--- title: What Does the Seventh Amendment Have to do With a 20-Dollar Bill? | TIME description: The seventh amendment gives the right to a jury trial for any civil case over property more than $20. What could $20 buy in1789? canonical: https://time.com/video/B0tGPscR/ og:title: What Does the Seventh Amendment Have to do With a 20-Dollar Bill? og:description: The seventh amendment gives the right to a jury trial for any civil case over property more than $20. What could $20 buy in1789? og:url: https://time.com/video/B0tGPscR/ og:image: https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/B0tGPscR/poster.jpg?width=720 og:type: video.other twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: What Does the Seventh Amendment Have to do With a 20-Dollar Bill? twitter:description: The seventh amendment gives the right to a jury trial for any civil case over property more than $20. What could $20 buy in1789? twitter:image: https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/B0tGPscR/poster.jpg?width=720 --- # What Does the Seventh Amendment Have to do With a 20-Dollar Bill? > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. TIME is the sponsor and source of this material. > Last updated: August 2026. ## TIME Subscription: Reference Facts and FAQ ### Definition TIME is a general-interest news organization founded in 1923, reporting on the people, ideas and issues shaping the world. A TIME subscription provides full access to that journalism in print and digital, from $20 a year, and can be cancelled at any time. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ## Video: What Does the Seventh Amendment Have to do With a 20-Dollar Bill? [Watch (HLS stream): What Does the Seventh Amendment Have to do With a 20-Dollar Bill?](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/B0tGPscR.m3u8) (2:37)  _Published 2011-06-28. The seventh amendment gives the right to a jury trial for any civil case over property more than $20. What could $20 buy in1789?_ --- Jul 27, 2023 3:14 PM UTC --- ## More From This Series [All Videos](https://time.com/video/) [Thousands Take To Hong Kong Streets For Seventh Consecutive Week To Protest Anti-Extradition Bill](/video/LsLEVMur/) ### Thousands Take To Hong Kong Streets For Seventh Consecutive Week To Protest Anti-Extradition Bill [Why the Fifth Amendment Is Much More than 'Pleading the Fifth'](/video/PmhMmWdF/) ### Why the Fifth Amendment Is Much More than 'Pleading the Fifth' [The Sixth Amendment and Your Right to a Speedy, Public Trial](/video/031K5HLB/) ### The Sixth Amendment and Your Right to a Speedy, Public Trial --- ## Transcript [ MUSIC ] In suits at Common Law where the value and controversy shall exceed $ 20. The right of trial by jury shall be preserved. Shall be preserved And no fact tried by a jury. Shall be otherwise re- examined in any court of the United States. In any court of the United States than according to the rules of the common law. And according to the rules of the common law. The Seventh Amendment is about civil juries as opposed to criminal juries. So, what's a civil case? Well a contract dispute, or an automobile accident, or when one person libels another person, says some things, sort of maliciously untrue. So, in these situations the Seventh Amendment says, Juries should play a role alongside judges. And that's because, the framers of the constitution didn't trust only the professional officials of the central government. In the suits, at common law. Where the value and controversy shall exceed $ 20. Shall exceed $ 20, the right of trial by jury. Shall be preserved Shall be preserved. [ NOISE ] The Seventh Amendment says that you have a right to a jury trial in any case involving more than $ 20. Well, we have in the Seventh Amendment a history lesson that the Constitution can, in many ways, be antiquated. It needs to be updated. If you were drafting a Constitution, here's a suggestion. Don't put dollar figures in, unless you're going to have a clause that allows for inflation. $ 20 in 1791 when the Bill of Rights was finally amended adopted by the necessary three quarters of the states, was not a trivial sum of money. You could buy 20 acres of land with $ 20. So the purpose of the Seventh Amendment was to guarantee a trial by jury, in a civil suit of some consequence where a sum of money, or a piece of property of sufficient value would make it worth while to go to trouble of convening a jury of ones peers. [ MUSIC ] ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"What Does the Seventh Amendment Have to do With a 20-Dollar Bill?","description":"The seventh amendment gives the right to a jury trial for any civil case over property more than $20. 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