The Seventh Amendment

The seventh Amendment has to do with the legal system at large, and how one percent of juries actually decide civil cases that fall under the jurisdiction of the seventh Amendment. The seventh Amendment is about guaranteeing the right to a trial by jury. Civil claims apply to the seventh Amendment as you are seeking financial compensation because you need to sue somebody in a civil case. The lawsuit has to be worth more than 20 dollars, which at the time of the Founding Fathers was a great amount of money.

The claim filed for such a trial must be viewed through the lens of English common law of 1791, otherwise, the case cannot go to trial by jury under the rights proposed by the Constitution. There are limits to what types of suits can be tried, as there are two types of civil law, common law, and equity law. Common law is about monetary compensation for some loss or another while equity law is about proposing court orders to resolve the problem. The United States may be the only civil jury trials because States are not part of the legal traditions in Europe, as well as England where civil jury trials are abolished.

A trial by jury comes from the old English system to make trial by juries something that was used in the middle ages. The seventh Amendment, however, was originally ratified by December 15, 1791, in which three quarters of the States succeeded at this endeavor. Juries originally had six members in the past, but now a jury is set at 12 people. James Madison proposed twenty Constitutional Amendments at the first United States Congress meeting. The seventh Amendment is one of the original Amendments in the Bill of Rights and is considered the most straightforward.

When the 18th century progressed, Americans wanted to be free of Britain. Americans simply wanted a way to govern themselves. The British were not going to let us go so easily, which is why the Revolutionary War occurred, and in 1776, the official independence from the Crown was declared. The Anti-Federalists of the day protested an original lack of trial by jury. This is why James Madison drafted the seventh Amendment, but not just to suit his desires. Common law implies law declared by judges as opposed to the law enacted by legislatures.

The right to a trial by jury is a right fundamentally set by the Constitution. It is the basis for our entire legal system. Trial by jury is something that all civil cases require, but lawsuits against the federal government do not include seventh Amendment protections. (It should also be seem that 20 dollars in 1800 is now 300 dollars in 2018.) The jury does decide the facts in a case. If one jury cannot do this, another jury takes over so that the main decision is left to the people. If the facts need to be re-examined, then the facts had been granted a new trial by the court.

In a civil trial, the judge cannot enter a verdict that was contrary to the evidence or the law. The seventh Amendment had originally been drafted to prevent the US government from abolishing jury trials. A plaintiff in a civil case can sue a manufacturer if that product they purchased could cause them injury. If an injury happens for whatever reason, a plaintiff can a person can sue for payment of medical bills as well as his lost wages if he takes time off of work. The seventh Amendment covers a variety of civil trials only because the original colonies wanted to self-govern and preserve their own governing traditions.

Work Cited

https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/amendments/amendment-vii

https://legaldictionary.net/7th-amendment/

https://study.com/academy/lesson/the-7th-amendment-definition-summary-court-cases.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seventh_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution