Digital Commons Network^™

U.S. Chamber Of Commerce Liability Survey: Inaccurate, Unfair, And Bad For Business, Theodore Eisenberg

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce uses its Survey of State Liability to criticize judiciaries and seek legal change but no detailed evaluation of the survey’s quality exists. This article presents evidence that the survey is substantively inaccurate and methodologically flawed. It incorrectly characterizes state law; respondents provide less than 10 percent correct answers for objectively verifiable responses. It is internally inconsistent; a state threatened with judicial hellhole status ranked first in the survey while venues not on the list ranked lower. The absence of correlation between survey rankings and observable activity suggests that other factors drive the rankings. Two factors …

Constitutional Solipsism: Toward A Thick Doctrine Of Article Iii Duty; Or Why The Federal Circuits’ Nonprecedential Status Rules Are (Profoundly) Unconstitutional, Penelope J. Pether

Working Paper Series

Constitutional Solipsism is the fourth in a series of articles on aspects of the private judging practices which have come to characterize the U.S. state and federal courts since the late 1950s. The first, Inequitable Injunctions: The Scandal of Private Judging in the U.S. Courts, 56 STAN. L. REV. 1435 (2004) gave a critical historical account of the development of the “practices of private judging” in U.S. Courts. Take a Letter, Your Honor: Outing the Judicial Epistemology of Hart v. Massanari, 62 WASH. & LEE L. REV. 1553 (2005), analyzed the development of a distinctive U.S. theory of precedent. Sorcerers, …

In Defense Of Ideology: A Principled Approach To The Supreme Court Confirmation Process, Lori A. Ringhand

Scholarly Works

In this paper, Professor Ringhand offers a principled defense of an ideological approach to the Supreme Court justice confirmation process. In constructing her argument, she does three things. First, she explores how the insights provided by recent empirical legal scholarship have created a need to re-think the role of the Supreme Court and, consequently, the process by which we select Supreme Court justices. In doing so, Professor Ringhand explains how these insights have called into question much of our conventional constitutional narrative, and how this failure of the conventional narrative has in turn undermined traditional objections to an ideologically-based confirmation …

The Stockley Verdict: An Explainer, Chad Flanders

All Faculty Scholarship

The purpose o f this document is to help explain some o f the existing Missouri law that Judge Wilson used in his opinion. It does not take a side on the opinion itself. At the end o f the day, the decision Judge Wilson made was based on his call on various disputed factual questions. The law was not, for the most part, at issue. I attempt only to describe the legal framework within with Judge Wilson decided the case; not to support or to criticize his verdict. Each person will ultimately have to make his or her own …

Remarks, More Remarks And A Grounds Of Decision: One Judgment Too Many? Tt Durai V Public Prosecutor, Unreported Magistrate's Appeal, S. Chandra Mohan

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In May 2008, the High Court dismissed the appeal of former NKF CEO, T T Durai, against his conviction and sentence. What is little known is that one of Durai's six grounds of appeal was in fact upheld. The appellate judge subsequently devoted nine out of 12 paragraphs of his four-page Grounds of Decision, to explain is reasons for doing so. Although this ruling did not affect the final outcome of the Durai appeal, it has to some extent helped to settle a question that has vexed criminal law practitioners in recent years. This concerns the legality and propriety of …

Imbree V Mcneilly: A View From Singapore, Yihan Goh

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In Imbree v. McNeilly, the High Court of Australia ruled that a learner driver is no longer to be held to the standard of a reasonable but unqualified (and inexperienced) driver in negligence claims. It is the modest aim of this case note to show that Imbree, while a decision on a narrow point, in fact hints at a larger difficulty in the ascertainment of the standard of care in individual cases. It is in this context that it will be suggested that, when the time comes for Singapore courts to consider the applicability of Imbree, this difficulty should be …

Corruption In Our Courts: What It Looks Like And Where It Is Hidden, Stratos Pahis

