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Comments On A Class Action Rule For Mississippi Comments, Howard M. Erichson Jan 2004

Comments On A Class Action Rule For Mississippi Comments, Howard M. Erichson

Faculty Scholarship

In my primary contribution to this Symposium, I address whether Mississippi ought to adopt a class action rule. In that article, I show that the lack of a class action rule prevents neither mass disputes nor mass aggregate litigation. I argue that for some mass disputes, class actions provide a superior mechanism for dispute resolution, and that Mississippi therefore should adopt a rule permitting class actions. There is another important question, however, which is what such a rule should contain if adopted. Indeed, the questions of whether to permit class actions and what a class action rule should contain are …


Foreseeing Greatness - Measurable Performance Criteria And The Selection Of Supreme Court Justices Symposium: Empirical Measures Of Judicial Performance, James J. Brudney Jan 2004

Foreseeing Greatness - Measurable Performance Criteria And The Selection Of Supreme Court Justices Symposium: Empirical Measures Of Judicial Performance, James J. Brudney

Faculty Scholarship

This article contributes to an ongoing debate about the feasibility and desirability of measuring the merit of appellate judges - and their consequent Supreme Court potential - by using objective performance variables. Relying on the provocative and controversial tournament criteria proposed by Professors Stephen Choi and Mitu Gulati in two recent articles, Brudney assesses the Supreme Court potential of Warren Burger and Harry Blackmun based on their appellate court records. He finds that Burger's appellate performance appears more promising under the Choi and Gulati criteria, but then demonstrates how little guidance these quantitative assessments actually provide when reviewing the two …


Doing Good, Doing Well Symposium, Howard M. Erichson Jan 2004

Doing Good, Doing Well Symposium, Howard M. Erichson

Faculty Scholarship

Rather than focusing on the differences between tort lawyers and activists as they ally with each other, this Article focuses on the motivations and explanations of the tort lawyers themselves. Positioned at the intersection of big-money practice and social change litigation, mass torts provide a useful study in multiple motivations. While financial incentives for plaintiffs' lawyers explain much of what happens in mass torts, policy objectives come into play as well, at least in the lawyers' rhetoric. Despite the obvious difficulty distinguishing reasons from rhetoric and rationalization, it is worth exploring the significance of mixed motives for lawyers who are …


Role Of The Bank For International Settlements In Shaping The World Financial System, The , Carl Felsenfeld, Genci Bilali Jan 2004

Role Of The Bank For International Settlements In Shaping The World Financial System, The , Carl Felsenfeld, Genci Bilali

Faculty Scholarship

The Bank for International Settlements ("BIS") was set up in Basel, Switzerland in 1923 to handle remaining financial issues from World War II largely having to do with German reparation payments. It was the first of the semi-public international banks. Over the years its functions have changed and, largely since the late 1970's, it has served as the situs for the world's central banks and financial regulators to pool ideas and deal with international financial issues. A group of committees, com- posed largely of representatives of central bankers, now meets at BIS and has been issuing memoranda and drafts of …


Neutrality Agreements And Card Check Recognition: Prospects For Changing Paradigms , James J. Brudney Jan 2004

Neutrality Agreements And Card Check Recognition: Prospects For Changing Paradigms , James J. Brudney

Faculty Scholarship

The rise of neutrality agreements is a major development in labor-management relations in this country. The union movement's new approach to organizing displaces elections supervised by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) with negotiated agreements that provide for employers to remain neutral during an upcoming union campaign and (in most instances) for employees to decide if they wish to be represented through signing authorization cards rather than through a secret ballot election. Professor Brudney demonstrates the substantial role now being played by this contractually based approach to union organizing. He also explains why so many employers have agreed to neutrality …


Isolated And Politicized: The Nlrb's Uncertain Future The National Labor Relations Board In Comparative Context: Introduction, James J. Brudney Jan 2004

Isolated And Politicized: The Nlrb's Uncertain Future The National Labor Relations Board In Comparative Context: Introduction, James J. Brudney

