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Full-Text Articles in Law
The Federal Rules Of Inmate Appeals, Catherine T. Struve
The Federal Rules Of Inmate Appeals, Catherine T. Struve
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The Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure turn fifty in 2018. During the Rules’ half-century of existence, the number of federal appeals by self-represented, incarcerated litigants has grown dramatically. This article surveys ways in which the procedure for inmate appeals has evolved over the past 50 years, and examines the challenges of designing procedures with confined litigants in mind. In the initial decades under the Appellate Rules, the most visible developments concerning the procedure for inmate appeals arose from the interplay between court decisions and the federal rulemaking process. But, as court dockets swelled, the circuits also developed local case management …
Can We Learn Anything About Pleading Changes From Existing Data?, Jonah B. Gelbach
Can We Learn Anything About Pleading Changes From Existing Data?, Jonah B. Gelbach
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In light of the gateway role that the pleading standard can play in our civil litigation system, measuring the empirical effects of pleading policy changes embodied in the Supreme Court's controversial Twombly and Iqbal cases is important. In my earlier paper, Locking the Doors to Discovery, I argued that in doing so, special care is required in formulating the object of empirical study. Taking party behavior seriously, as Locking the Doors does, leads to empirical results suggesting that Twombly and Iqbal have had substantial effects among cases that face Rule 12(b)(6) motions post-Iqbal. This paper responds to …
The Relational Contingency Of Rights, Gideon Parchomovsky, Alex Stein
The Relational Contingency Of Rights, Gideon Parchomovsky, Alex Stein
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In this Article, we demonstrate, contrary to conventional wisdom, that all rights are relationally contingent. Our main thesis is that rights afford their holders meaningful protection only against challengers who face higher litigation costs than the rightholder. Contrariwise, challengers who can litigate more cheaply than a rightholder can force the rightholder to forfeit the right and thereby render the right ineffective. Consequently, in the real world, rights avail only against certain challengers but not others. This result is robust and pervasive. Furthermore, it obtains irrespectively of how rights and other legal entitlements are defined by the legislator or construed by …
Locking The Doors To Discovery? Assessing The Effects Of Twombly And Iqbal On Access To Discovery, Jonah B. Gelbach
Locking The Doors To Discovery? Assessing The Effects Of Twombly And Iqbal On Access To Discovery, Jonah B. Gelbach
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Many observers believe the Supreme Court’s Twombly and Iqbal opinions have curtailed access to civil justice. But previous empirical studies looking only at Rule 12(b)(6) grant rates have failed to capture the full effect of these cases because they have not accounted for party selection—changes in party behavior that can be expected following changes in pleading standards. In this Note, I show how party selection can be expected to undermine the empirical usefulness of simple grant-rate comparisons. I then use a conceptual model of party behavior that allows me to derive an adjusted measure of Twombly/Iqbal’s impact and show …
Vultures Or Vanguards?: The Role Of Litigation In Sovereign Debt Restructuring, Jill E. Fisch, Caroline M. Gentile
Vultures Or Vanguards?: The Role Of Litigation In Sovereign Debt Restructuring, Jill E. Fisch, Caroline M. Gentile
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The market for sovereign debt differs from the market for corporate debt in several important ways including the risk of opportunistic default by sovereign debtors, the importance of political pressures, and the presence of international development organizations. Moreover, countries are subject to neither liquidation nor standardized processes of debt reorganization. Instead, negotiations between a sovereign debtor and its creditors lead to a voluntary restructuring of the sovereign's debt. One of the greatest difficulties in restructuring claims against sovereign debtors is balancing the interests of the majority of the creditors with those of minority creditors. Holdout creditors serve as a check …
Lawyers On The Auction Block: Evaluation And Selection Of Class Counsel By Auction, Jill E. Fisch
Lawyers On The Auction Block: Evaluation And Selection Of Class Counsel By Auction, Jill E. Fisch
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The lead counsel auction has attracted increasing attention. Auction advocates argue that auctions introduce competitive market forces that improve the selection and compensation of class counsel. The benefits of the auction, the;' claim, include lower legal fees and better representation. Careful scrutiny reveals that auction advocates have overlooked substantial methodological problems with the design and implementation of the lead counsel auction. Even if these problems were overcome, the auction procedure is flawed: Auctions are poor tools for selecting firms based on multiple criteria, compromise the judicial role, and are unlikely to produce reasonable fee awards. Although the existing record is …
The Roles Of Litigation, Stephen B. Burbank
The Roles Of Litigation, Stephen B. Burbank
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No abstract provided.
Human Rights, Civil Wrongs And Foreign Relations: A "Sinical" Look At The Use Of U.S. Litigation To Address Human Rights Abuses Abroad, Jacques Delisle
Human Rights, Civil Wrongs And Foreign Relations: A "Sinical" Look At The Use Of U.S. Litigation To Address Human Rights Abuses Abroad, Jacques Delisle
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No abstract provided.
Aggregation, Auctions, And Other Developments In The Selection Of Lead Counsel Under The Pslra, Jill E. Fisch
Aggregation, Auctions, And Other Developments In The Selection Of Lead Counsel Under The Pslra, Jill E. Fisch
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No abstract provided.
Taking Action Against Auctions: The Third Circuit Task Force Report, Jill E. Fisch
Taking Action Against Auctions: The Third Circuit Task Force Report, Jill E. Fisch
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No abstract provided.
Class Action Reform, Qui Tam, And The Role Of The Plaintiff, Jill E. Fisch
Class Action Reform, Qui Tam, And The Role Of The Plaintiff, Jill E. Fisch
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No abstract provided.
Class Action Reform: Lessons From Securities Litigation, Jill E. Fisch
Class Action Reform: Lessons From Securities Litigation, Jill E. Fisch
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No abstract provided.
An Analysis Of Fee Shifting Based On The Margin Of Victory: On Frivolous Suints, Meritorious Suits, And The Role Of Rule 11, Howard F. Chang, Lucian A. Bebchuk
An Analysis Of Fee Shifting Based On The Margin Of Victory: On Frivolous Suints, Meritorious Suits, And The Role Of Rule 11, Howard F. Chang, Lucian A. Bebchuk
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When plaintiffs cannot predict the outcome of litigation with certainty, neither the American rule (each litigant bears its own litigation expenses) nor the British rule (the losing litigant pays the attorneys' fees of the winning litigant) would induce optimal decisions to bring suit. Plaintiffs may bring frivolous suits when litigation costs are small relative to the amount at stake; plaintiffs may not bring meritorious suits when litigation costs are large relative to this amount. More general fee-shifting rules are based not only on the identity of the winning party but also on how strong the court perceives the case to …
Constructing The Insurance Relationship: Sales Stories, Claims Stories, And Insurance Contract Damages, Tom Baker
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No abstract provided.
Captive Courts: The Destruction Of Judicial Decisions By Agreement Of The Parties, Jill E. Fisch
Captive Courts: The Destruction Of Judicial Decisions By Agreement Of The Parties, Jill E. Fisch
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No abstract provided.
The World In Our Courts, Stephen B. Burbank
The World In Our Courts, Stephen B. Burbank
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No abstract provided.
Rewriting History: The Propriety Of Eradicating Prior Decisional Law Through Settlement And Vacatur, Jill E. Fisch
Rewriting History: The Propriety Of Eradicating Prior Decisional Law Through Settlement And Vacatur, Jill E. Fisch
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No abstract provided.
The Costs Of Complexity, Stephen B. Burbank
The Costs Of Complexity, Stephen B. Burbank
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No abstract provided.