Case Name: C. R. Edson ads. B. B. Cheshire
Court: Constitutional Court of South Carolina
Jurisdiction: South Carolina
Decision Date: 1823-05
Citations: 2 McCord 385
Docket Number: 
Parties: C. R. Edson ads. B. B. Cheshire.
Judges: Justices Johnson7 Huger, Richardson and Nott7 concurred.
Reporter: South Carolina Law Reports
Volume: 13
Pages: 385–386

Head Matter:
C. R. Edson ads. B. B. Cheshire.
jtfó person, (unless a transient person,) can be held to bail for alcss sum than $ 30 61.
Tried before Mr. Justice Gantt, Newberry districtj July-Term, 1822.
MOTION to quash the order for bail endorsed on the process, and to discharge the bail, on the ground that the gum sworn to was not "sufficient, being only $30 121-2 cents.
Motion overruled.
The present was an application to reverse that decision, on the grounds,
1st. That $ 30 12 1-2 is not equal to £S0 current money $ and the act must be followed strictly in favour of personal liberty.
2nd. The sum to be sworn to, to authorize an order for bail, is $30 61, agreeably to the rule of computation pointed out, (1 Brevards Digest, 12, of the Introduction,) which has always been acted under in all cases.
3rd. Analogy would fix it at $ 30 61 ; as the jurisdiction of magistrates, formerly ¿6 20, current money, has always been estimated at $12 84.
4th. The Judge was wrong in taking a different rule of computation “ quoad bail,” to what is adopted in other cases.

Opinion:
Mr. Justice Colcock
delivered the opinion of the court:
The words of the act admit of no doubt, and leave no discretion on the subject with the Judge. " No person shall hereafter be held to bail for any sum less than £ 50, current money." (Public Laws, 273.)
By any mode of computation known to the law on this subject, the sum of $ 30 12 1-2 is less than A50 current. This act was passed in 1769, at which time the current money Jhad not depreciated to the extent that it afterwards did, when the scale of depreciation was fixed, and the' value* of the currency at that time was seven for one.
O'Neal '8? Johnson, for the motion,-
Rauskett 8? Dunlap, contra.
The motion must therefore be granted.
Justices Johnson7 Huger, Richardson and Nott7 concurred.