Faculty Scholarship

The National Labor Relations Board has managed to remain unusually detached or isolated in its decision-making even as it has come to operate in an openly partisan manner. There is a certain paradoxical quality to the coexistence of these two descriptors for Board conduct: isolation in agency performance ordinarily suggests a neutral separation from the political process whereas politicization implies a close connection to the elected branches. The explanation for this odd pairing involves a number of factors: some reflect political realities beyond the agency's ability to control, others relate to the structure of the NLRA, and still others are …


Body And Soul Under The Law, And The Response From Law And Literature In Bartleby, The Scrivener And Billy Budd, Sailor Symposium: The Failure Of The Word, Thane Rosenbaum Jan 2004

Body And Soul Under The Law, And The Response From Law And Literature In Bartleby, The Scrivener And Billy Budd, Sailor Symposium: The Failure Of The Word, Thane Rosenbaum

Faculty Scholarship

The values of the American legal system, and the annual Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue, have at least one thing in common: both are unquestionably, if not shamelessly, body conscious. Nothing triggers legal exposure with greater certainty than an injury to the human body. The body is the locus of the law's remedial obsessions. Unless the body is bruised, some scar is left, an essential piece of anatomy is altered, or some damage takes place in a material, external sense to objects that have definable, tangible characteristics, the law is without moral force or conviction.


International Law, International Relations Theory, And Preemptive War: The Vitality Of Sovereign Equallity Today Case Studies In Conservative And Progressive Legal Orders, Thomas H. Lee Jan 2004

International Law, International Relations Theory, And Preemptive War: The Vitality Of Sovereign Equallity Today Case Studies In Conservative And Progressive Legal Orders, Thomas H. Lee

Faculty Scholarship

Although sovereign equality - the norm that all sovereign states are entitled to the same bundle of rights on the international plane - has long been a central norm of international law, its retention in the realm of preemptive war is fairly to be questioned when one sovereign state possesses overwhelming military power. In this Article, Professor Lee examines the historical and normative foundations of sovereign equality, finds them wanting under the condition of a militarily supreme republican state, but defends the norm on the pragmatic ground of what is best for the supreme state to defend itself against covert, …


George Bundy Smith - A Good Lawyer , John D. Feerick Jan 2004

George Bundy Smith - A Good Lawyer , John D. Feerick

Faculty Scholarship

As I have noted elsewhere, if I were asked to pick one moment in the legal history of the country where what ought to be came together with what is, it would be the unanimous decision of nine white men in Brown v. Board of Education dismantling the segregation of white and black children in public education. This was a watershed moment in the history of law. As Judge Robert Carter of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York has written, this decision will "always stand at the highest pinnacle of American judicial expression because …


Merger Of Law And Mediation: Lessons From Equity Jurisprudence And Roscoe Pound, The , Jacqueline Nolan-Haley Jan 2004

Merger Of Law And Mediation: Lessons From Equity Jurisprudence And Roscoe Pound, The , Jacqueline Nolan-Haley

Faculty Scholarship

This article examines Roscoe Pound's concerns with the decline of equity jurisprudence in the American legal system, suggesting that they resonate with those of modern ADR scholars who worry about the effects of blending settlement with adjudication and mediation with the law. It examines court-connected mediation with particular emphasis on the historic parallels between equity and mediation. Both equity and mediation offer a form of "individualized justice" unavailable in the official legal system, and each allow room for mercy in an otherwise rigid, rule-bound justice system. Yet, scholars question whether equity today is still equitable and whether institutionalized mediation offers …


Is There A First Amendment Defense For Bush V. Gore , Abner S. Greene Jan 2004

Is There A First Amendment Defense For Bush V. Gore , Abner S. Greene

Faculty Scholarship

Could so many well-established scholars be wrong? Is it possible that Bush v. Gore is defensible, after all? The two pillars of the decision-the Equal Protection Clause justification for the merits holding and the "safe harbor" remedial ruling - indeed seem weak. The alternative merits view-that the Florida Supreme Court had engaged in statutory amendment under the guise of statutory interpretation, thus violating Article II of the federal Constitution-runs aground against the plausible (albeit not necessarily correct) readings of the state high court. If one agrees that these merits and remedial arguments are indefensible, then mustn't one agree with the …


