Law Commons^™

The Cost Of Obeying The Law?: The Seventh Circuit Rejects The Bona Fide Error Defense From A Debt Collector Who Followed The Then-Binding Law, Jun Qiu

Seventh Circuit Review

It is expected that people should follow the law, which includes the statutes themselves and the judicial rulings interpreting those statutes. However, if the binding judicial interpretation changes, should the parties be liable for their behavior following the old binding judicial interpretation of a federal statute at the time when it was still in effect? Or, should there be any defense that would allow the parties to shield themselves from liability for a good-faith reliance on the old binding judicial interpretation?

Stranded At Sea: The Seventh Circuit And The Rule 11 “Safe Harbor” Rule, Daniel Ristau

Seventh Circuit Review

When lawyers pursue frivolous claims, they invite sanctions. Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure requires attorneys to certify that the pleadings and motions they submit are meritorious. Since 1993, attorneys have been required to serve opposing counsel with a motion—to fire a warning shot—when they intend to file for sanctions. This provides attorneys an opportunity to seek “safe harbor” and avoid sanctions by withdrawing or amending actions brought for an improper purpose.

Your Supervisor As Your Chattel: Broadening The Scope Of Negligent Hiring And Retention In Illinois, Philip F. Vieira

Seventh Circuit Review

In Illinois, employers have a duty to act reasonably in hiring and retaining their employees. An employer who negligently hires or retains an employee may be liable for injuries caused by that employee even if the employee is acting outside the scope of employment. Of course, this doctrine has to have some limit. Otherwise, employers would be responsible for practically any injury committed by one of its employees, even if it is only tangentially related to the fact of employment. However, courts have struggled to define that outer limit. Particularly when faced with horrific injuries, courts may be tempted to …

Mirror, Mirror On The Wall, Are They Trainees And Not Employees At All? The Legality And "Economic Reality" Of Unpaid Internships, Beatriz Carrillo

Seventh Circuit Review

The number of unpaid internships has skyrocketed over the past years as employers seem to prefer those with experience in the field. “Experience” has become the currency that college students seek to open the door to future employment. Unpaid interns have become the modern-day equivalent of entry-level employees. However, they are not paid for the hours worked and lack the normal employment protections offered to employees, such as FLSA and Title VII protections. The court's interest recently has been sparked to define the roles of interns in the labor force and has started to shape intern’s legal protections. As a …

The “Animus” Briefs: Attacks On The Seventh Circuit’S Sound Analysis Of Transgender Bathroom Rights In Public Schools, Brennan B. Hutson

Seventh Circuit Review

You have probably heard about state legislatures floating the idea of “bathroom laws” that would prohibit transgendered individuals from using the bathroom of their gender identity in public places. Although no state has actually signed such legislation into law, the spirit of those anti-transgender laws has been carried out in smaller governmental entities: public schools. Unlike a hypothetical state law, which would be nearly impossible to enforce without state officials performing inspections of genitals, a school policy is truly enforceable and has real effects.

Outgrowing Its Usefulness: Seventh Circuit Limits The Application Of The Common Actor Inference In Title Vii Discrimination Cases, Michael G. Zolfo

Seventh Circuit Review

Can a person harbor discriminatory views toward protected minority groups, yet still hire a member of that group as an employee? Under Title VII jurisprudence, the “common actor inference” holds that if the same supervisor hires and fires an employee in a short time period, that supervisor likely did not have a discriminatory reason for the employment decision. The common actor inference has been accepted and used across all U.S. Circuit Courts of Appeal, but was recently criticized and limited by the Seventh Circuit.

Baby Got (A Broken) Back, But No Remedy: The Seventh Circuit’S Refusal To Provide A Remedy For Eighth Amendment Violations, Timothy Lavino

Seventh Circuit Review

Since 1871, individuals have been able to bring a cause of action against state officials who violate the individual’s constitutional rights. However, it wasn’t until the 1965 case Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics that the U.S. Supreme Court created a cause of action for individuals whose Fourth Amendment rights were violated by federal officials. Since 1965, this cause of action, known as a Bivens action, has been extended to violations of the Fifth and Eighth Amendments.

