| Litigants: | Beacon Theatres v. Westover |
| Arguedate: | December 10 |
| Argueyear: | 1958 |
| Decidedate: | May 25 |
| Decideyear: | 1959 |
| Fullname: | Beacon Theatres, Incorporated v. Westover, United States District Judge, et al. |
| Usvol: | 359 |
| Uspage: | 500 |
| Parallelcitations: | 79 S. Ct. 948; 3 L. Ed. 2d 988; 1959 U.S. LEXIS 1934; 2 Fed. R. Serv. 2d (Callaghan) 650 |
| Prior: | Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, 252 F.2d 864 (9th Cir. 1958) |
| Holding: | Only under the most imperative circumstances can right to jury trial of legal issues be lost through prior determination of equitable claims. |
| Majority: | Black |
| Joinmajority: | Warren, Douglas, Clark, Brennan |
| Dissent: | Stewart |
| Joindissent: | Harlan, Whittaker |
| Notparticipating: | Frankfurter |
| Lawsapplied: | U.S. Const. amend. VII |
Beacon Theatres, Inc. v. Westover, 359 U.S. 500 (1959), was a case decided by the Supreme Court of the United States dealing with jury trials in civil matters. The court held that where legal and equitable claims are joined in the same action, the legal claims must be tried by a jury before the equitable claims can be resolved.[1]
Cornell Law School's Legal Information Institute summarized it like this:[2]
The question was whether the exclusive agreement of Fox Theatres with the distributor Westover for first-run movies was reasonable.