Definition
A bill of review is a pleading filed in a court of equity to obtain re-examination and reversal of a final decree that has already been enrolled. It is not an original action but a proceeding within the same court that issued the original decree, asking that court to reconsider its own final judgment on one of three recognized grounds: (1) error of law apparent on the face of the record; (2) discovery of new evidence that could not with reasonable diligence have been obtained before the decree was entered; or (3) fraud in obtaining the original decree.
The bill of review was a creature of equity practice, historically filed in Chancery and its American counterparts. It occupied a specific procedural niche — available only after a decree had been enrolled (formally entered as final), distinguishing it from rehearings and appeals available earlier in the proceedings. Once enrolled, the decree had a special finality that ordinary motions could not disturb; the bill of review was the designated instrument for challenging it.
Common Confusion
BILL OF REVIEW vs. BILL OF REVIVOR: These are easily conflated but address entirely different problems. A bill of revivor (also called a bill of revivor and supplement, or cross-referenced as a bill of complaint in some older taxonomy) is filed to revive a suit that has abated — typically because a party died or became legally incapacitated before a decree was entered. A bill of review, by contrast, presupposes a completed final decree and challenges its correctness. Rapalje & Lawrence explicitly distinguishes the two, listing revivor under bill of complaint and directing readers to bill of review separately. Researchers encountering either term in equity records should confirm which procedural posture the case was in at the time of filing.
BILL OF REVIEW vs. APPEAL: In modern practice, the functions of the bill of review have been largely absorbed by appellate procedure and post-judgment relief motions. An appeal challenges a decision before it becomes final or seeks review in a higher court. A bill of review historically operated in the same court on an already-enrolled decree. The distinction mattered enormously in equity practice; it is less significant today but critical for understanding pre-merger equity proceedings.
Core Elements
For a bill of review to lie, three threshold conditions traditionally applied:
1. FINAL ENROLLED DECREE: The underlying decree must have been enrolled — formally completed and entered as final. A decree not yet enrolled could be challenged through rehearing, not bill of review.
2. RECOGNIZED GROUND: The bill must rest on one of the established grounds: (a) error of law apparent on the face of the record (no new facts introduced — the error must be visible in what the court already had before it); (b) newly discovered evidence, subject to strict requirements that the evidence was material, not merely cumulative, and was not discoverable by due diligence before the decree; or (c) fraud, which could justify reopening even an otherwise unimpeachable decree.
3. LEAVE OF COURT: For bills grounded on new evidence, leave of court was typically required before filing, providing an initial screen against abuse of the process.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers working in equity records from the colonial period through the mid-twentieth century will encounter bills of review in case files, chancery dockets, and equity pleading treatises. Understanding what a bill of review is — and what it is not — is essential for reconstructing the procedural history of an equity case.
The merger of law and equity under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (1938) and analogous state reforms effectively abolished the bill of review as a distinct procedural device. Its functions were redistributed to Rule 60(b) (relief from final judgment) and appellate review. State equity practice timelines vary; some states retained distinct equity courts and procedures considerably longer than the federal system.
Historical sources often cite bills of review without explaining why the ground chosen mattered procedurally. A bill grounded on error of law introduced no new facts and was evaluated solely on what was already in the record — an important constraint. A bill grounded on new evidence triggered different procedural requirements and was harder to obtain leave to file. Knowing the ground affects how a researcher interprets the legal argument being made.
Rapalje & Lawrence provides only a skeletal entry, directing readers to two case citations — 17 How. (U.S.) 468 and 1 Root (Conn.) 578 — without substantive discussion. Researchers needing doctrine rather than just citation should consult equity treatises directly (Story's Equity Pleading, Mitford's Pleadings in Chancery) rather than relying on the dictionary entry alone.
The term also appears in older state court records under variant spellings and occasionally conflated with related bills (revivor, supplement, cross-bill). Careful attention to the procedural posture of the case at the time of filing is required to identify which instrument is actually at issue.
Historical Dictionary Support
Rapalje & Lawrence treats the bill of review with characteristic brevity, listing it under a combined heading alongside bill of revivor and bill of particulars and providing only case citations rather than doctrinal explanation. The 1883 edition was compiled at a moment when equity practice was still alive but already being systematized, and the entry reflects the assumption that practitioners would know the doctrine and needed only the citations. The sources cited — a U.S. Supreme Court case from the Howard reporter and an early Connecticut report — suggest the bill of review was recognized across both federal equity jurisdiction and early state chancery practice, though without elaboration on whether those jurisdictions treated the grounds identically.
What Rapalje & Lawrence does not provide: any synthesis of the three recognized grounds, any discussion of the enrolled-decree requirement, or any guidance on the distinction from bill of revivor beyond the cross-reference. Researchers should treat the entry as a pointer to primary sources rather than as a substantive definition.
Jurisdictional Note
The bill of review was a feature of equity jurisdiction wherever Chancery-style courts operated — English Chancery, U.S. federal equity courts, and state chancery systems. After the 1938 federal merger of law and equity, the device was superseded in federal practice. State timelines varied; Delaware, New Jersey, and a handful of other states retained distinct equity courts longer, meaning the bill of review remained procedurally relevant there into the latter half of the twentieth century. Researchers working in those jurisdictions should check the specific date of equity merger.