Law Commons^™

The Meaning Of Probative Value And Prejudice In Federal Rule Of Evidence 403: Can Rule 403 Be Used To Resurrect The Common Law Of Evidence?, Edward J. Imwinkelried

Vanderbilt Law Review

In the common law system of evidence, logically relevant evidence is presumptively admissible. The logical relevance of an item of evidence, however, does not guarantee its admission. The common law has developed a number of rules that exclude logically relevant evidence. In some cases, the common law excludes evidence because of doubts about the credibility or reliability of that type of evidence. For example, the best evidence rule rests primarily on skepticism about the trustworthiness of secondary evidence concerning a document's contents.- When the issue is the content of a document, the common law prefers that the document itself be …