Neither Cruel Nor Unusual: An Hour And A Half Delay In Treatment Can Now Amount To Deliberate Indifference, Monica J. Raven

Seventh Circuit Review

The Eighth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution proscribes cruel and unusual punishment. To state a cognizable claim, a plaintiff must allege that a prison official or medical professional was deliberately indifferent to his or her objectively serious medical need. In Lewis v. McLean, the Seventh Circuit analyzed whether a nurse and prison official’s hour and a half delay in treatment created a triable issue as to whether they acted with deliberate indifference. The plaintiff alleged that the defendants showed deliberate indifference to his severe back pain by delaying his access to medical care. The defendants, on the other hand, …

Between Scylla And Charybdis: Ezell V. City Of Chicago (Ezell Ii) And How The Seventh Circuit Continues To Narrow Chicago’S Constitutional Path Forward On Gun Control, Christopher Gerardi

Seventh Circuit Review

It has been less than a decade since the Supreme Court reset the landscape of gun rights by recognizing, for the first time, that the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to keep and bear arms unconnected with any militia service. The Court was notably silent as to which standard of review lower courts should apply to the inevitable wave of Second Amendment challenges to federal, state, and local gun control legislation. In the absence of guidance from the Supreme Court, the majority of the Federal Circuit Courts of Appeals have adopted a two-step means-end test similar in many respects …

Layering, Conversion, And Drifting: A Comparative Analysis Of Path Dependent Change In Consumer Insolvency Systems, Megan Mcdermott

Chicago-Kent Law Review

The past twenty-five years have been marked by major developments in consumer insolvency systems around the world. The threshold challenge for comparative scholars is to keep up with the changes occurring in individual countries, as a necessary—but preliminary—step toward broader comparisons of the historical, social, and institutional forces in consumer bankruptcy. In order for deeper work to take place, though, the field needs consensus on what factors are most useful to analyze. Moreover, the dynamic environment of consumer insolvency requires a framework for analysis that is flexible and adaptable enough to provide insights notwithstanding the rapid changes in the field. …

The Ammanati Affair: Seven Centuries Old, And Not Feeling The Age, Eugenio Vaccari

Chicago-Kent Law Review

The enactments of the UNCITRAL Model Law on Cross-Border Insolvency and the European Regulations on insolvency proceedings have promoted an incremental approach towards substantive harmonization. This strategy has not remained unquestioned. One of the major criticisms is that such a course of actions overlooks the nature of the issues currently raised in multi-national and cross-disciplinary bankruptcy procedures.

This Article focuses on the Anglo/American bankruptcy tradition. It adopts a doctrinal methodology to question the conclusion that “collectivity” is and should be a procedural, objective, and secondary notion in light of two case studies. It suggests that in the context of cross-border, …

Preventing Drug-Related Deaths At Music Festivals: Why The "Rave" Act Should Be Amended To Provide An Exception For Harm Reduction Services, Robin Mohr

Chicago-Kent Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Canadian Lens On Third Party Litigation Funding In The American Bankruptcy Context, Stephanie Ben-Ishai, Emily Uza

Chicago-Kent Law Review

This Article offers two major recommendations to expand the use of third party litigation funding (“TPLF”) into the U.S. insolvency context. As seen in the Canadian context, courts have accepted the use of litigation funding agreements fitting within certain parameters. If U.S. courts follow suit, friction against the implementation of TPLF can be mitigated. Alternatively, regulation may occur through legislative and regulatory models to govern and set out precisely what types of arrangements are permitted. Involving entities such as the SEC may expedite the acceptance of TPLF, but special attention is necessary not to intermingle notions of fiduciaries into the …

When Borders Dissolve, Laura N. Coordes

Chicago-Kent Law Review

Scholars have long sought to apply principles from U.S. bankruptcy law to sovereign debt restructurings. Chapter 9 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code, used to adjust the debts of municipalities, has been a particular source of inspiration, and several proposals currently exist to adapt chapter 9 to address the challenges of sovereign debt restructuring.

The difficulties of applying chapter 9 in practice, however, have demonstrated the limitations of a one-size-fits-all solution to municipal distress. Similarly, attempts to adapt chapter 9 to apply uniformly to a broad range of sovereign states may be ineffective. A recurring problem lies in the fact that …

Modularity In Cross-Border Insolvency, Andrew B. Dawson

Chicago-Kent Law Review

This Article proposes a framework for thinking about the design structure of the Model Law on Cross-Border Insolvency. The Model Law has been successful by many metrics; however, it has faced various implementation challenges. As leading scholar Professor Jay Westbrook has noted, thinking about these problems requires thinking about the Model Law as a system. To understand the system, it is necessary to understand its architecture, and I argue that this architecture is best understood as reflecting a modular design structure, i.e., one that divides complex systems into a hierarchical system of self-contained components. Modularity has provided insights into other …