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Meta-Theory Of International Criminal Procedure: Vindicating The Rule Of Law, Jens David Ohlin

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

International criminal procedure is in a second phase of development, moving beyond the common law/civil law dichotomy and searching for its sui generis theory. The standard line is that international criminal procedure has an instrumental value: it services the general goals of international criminal justice and allows punishment for violations of substantive international criminal law. However, international criminal procedure also has an important and often overlooked intrinsic value not reducible to its instrumental value: it vindicates the Rule of Law. This vindication is performed by adjudicating allegations of criminal violations that occurred during periods of anarchy characterized by the absence …

Unlv Magazine, Michelle Mouton, Tony Allen, Afsha Bawany, Shane Bevell, Phil Hagen, Greg Lacour, Erin O'Donnell, Karyn S. Hollingsworth

UNLV Magazine

No abstract provided.

Atrocity Crimes Litigation: 2008 Year-In-Review, Beth Van Schaack

Faculty Publications

This survey of 2008's top developments in these international fora will focus on the law governing international crimes and applicable forms of responsibility. Several trends in the law are immediately apparent. The tribunals continue to delineate and clarify the interfaces between the various international crimes, particularly war crimes and crimes against humanity, which may be committed simultaneously or in parallel with each other. Several important cases went to judgment in 2008 that address war crimes drawn from the Hague tradition of international humanitarian law, and the international courts are demonstrating a greater facility for adjudicating highly technical aspects of this …

Defining Family: Naming, Orientation, And Redemption In The Case Of Terri Schiavo, M. Chad Mcbride, Karen L. Taas, Paige W. Toller

Communication Faculty Publications

This paper undertakes a detailed analysis of the Terri Schiavo case as it was covered in popular media. Drawing on Burkean theory, we argue a critical issue in the case was a struggle between Terri's parents and husband to be seen as the more legitimate family in order to determine the duration and extent of Terri 's medical care. We discuss how the private debate over Terri's health and the decision to remove her feeding tube entered into the public scenes of legal and political action. This shift to the public scene represented problems for the parties directly involved in …

The Paternalistic Ideology Of Erisa And Unforgiving Courts: Restoring Balance Through A Grand Bargain, Edward A. Zelinsky

Faculty Articles

No abstract provided.

Judicial Independence In Excess: Reviving The Judicial Duty Of The Supreme Court, Paul D. Carrington, Roger C. Cramton

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Independence from extrinsic influence is, we know, indispensable to public trust in the integrity of professional judges who share the duty to decide cases according to preexisting law. But such independence is less appropriate for those expected to make new law to govern future events. Indeed, in a democratic government those who make new law are expected to be accountable to their constituents, not independent of their interests and unresponsive to their desires. The Supreme Court of the United States has in the last century largely forsaken responsibility for the homely task of deciding cases in accord with preexisting law …

What Is The Settlement Rate And Why Should We Care?, Theodore Eisenberg, Charlotte Lanvers

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

After establishing the importance of knowledge of settlement rates, this article first shows that different research questions can yield different settlement rates. Using data gathered from about 3,300 federal cases in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania (EDPA) and the Northern District of Georgia (NDGA), differing measures of settlement emerge depending on whether one is interested in (1) settlement as a proxy for plaintiffs’ litigation success, or (2) settlement as a measure of litigated disputes resolved without final adjudication. Using settlement as a proxy for plaintiff success, we estimate the aggregate settlement rate across case categories in the two districts to …

Should Brian Nichols Be Tried In A Federal Court?, Ronald Carlson, Donald E. Wilkes

Popular Media

Although Brian Nichols has been sentenced in state court to a total of 485 years of imprisonment, the question has been raised whether he should subsequently be tried in federal court for the murder of an off-duty U.S. Customs agent. Prof. Carlson argues in the affirmative, while Prof. Wilkes finds the suggestion "stupendously stupid."

