Law Commons^™

The Supreme Court's New Approach To Personal Jurisdiction, Bernadette Bollas Genetin

Bernadette Bollas Genetin

The Supreme Court has returned to the issue of whether a “reasonableness” analysis or an “interstate federalism” focus underlies personal jurisdiction doctrine. It has, thus, renewed the debate regarding whether the so-called “forward-looking” or “backward-looking” face of International Shoe should control.

This Article explores two 2014 cases in which the Court took strides toward implementing a liberty interest, or reasonableness, view of personal jurisdiction. In the first case, Daimler AG v. Bauman, the Court introduced a new, narrower approach to general jurisdiction. Under Bauman’s more constrained analysis, general jurisdiction will be available primarily in an individual’s domicile and a corporation’s …

"Just A Bit Outside!": Proportionality In Federal Discovery And The Institutional Capacity Of The Federal Courts, Bernadette Bollas Genetin

Bernadette Bollas Genetin

This Article focuses on pending amendments to Rule 26(b)(1), the scope-of-discovery provision in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Proposed Rule 26(b)(1) would authorize parties to obtain discovery of “any non-privileged matter that is relevant to any party’s claim or defense” if that information is also “proportional to the needs of the case,” based on enumerated proportionality factors – “the importance of the issues at state in the action, the amount in controversy, the parties’ relative access to relevant information, the parties’ resources, the importance of the discovery in resolving the issues, and whether the burden or expense of the …

Reassessing The Avoidance Canon In Erie Cases, Bernadette Bollas Genetin

Bernadette Bollas Genetin

This Article advocates that the Supreme Court recalibrate the avoidance canon used in Erie cases in which Federal Rules are in potential conflict with state law. The Article examines the Court’s historical use of avoidance in Erie cases, observing that contemporary jurists inappropriately conflate the purposes of pre- and post-Hanna avoidance when they conclude that avoidance in both periods protected state interests. Avoidance in the post-Hanna period has been premised on protecting important state interests and regulatory policies, but pre-Hanna avoidance attempted, with mixed success, to protect the Federal Rules. The Article also reveals that the Court’s post-Hanna federalism focus …

Summary Judgment And The Influence Of Federal Rulemaking (Foreword To Symposium: The Future Of Summary Judgment), Bernadette Bollas Genetin

Bernadette Bollas Genetin

This essay provides an overview of symposium articles on The Future of Summary Judgment, which were submitted in connection with the Section on Litigation’s program on summary judgment at the 2010 Annual Meeting of the Association of American Law Schools. Contributions to the symposium by Professors Edward Brunet, Stephen Burbank, Jeffrey Cooper, Steven Gensler, and Linda Mullenix, explore issues regarding (1) amendments to Federal Rule 56 that are set to take effect on December 1, 2010; (2) emerging safeguards to prevent improvident grant of summary judgment; (3) the potential of summary judgment to impact interrelated aspects of the pretrial process, …

Powers That Be: A Reexamination Of The Federal Courts' Rulemaking And Adjudicatory Powers In The Context Of A Clash Of A Congressional Statute And A Supreme Court Rule, Bernadette Bollas Genetin

Bernadette Bollas Genetin

This Article examines the long-standing conflict between Rule 17(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which was promulgated by the Supreme Court, and a federal statute, the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA). The Article emphasizes that, when a Federal Rule incorporates state law, many federal courts have applied and inappropriate analysis to conflicts between congressional statutes and Supreme Court Rules; these courts focus on a clash of federal-state authority, rather than recognizing that the conflict presents a horizontal clash of federal authority.

The Article has three goals. First, the Article identifies the flaw in current statute-Rule …

Expressly Repudiating Implied Repeals Analysis: A New Framework For Resolving Conflicts Between Congressional Statutes And Federal Rules, Bernadette Bollas Genetin

Bernadette Bollas Genetin

Part I of this Article provides a framework for understanding the core issues of interbranch power implicated in statute-Rule conflicts by discussing the constitutional foundations of procedural rulemaking authority, Congress’ statutory delegation of rulemaking authority to the Supreme Court in the Rules Enabling Act, and the experience of Court and congressional involvement in procedural rulemaking.

Part II examines the predominant method of analyzing apparent statute-Rule conflicts – use of canon of statutory interpretation disfavoring implied repeals. Part II demonstrates that the Supreme Court has used this implied repeals analysis, but has never discussed directly or comprehensively the appropriate methodology for …