

Right.

The federal courts have subject matter jurisdiction over matters other than diversity jurisdiction. For example, there is no lower dollar limit on matters that involve a federal question.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the info!

[ikkyu2.livejournal.com]

Twenty dollars was a double eagle, which was a coin, which contained a troy oz. of gold.

Just look up the spot price of gold; that's what $20 was all the way up until 1928 when the USA was taken off the gold standard.