Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 12 of 12
Full-Text Articles in Law
Fiduciary Duties And Exculpatory Clauses: Clash Of The Titans Or Cozy Bedfellows, Louise Lark Hill
Fiduciary Duties And Exculpatory Clauses: Clash Of The Titans Or Cozy Bedfellows, Louise Lark Hill
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
Centuries ago, when land represented the majority of wealth, the trust was used primarily for holding and transferring real property. As the dominant form of wealth moved away from family land, the trust evolved into a device for managing financial assets. With this transformation came the use of exculpatory clauses by both amateur and professional trustees, providing an avenue for these fiduciaries to escape liability for designated acts. With the use of exculpatory provisions, discussion abounded about whether fiduciary duties were mandatory or subject to modification. The latter view eventually prevailed, with the majority of jurisdictions viewing fiduciary duties as …
The Federal Common Law Of Vicarious Fiduciary Liability Under Erisa, Colleen E. Medill
The Federal Common Law Of Vicarious Fiduciary Liability Under Erisa, Colleen E. Medill
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
The Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 ("ERISA"), the federal law that regulates employer-sponsored benefit plans, has a rich history of judiciallycreated federal common law. This Article explores the theoretical, policy, statutory, and stare decisis grounds for the development of another area offederal common law under ERISA-the incorporation of respondeat superior liability principles to impose ERISA fiduciary liability ("vicarious fiduciary liability") upon a corporation for the fiduciary activities of its employees or agents. The Article proposes that the federal courts should adopt a federal common law rule of vicarious fiduciary liability under ERISA based on the traditional scope of …
Turning A Short-Term Fling Into A Long-Term Commitment: Board Duties In A New Era, Nadelle Grossman
Turning A Short-Term Fling Into A Long-Term Commitment: Board Duties In A New Era, Nadelle Grossman
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
Corporate boards face significant pressure to make decisions that maximize profits in the short run. That pressure comes in part from executives who are financially rewarded for short-term profits despite the long-term risks associated with those profit-making activities. The current financial crisis, where executives at AIG and numerous other institutions ignored the long-term risks associated with their mortgage backed securities investments, arose largely because those executives were compensated for the short-term profits generated by those investments despite their longer-term risks. Pressure on boards for short-term profits also comes from activist investors who seek to make quick money off of trading …
The Tort Of Betrayal Of Trust, Caroline Forell, Anna Sortun
The Tort Of Betrayal Of Trust, Caroline Forell, Anna Sortun
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
Fiduciary betrayal is a serious harm. When the fiduciary is a doctor or a lawyer, and the entrustor is a patient or client, this harm frequently goes unremedied. Betrayals arise out of disloyalty and conflicts of interest where the lawyer or doctor puts his or her interest above that of his or her client or patient. They cause dignitary harm that is different from the harm flowing from negligent malpractice. Nevertheless, courts, concerned with overdeterrence, have for the most part refused to allow a separate claim for betrayal. In this Article, we suggest that betrayal deserves a remedy and propose …
Stock Market Volatility And 401 (K) Plans, Colleen E. Medill
Stock Market Volatility And 401 (K) Plans, Colleen E. Medill
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
Many workers today depend on their 401(k) plan to provide them with an adequate income during retirement. For these workers to achieve retirement income security, their 401(k) plan investments must perform well over their working lifetime. Employers' selection of investment options for the 401(k) plan, a fiduciary duty under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), plays a critical role in determining investment performance. In this Article, Professor Medill uses a series of hypothetical litigation scenarios to illustrate how interpretation of the employer's duty of prudence and duty of loyalty under ERISA present different policy choices for the …
Beyond Managerialism: Investor Capitalism?, Alfred F. Conard
Beyond Managerialism: Investor Capitalism?, Alfred F. Conard
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
Capitalism, in most large public corporations, has been subtly transformed from a system of dominance by the suppliers of capital to a system of dominance by the managers, dubbed "managerialism." In many respects, managerialism is beneficial to investors and other enterprise constituencies, since managers' rewards typically grow with the profitability of the enterprise. But managerialism permits drastic wastes of resources when managers hang on to their jobs after they have become inefficient or spend lavishly to defend themselves against takeover bids. Derivative suits, shareholder proposals, independent directors, and other prescriptions have failed to stifle managerial abuses. This is the message …
Two Models Of Corporate Governance: Beyond Berle And Means, Lynne L. Dallas
Two Models Of Corporate Governance: Beyond Berle And Means, Lynne L. Dallas
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
This Article introduces a new model of corporate governance, which challenges, as did Berle and Means, the conclusions drawn from the traditional ownership model. Rather than focusing upon the inefficiencies of the large complex firm resulting from the separation of share ownership and control, however, this new model, which I call the power model, focuses upon the political nature of decision making in the large corporation, which exists regardless of the identity of the entrepreneur.