Recruiting And Selecting Child Welfare Staff, Michelle Graef, Megan Paul, Tara L. Myers

Center on Children, Families, and the Law: Faculty Publications

In this chapter, the focus is on recruiting and selecting new staff and on the steps agencies can take to ensure that they are doing the best possible job to attract and hire a high-performing, committed workforce. This chapter reviews a number of strategies for improving recruitment and selection processes and provides case examples from the authors' work with child protection agencies in several states. These projects have been accomplished by a team of researchers at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's Center on Children, Families, and the Law (CCFL). Some of the techniques described here will be familiar, whereas others are …

Review Of Trial Of Modernity: Judicial Reform In Early Twentieth Century China, 1901-37, By Xiaoqun Xu, Nicholas C. Howson

Reviews

Observing these significant legal-political debates in the Chinese press and academy in the first decade of the twenty-first century, we might think they concern battles started only in the last decade and a half of Reform-era China. Now Professor Xu Xiaoqun reminds us that these struggles have a much longer pedigree, stretching back to the end of the nineteenth century and China's first fraught encounter with "the West" and one idea of "modernity."

Reality Bites: The Illusion Of Science In Bite-Mark Evidence, Erica Beecher-Monas

Law Faculty Research Publications

No abstract provided.

Conceptualizing Aggression, Noah Weisbord

Faculty Publications

The special working group tasked by the International Criminal Court’s Assembly of States Parties to define the supreme international crime, the crime of aggression, has produced a breakthrough draft definition.

This paper analyzes the key concepts that make up the emerging definition of the crime of aggression by developing and applying a future-oriented methodology that brings together scenario planning and grounded theory. It proposes modifications and interpretations of the constituent concepts of the crime of aggression intended to make the definition sociologically relevant today and in the foreseeable future.

The Modern Problem-Solving Court Movement: Domination Of Discourse And Untold Stories Of Criminal Justice Reform, Mae Quinn

Journal Articles

There is a chasm between the rhetoric about and the reality of modern court reform movements. It is a deeply troubling divide. This Article, responding to the work of Professor Jane Spinak, is not concerned with innovations within the family court system. Rather, it examines modern criminal justice reforms.1 It focuses on the claims of the contemporary ―problem-solving court‖ movement—a movement that has resulted in the development of thousands of specialized criminal courts across the country over the last two decades.2

Plaintiphobia In State Courts? An Empirical Study Of State Court Trials On Appeal, Theodore Eisenberg, Michael Heise

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Prior federal civil appellate studies show that appeals courts overturn jury verdicts more than bench decisions and that defendants fare better than plaintiffs on appeal. Attitudinal and selection effect hypotheses may explain the appellate court tilt favoring defendants. This study presents the first statistical models of the appeals process for a comprehensive set of state court civil trials to test theories on appellate outcomes. Using data from 46 large counties on 8,038 trials and 549 concluded appeals, we find that appellate reversal rates for jury trials and defendant appeals exceed reversal rates for bench trials and plaintiff appeals. The reversal …

The Phases And Faces Of The Duke Lacrosse Controversy: A Conversation, James E. Coleman, Angela Davis, K.C. Johnson, Lyrissa Lidsky

Faculty Publications

The genesis of this panel is an essay I wrote arguing that the single moniker "Duke lacrosse controversy" encapsulates a broad, multi-faceted legal, political, and social controversy that more accurately consists of five related seriatim sub-controversies. Initially, it was a sexual assault case. An African-American woman, hired as an exotic dancer at a party thrown by members of the Duke University men's lacrosse team, reported to Durham police that she had been sexually assaulted by several white team members. The allegations quickly became a national story, tinged with issues of race, class, gender, privilege, and at some level, the role …

Trade Adjustment Assistance At The U.S. Court Of International Trade: The Year In Review, 41 Geo. J. Int'l L. 137 (2009), Steven D. Schwinn

UIC Law Open Access Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Filling Federal Appellate Vacancies, Carl W. Tobias

Law Faculty Publications

Judicial selection for the United States Courts of Appeals has rarely been so controversial. Delay in nominating and analyzing candidates as well as fractious accusations, recriminations, and "paybacks" between Democrats and Republicans have vexed circuit appointments over two decades. Many judgeships remain empty for long periods, while one position has been vacant since 1994. Certain appellate tribunals have confronted acute difficulties. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit recently operated absent half its judicial complement across eight months, and numerous courts labored without one in three members at various junctures.