The Avoidance Of Pre-Bankruptcy Transactions: An Economic And Comparative Approach, Aurelio Gurrea-Martínez

Chicago-Kent Law Review

Most insolvency jurisdictions provide several mechanisms to reverse transactions entered into by a debtor prior to the commencement of the bankruptcy procedure. These mechanisms, generally known as claw-back actions or avoidance provisions, may fulfil several economic goals. First, they act as an ex post alignment of incentives between factually insolvent debtors and their creditors, since the latter become the residual claimants of an insolvent firm, but they do not have any control over the debtor’s assets while the company is not yet subject to a bankruptcy procedure. Thus, avoidance powers may prevent or, at least, reverse opportunistic behaviors faced by …

Infinite Jest: The Otiose Quest For Completeness In Validating Insolvency Judgments, Bruce A. Markell

Chicago-Kent Law Review

Universalism in cross-border bankruptcies strives to reduce waste, and harmonize restructuring and recoveries. Universalism’s avatar is UNCITRAL’s 1997 Model Law on Cross-Border Insolvencies (Model Law). Underlying the Model Law, however, is an implicit assumption that court orders entered in the proceeding where the debtor’s center of main interests is located will be respected in all other states in which the debtor has assets or operations. That assumption may have been incorrect, as shown by cases such as the United Kingdom’s Rubin v. Eurofinance, S.A.

This Article looks at UNCITRAL’s reaction to Rubin: its new Model Law on Recognition …

Market Organisations And Institutions In America And England: Valuation In Corporate Bankruptcy, Sarah Paterson

Chicago-Kent Law Review

Courts in England and the United States have traditionally adopted different approaches to the question of valuation in debt restructuring cases. In England, courts have tended to determine whether to approve the allocation of equity in a debt restructuring by reference to the amounts creditors would have received if no debt restructuring had been agreed. The company has typically argued that if no debt restructuring had been agreed either the business or the assets would have been sold. Typically, some evidence of exposure of the business and assets to the market will be submitted to identify the value which would …

Fiduciary Duties Of Directors Of Insolvent Corporations: A Comparative Perspective, Alessandra Zanardo

Chicago-Kent Law Review

Over the last two decades, in many jurisdictions great emphasis has been placed on directors’ fiduciary duties when a corporation is insolvent or in the amorphous “zone of insolvency”; notably, to investigate whether the directors should continue to promote the best interests of the corporation for the benefits of its shareholders, or whether their duties shift to creditors.

The resolution of this ubiquitous issue will help to answer the following questions: Do creditors have standing to pursue claims for breach of fiduciary duties in the insolvency scenario? And, if they do, is it direct or derivative standing?

This Article will …

The Question For Another Day: Hooker V. Illinois State Board Of Elections And Its Effect On The Vitality Of Citizen Ballot Initiatives And Redistricting Reform In Illinois, Thomas Q. Ford

Chicago-Kent Law Review

Like most states, Illinois is no stranger to political gerrymandering. Since 2010, redistricting reformers have made repeated efforts to change the way Illinois's political maps are drawn, essentially by minimizing or eliminating the role lawmakers play in the process. Polls show the vast majority of Illinoisans support such a change. Reformers have chosen Illinois's citizen ballot initiative as their vehicle to amend the redistricting process, but every proposed initiative has been struck down in court before reaching voters. Most recently, the Illinois Supreme Court rejected a proposed initiative in Hooker v. Illinois State Board of Elections. This Note argues …

Commitment Through Fear: Mandatory Jury Trials And Substantive Due Process Violations In The Civil Commitment Of Sex Offenders In Illinois, Michael Zolfo

Chicago-Kent Law Review

In Illinois, a person deemed a Sexually Violent Person (“SVP”) in a civil trial can be detained indefinitely in treatment facilities that functionally serve as prisons. SVPs are not afforded the right to waive a jury trial, a right that criminal defendants enjoy. This results in SVPs facing juries that treat sex offenders as monsters or sub-humans, due to often sensationalistic media coverage and the use of sex offenders as boogeymen in political campaigns. The lack of a jury trial waiver results in more individuals being deemed SVPs, depriving many of their liberty without the due process of law, a …

Cohabitation In Illinois: The Need For Legislative Intervention, Stefanie L. Ferrari

Chicago-Kent Law Review

No abstract provided.

