Limited Liability Act

Historical Context Note

Litencyc Editors (Independent Scholar - Europe)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.07: English Writing and Culture of the Victorian Period, 1837-1901.
Vol. editors: Gillian Fenwick (University of Toronto), Grace Moore (University of Otago)

Domains

Legislation (Bills, Acts, Laws ...)

Dates

Date of occurrence 1862

Places

United Kingdom (Location)

The terms of the 1855 Limited Liability Act allowed the shareholders of companies more than 25 strong to be liable only for an amount equal to the value of their investment. This protected them against potential plaintiffs: if the company was sued, the plaintiffs would be suing the company itself, rather than the investors. This encouraged people without huge fortunes to invest in companies, without fear of risking bankruptcy. An 1862 Companies Act extended this policy to include insurance companies, which had not been included under the 1855 Act.

Please log in to consult the article in its entirety. If you are a member (student of staff) of a subscribing institution (see List), you should be able to access the LE on campus directly (without the need to log in), and off-campus either via the institutional log in we offer, or via your institution's remote access facilities, or by creating a personal user account with your institutional email address. If you are not a member of a subscribing institution, you will need to purchase a personal subscription. For more information on how to subscribe as an individual user, please see under Individual Subcriptions.

85 words

Citation: Editors, Litencyc. "Limited Liability Act". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 30 August 2013 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=2052, accessed 23 November 2024.]

Save this article

If you need to create a new bookshelf to save this article in, please make sure that you are logged in, then go to your 'Account' here

Limited Liability Act

Domains

Dates

Places

Save this article

Leave Feedback