The Senate, which furnishes advice and consent, has …

Isaiah And His Young Disciples: Justice Brandeis And His Law Clerks, Todd C. Peppers

Scholarly Articles

It cannot be said that Louis Dembitz Brandeis has suffered from a lack of scholarly attention. Brandeis is considered to be one of the most influential Justices in the history of the U.S. Supreme Court, and scores of books and law-review articles have been written about Brandeis the lawyer, the political insider, the Zionist, and the Justice. A case can be made, however, that history has not fully recognized the important and lasting contribution that Brandeis made to the development of the institutional rules and norms surrounding the Supreme Court law clerk, an oversight that this essay seeks to rectify.

Corrupt Conditions Surrounding The Eccc And Their Effect On Judicial Decision-Making And The Appearance Of Fairness, Michael A. Kertesz

War Crimes Memoranda

No abstract provided.

Complementarity In Crisis: Uganda, Alternative Justice, And The International Criminal Court, Alexander K.A. Greenawalt

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

In this Article, I take up a focused analysis of the Uganda prosecutions, considering both the interpretive dilemmas facing the Court and the efforts of Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo to address them. Part I provides a summary of events leading to the LRA arrest warrants and the recent peace negotiations. Part II turns to the text of the Rome Statute, with a focus on Article 19's framework for complementary jurisdiction and the Article 53 dictate that “interests of justice” may trump the admissibility of investigations and cases that otherwise meet all relevant statutory criteria. Although the ICC is structured to give …

The Ideology Of Legal Interpretation, Jason J. Czarnezki

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This Article questions whether consistency in legal interpretation is truly a manifestation of the influence of law or instead a means to a preferred policy end. Part I of this Article discusses the legal interpretive tools of originalism and legislative history and how they might influence outcomes in cases. Part II discusses judicial decision-making in the U.S. Courts of Appeals and justifies their use in the analysis. Parts III and IV offer information on our data and methodology, as well as a discussion of the results. Finally, in Part V, we find that the use of legal interpretive strategies are …

A Theory Of Wto Adjudication: From Empirical Analysis To Biased Rule Development, Juscelino F. Colares

Faculty Publications

The positive theory of litigation predicts that, under certain conditions, plaintiffs and defendants achieve an unremarkable and roughly equivalent share of litigation success. This Article, grounded in an empirical analysis of WTO adjudication from 1995 through 27, reveals a high disparity between Complainant and Respondent success rates: Complainants win roughly ninety percent of the disputes. This disparity transcends case type, party identity, income level, and other litigant-specific characteristics. After analyzing and discarding standard empirical and theoretical alternative explanations for the systematic disparity in success rates, this study demonstrates, through an examination of patterns in WTO adjudicators' notorious decisions, that biased …

Standing Still In The Roberts Court (Panel), Jonathan H. Adler

Faculty Publications

This Article, prepared for the Case Western Reserve Law Review symposium on “Access to the Courts in the Roberts Era,” offers a preliminary look at the standing jurisprudence of the Roberts Court. Contrary to claims made by some Court commentators, the Roberts Court has not tightened the requirements for Article III standing. To the contrary, insofar as the Roberts Court has altered the law of standing, it has made it easier for at least some litigants to pursue their claims in federal court. The Court’s decisions denying standing have largely reaffirmed prior holdings. By comparison, some of the Court’s decisions …