Will The Supreme Court Still “Seldom Stray Very Far”?: Regime Politics In A Polarized America, Kevin J. Mcmahon

Chicago-Kent Law Review

This Article examines the concept of a “minority Justice,” meaning a Supreme Court Justice appointed by a President who had failed to win the popular vote and confirmed with the support of a majority of senators who had garnered fewer votes in their most recent elections than their colleagues in opposition. Specifically, Neil Gorsuch was the first “minority Justice,” receiving the support of senators who had collected nearly 20 million fewer votes than those in opposition (54,098,387 to 73,425,062). From there, the Article considers the significance this development, first by examining some of the foundational work of the regime politics …

What Members Of Congress Say About The Supreme Court And Why It Matters, Carolyn Shapiro

Chicago-Kent Law Review

Republican and Democratic senators took strikingly different approaches to Justice Neil Gorsuch’s confirmation hearing. Republicans focused on judicial process—what judges are supposed to do, how they are constrained, and the significance of the constitutional separation of powers—evoking rhetoric long used by the political right. Democrats, by contrast, focused primarily on case outcomes, complaining, for example, that Gorsuch favored “the big guy” over “the little guy” in cases he decided as a judge on the Tenth Circuit. This Article critiques the Democrats’ failure to discuss judicial process and to promote their own affirmative vision of the judiciary and the Constitution. A …

The Supreme Court And American Politics: Symposium Introduction, Christopher W. Schmidt, Carolyn Shapiro

Chicago-Kent Law Review

No abstract provided.

Keynote Address: Judging The Political And Political Judging: Justice Scalia As Case Study, Richard L. Hasen

Chicago-Kent Law Review

This is a revised version of a Keynote Address delivered at “The Supreme Court and American Politics,” a symposium held October 17, 2017 at the Chicago-Kent College of Law. In this Address, Professor Hasen considers through the lens of Justice Scalia’s opinions the role that views of the political process play, at least rhetorically, in how Supreme Court Justices decide cases. It focuses on Justice Scalia’s contradictory views on self-dealing and incumbency protection across a range of cases, comparing campaign finance on the one hand to partisan gerrymandering, voter identification laws, political patronage, and ballot access rules on the other. …

Above Politics: Congress And The Supreme Court In 2017, Jason Mazzone

Chicago-Kent Law Review

The Supreme Court figured prominently in the November 2016 elections because of the vacancy on the Court that resulted from the death of Justice Antonin Scalia. This Essay picks up the story by examining the place of the Supreme Court in national politics during 2017. It traces congressional efforts to respond to statutory and constitutional rulings by the Court as well as steps to regulate the operations of the Court and the work of the Justices. Although in 2017 Republicans and Democrats introduced numerous bills directed at the Court, these bills were generally modest in scope and, even so, did …

The Forgotten Issue? The Supreme Court And The 2016 Presidential Campaign, Christopher W. Schmidt

Chicago-Kent Law Review

This Article considers how presidential candidates use the Supreme Court as an issue in their election campaigns. I focus in particular on 2016, but I try to make sense of this extraordinary election by placing it in the context of presidential elections over the past century.

In the presidential election of 2016, circumstances seemed perfectly aligned to force the Supreme Court to the front of public debate, but neither Donald Trump nor Hillary Clinton treated the Court as a central issue of their campaigns. Trump rarely went beyond a brief mention of the Court in his campaign speeches; Clinton basically …

Neil Gorsuch And The Ginsburg Rules, Lori A. Ringhand, Paul M. Collins Jr.

Chicago-Kent Law Review

Supreme Court nominees testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee frequently invoke the so-called “Ginsburg Rule” to justify not answering questions posed to them. According to this “rule,” nominees during their testimony must avoid signaling their preferences about previously decided Supreme Court cases or constitutional issues. Using empirical data on every question asked and answered at every hearing from 1939–2017, we explore this “rule,” and its attribution to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. We demonstrate three things. First, the Ginsburg Rule is poorly named, given that the practice of claiming a privilege to not respond to certain types of questions predates the …

Taking Judicial Legitimacy Seriously, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer

Chicago-Kent Law Review

Chief Justice Roberts appears worried about judicial legitimacy. In Gill v. Whitford, the Wisconsin gerrymandering case, he explicitly worries about the message the Court would send if it wades into the gerrymandering debate. More explicitly, he worries about “the status and integrity” of the Court if is seen as taking sides in politically charged controversies. Similarly, during his confirmation hearing, Roberts warned that the Court has a limited role in our constitutional scheme and must stay within it. To decide cases on the basis of policy and not law would compromise the Court’s legitimacy. This Essay is skeptical. For one, …