Equitable maxim

Maxims of equity are legal maxims that serve as a set of general principles or rules which are said to govern the way in which equity operates. They tend to illustrate the qualities of equity, in contrast to the common law, as a more flexible, responsive approach to the needs of the individual, inclined to take into account the parties’ conduct and worthiness. They were developed by the English Court of Chancery and other courts that administer equity jurisdiction, including the law of trusts. Although the most fundamental and time honored of the maxims, listed on this page, are often referred to on their own as the 'maxims of equity' or 'the equitable maxims', it cannot be said that there is a definitive list of them. Like other kinds of legal maxims or principles, they were originally, and sometimes still are, expressed in Latin.

Maxims of equity are not a rigid set of rules, but are, rather, general principles which can be deviated from in specific cases. Snell's Equity, an English treatise, takes the view that the "Maxims do not cover the whole ground, and moreover they overlap, one maxim contains by implication what belongs to another. Indeed it would not be difficult to reduce all under two: 'Equity will not suffer a wrong to be without a remedy' and 'Equity acts on the person'".

Sometimes phrased as "equity regards as done what should have been done", this maxim means that when individuals are required, by their agreements or by law, to perform some act of legal significance, equity will regard that act as having been done as it ought to have been done, even before it has actually happened. This makes possible the legal phenomenon of equitable conversion.

The consequences of this maxim, and of equitable conversion, are significant in their bearing on the risk of loss in transactions. When parties enter a contract for a sale of real property, the buyer is deemed to have obtained an equitable right that becomes a legal right only after the deal is completed.

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