%0 Journal Article
%T ACCOUNTiNG, ENGINEERING, OR ADVERTISING? LIMITED LIABILITY, THE COMPANY PROSPECTUS, AND THE LANGUAGE OF UNCERTAINTY IN VICTORIAN BRITAIN
%A Wade E. Shilts
%J Essays in Economic & Business History
%D 2004
%I The Economic & Business History Society
%X This paper looks at a particularly puzzling historical example of delay in the use of the law, the under-use by Victorian Britain of the general incorporation statutes passed between 1844 and 1862. Comparison of the rhetoric of company prospectuses of 1824-1862 and 1898 suggests that uncertainty about the meaning of ¡°incorporation with limited liability¡± among those who might have benefited from it may have persisted for decades following the statute¡¯s passage. Continuing uncertainty meant continuing interpretation costs, and continuing interpretation costs meant insufficient interpretation: until each law user involved with an enterprise interpreted and came to understand the rule¡¯s meaning, less than fully realized.
%U http://www.ebhsoc.org/journal/index.php/journal/article/view/72