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Justice Holmes’S Bad Man And The Depleted Purposes Of Punitive Damages, Jill W. Lens
Justice Holmes’S Bad Man And The Depleted Purposes Of Punitive Damages, Jill W. Lens
Jill Wieber Lens
Justice Holmes introduced his bad man as a tool to separate law and morality. The bad man is not affected by morality, and sees a tort duty only as an obligation to pay damages. The bad man does not consider any chance of escaping liability, so he sees that obligation as mandatory. Applied hypothetically to punitive damages, the bad man would not appreciate the morality basis for imposing punitive damages or the moral condemnation and stigma that traditionally results from that imposition. Instead, he sees punitive damages as just another check that he will be required to write.
In Exxon …