Attorney Misappropriation Of Clients' Funds: A Study In Professional Responsibility, Gregory Dunbar Soule
Attorney Misappropriation Of Clients' Funds: A Study In Professional Responsibility, Gregory Dunbar Soule
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
The legal profession has initiated disciplinary processes and clients' security funds in order to achieve certain objectives. This article will delineate these objectives and evaluate whether they have been satisfied. Moreover, it will propose additional goals that the legal profession, given its present status as a self-regulating profession, should attain in satisfying its responsibility for governing the professional conduct of its members. Finally, additional measures that several states have instituted in order to complement the efforts of disciplinary agencies and clients' security funds by fulfilling unsatisfied needs of professional responsibility will be examined.
Providing An Effective Remedy In Shareholder Suits Against Officers, Directors, And Controlling Persons, Michael H. Woolever
Providing An Effective Remedy In Shareholder Suits Against Officers, Directors, And Controlling Persons, Michael H. Woolever
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
Corporate officers, directors, and controlling persons occupy a fiduciary relationship toward the corporation and its shareholders in the exercise of control over corporate affairs. This fiduciary obligation requires that officers, directors, and controlling persons act in good faith and perform their offices in the best interests of the corporation and its shareholders and not to their own advantage. When this duty is breached, a shareholder may bring an action against these fiduciaries, either in his own name or derivatively for the benefit of the corporation. Under present law, however, it may be impossible for an American court to secure jurisdiction …
Attorneys' Conflicts Of Interest In The Investment Company Industry, Farrell C. Glasser
Attorneys' Conflicts Of Interest In The Investment Company Industry, Farrell C. Glasser
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
This article explores the problem of conflicts of interest resulting from the retention of the same attorneys by investment companies and their affiliates. After an analysis of the problem, it suggests appropriate remedial measures that could be instituted to prevent these conflicts from occurring in the investment company industry.
Proposed Amendments To The Welfare And Pension Plans Disclosure Act, Stephen E. Dawson
Proposed Amendments To The Welfare And Pension Plans Disclosure Act, Stephen E. Dawson
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
Proposals to regulate private pension and deferred profit-sharing plans are by no means new to Congress. With the rapid growth in size, number and complexity of such plans in the late 1940's and early 1950's, Congress began to give increasingly close attention to their defects and, particularly, to their mismanagement. The first congressional attempt to reduce the instances of private pension plan mismanagement occurred in 1958 when Congress enacted the Welfare and Pension Plans Disclosure Act. The Act was amended once in 1962, and further proposed amendments are presently before the Congress. This note will examine two of the proposed …
Financial Statement Insurance: A New Approach To Ivestor Protection, Stephen Z. Surridge
Financial Statement Insurance: A New Approach To Ivestor Protection, Stephen Z. Surridge
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
The accounting profession rapidly is moving toward a crisis in liability. Members of the investing public are suing accountants with mounting frequency and success. This article will analyze briefly the origin and present dimensions of the crisis, and then propose a plan for replacing court-imposed liability with insured liability through the offering of financial statement insurance. The essentials of the plan can be simply stated. Insurance would be offered by accountants to investors on a voluntary basis in conjunction with purchases and sales of corporate stock and securities. Individual investors would be able to purchase from the auditors of a …