chancery practice. When a bill is filed to open an account, stated, liberty is sometimes given to the plaintiff to surcharge and falsify such account. That is, to examine not only errors of fact, but errors of law.
Law Dictionary – Alternative Legal Definition
(noun) – an over charge, an exaction, Impost, or incumbrance beyond what is just and right, or beyond one’s authority or power. “Surcharge” may mean a second or further mortgage. Wharton.
(verb) – To put more cattle upon a common than the herbage will sustain or than the party has a right to do. 3 Bl. .Comm. 237. In equity practice. To show that a particular item, in favor of the party surcharging, ought to have been included, but was not, in an account which is alleged to be settled or complete. Second surcharge. In English law. The surcharge of a common a second time, by the same defendant against whom the common was before admeasured, and for which the writ of second surcharge was given by the statute of Westminster. 2. 3 Bl. Comm. 239. Surcharge and falsify. This phrase, as used in the courts of chancery, denotes the liberty which these courts will occasionally grant to a plaintiff, who disputes an account which the defendant alleges to be settled, to scrutinise particular items therein without opening the entire account. The showing an item for which credit ought to have beeu given, but was not is to surcharge the account; the proving an item to have been inserted wrongly is to falsify the account.