>>> Item number 261, dated 93/11/04 07:08:54 -- ALL
Date: Thu, 4 Nov 1993 07:08:54 CST Reply-To: Legal History discussion list <H-LAW@UICVM.BITNET> Sender: Legal History discussion list <H-LAW@UICVM.BITNET> From: cfcrw@ecnuxa.bitnet Subject: usury (fwd)
G.C.Seabourne@BRISTOL.AC.UK
4th November 1993
Dear All,
I am working on a project concerning the usury laws in the UK (which were abolished in 1854) and would be interested in any views on the U.S. situation, since it has come to my attention that usury laws still exist there. Any potential collaborators out there?
Yours faithfully,
Gwen Seabourne
>>> Item number 266, dated 93/11/05 06:49:51 -- ALL
Date: Fri, 5 Nov 1993 06:49:51 CST Reply-To: Legal History discussion list <H-LAW@UICVM.BITNET> Sender: Legal History discussion list <H-LAW@UICVM.BITNET> From: cfcrw@ecnuxa.bitnet Subject: Usury
This message was originally submitted by Lawrence.Friedman@STANFORD
On the message from g.c.seaborne (do I have this right), about usury laws: long ago (1963) I published an article "The Wisconsin Usury Laws: A Study in Legal and Social History," 1963 Wisconsin Law Review 515, which might conceivably be of some interest. Maybe somebody out there knows of something more recent in both senses (my article dealt w/ the mid-19th century, primarily).
LMFriedman
>>> Item number 268, dated 93/11/05 14:02:31 -- ALL
Date: Fri, 5 Nov 1993 14:02:31 CST Reply-To: Legal History discussion list <H-LAW@UICVM.BITNET> Sender: Legal History discussion list <H-LAW@UICVM.BITNET> From: cfcrw@ecnuxa.bitnet Subject: Re: Usury
This message was originally submitted by G.C.Seabourne@BRISTOL.AC.UK
Dear Sir,
Thank you for your note. It was actually your article which sparked off my interest in the US angle to this project - which began as a research project with the Law Commission when I spent a year as a research assistant there, and which I would like to think about as a potential PhD topic.
Thank you for your interest,
Gwen Seabourne
>>> Item number 280, dated 93/11/09 13:14:39 -- ALL
Date: Tue, 9 Nov 1993 13:14:39 CST Reply-To: Legal History discussion list <H-LAW@UICVM.BITNET> Sender: Legal History discussion list <H-LAW@UICVM.BITNET> From: cfcrw@ecnuxa.bitnet Subject: usury
From dtkonig@papaya.wustl.edu Tue Nov 9 10:09:33 1993
>
> I can recommend a article of my own, which treats the application of
> usury statutes in court; it is, then, a study of the case law of usury
> in colonial Massachusetts and Virginia, within a larger comparative
> study of the two legal cultures: "The Virgin and the Virgin's Sister:
> Virginia, Massachusetts, and the Contested Legacy of Colonial Law," in
> Russell K. Osgood, ed., THE HISTORY OF THE LAW IN MASSACHUSETTS (Boston,
> 1992). I hope it is of use to someone.
> David Konig, History, Washington University in St. Louis
>
>>> Item number 281, dated 93/11/10 07:49:44 -- ALL
Date: Wed, 10 Nov 1993 07:49:44 CST Reply-To: Legal History discussion list <H-LAW@UICVM.BITNET> Sender: Legal History discussion list <H-LAW@UICVM.BITNET> From: cfcrw@ecnuxa.bitnet Subject: Re: usury
>
> I am working on a project concerning the usury laws in the UK
> (which were abolished in 1854) and would be interested in any views on
> the U.S. situation, since it has come to my attention that usury laws
> still exist there. Any potential collaborators out there?
> Yours faithfully, > Gwen Seabourne
>
I don't know what sort of project it is, but if your legal history is in the least cultural (i.e. you intend reading anything other than court records and law reports) then can I recommend the VICTORIA (@IUBVM.EARN) list ?
This consists of 1/ C19th historians and 2/ C19th english lit scholars, in about equal numbers. Post a general query along the lines of "tell me which novels to read to understand what people thought about usury mid-century" and you'll probably get a good selection (it's a pretty active list).
My own interests are in general contract law, but rather later in the century, and as a vehicle for a general intellectual history of the judiciary rather than for itself.
(A pleasant surprise to see that Lawrence Friedman is on the net -- clever of you to flush him out !)
Steve Hedley, Faculty of Law, University of Cambridge
>>> Item number 285, dated 93/11/13 19:42:48 -- ALL
Date: Sat, 13 Nov 1993 19:42:48 CST Reply-To: Legal History discussion list <H-LAW@UICVM.BITNET> Sender: Legal History discussion list <H-LAW@UICVM.BITNET> From: cfcrw@ecnuxa.bitnet Subject: Re: usury
A book you already may have seen is, I think, Toll, Meeting House and Counting House, concerning attitudes about pricing in colonial Pennsylvania.
Today all but a few of the states have had their wings clipped with respect to the ability to cap consumer interest rates by federal laws providing for federal rates to preempt state rates unless states "opted out" of the federal scheme during the eighties. And federal banking authorities have interpreted such things as penalty fees and late fees to fall within the definition of interest, which has a very high ceiling under the federal regime. One state in which recent court decisions have imposed limits on excessive fees is California. But even there, national banks (as opposed to state banks) have been able to import outside rates into states which have meaningful limits. It would be interesting to study how the distinction between commercial transactions (where interest rate regulation has been permissive) and consumer transactions (where, historically, regulation has been more stringent) develope but I don't know of work that has been done on the subject.
Norm Silber, Hofstra Law School, Hempstead, N.Y.