Religious Lawyering In A Liberal Democracy: A Challenge And An Invitation William A. Brahms Lecture On Law & Religion, Russell G. Pearce Jan 2004

Religious Lawyering In A Liberal Democracy: A Challenge And An Invitation William A. Brahms Lecture On Law & Religion, Russell G. Pearce

Faculty Scholarship

At a time when many believe that law is no longer a noble profession, many lawyers see no reason to devote time and energy to promoting the public good. Religious lawyering may offer a powerful antidote: a robust framework for lawyers to integrate into their professional lives their most deeply rooted values, perspectives and critiques, and persuasive reasons to improve the quality of justice and work for the common good. At its best, religious lawyering echoes Martin Luther King's advice to the street sweeper. How wonderful it would be, indeed, if we practiced law so well that the host of …


Vultures Or Vanguards: The Role Of Litigation In Sovereign Debt Restructuring Conference On Sovereign Debt Restructuring: The View From The Legal Academy, Jill E. Fisch, Caroline M. Gentile Jan 2004

Vultures Or Vanguards: The Role Of Litigation In Sovereign Debt Restructuring Conference On Sovereign Debt Restructuring: The View From The Legal Academy, Jill E. Fisch, Caroline M. Gentile

Faculty Scholarship

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 …


Typology Of Aggregate Settlements, A , Howard M. Erichson Jan 2004

Typology Of Aggregate Settlements, A , Howard M. Erichson

Faculty Scholarship

It is odd, considering how often lawyers engage in aggregate settlements, that no one seems able to explain what "aggregate settlement" means. It is one of the most important yet least defined terms in complex litigation. Lawyers and judges talk about aggregate settlements as though it were obvious what the term signifies and as though it describes a single thing. In fact, group settlements in multiparty litigation vary significantly. And they vary in ways that make it difficult to determine whether certain deals ought to be understood as collective settlements or simply as groups of individual settlements bundled together. This …


Supreme Court Of The United States As Quasi-International Tribunal: Reclaiming The Court's Original And Exclusive Jurisdiction Over Treaty-Based Suits By Foreign States Against States, The, Thomas H. Lee Jan 2004

Supreme Court Of The United States As Quasi-International Tribunal: Reclaiming The Court's Original And Exclusive Jurisdiction Over Treaty-Based Suits By Foreign States Against States, The, Thomas H. Lee

Faculty Scholarship

The thesis of this Article is that the Constitution vests in the Supreme Court original and exclusive jurisdiction over suits brought by foreign states against States alleging violation of ratified treaties of the United States. The basis for non-immunity in suits by foreign states is the same theory of ratification consent that is presumed to justify suits against States by other States or the United States. Just as the States by ratifying the Constitution agreed to suits in the national court by other States and the national sovereign to ensure domestic peace, they agreed to suits by foreign states in …


Federal Sentencing During The Interregnum: Defense Practice As The Blakely Dust Settles , Ian Weinstein, Nathaniel Z. Marmur Jan 2004

Federal Sentencing During The Interregnum: Defense Practice As The Blakely Dust Settles , Ian Weinstein, Nathaniel Z. Marmur

Faculty Scholarship

Although the long term impact of Blakely v. Washington is not yet clear, no one can doubt that the case raises a host of immediate, significant and perplexing practical questions for federal criminal defense attorneys. The Supreme Court has granted certiorari in a pair of cases raising Blakely issues and oral argument is scheduled for October 4, 2004. It seems likely that the Supreme Court will offer some guidance by Thanksgiving. Until the Court rules, uncertainty will continue as the lower courts interpret Blakely in disparate ways. Once the Court does rule, many hard questions may remain unanswered. This article …


Understanding The Mark: Race, Stigma, And Equality In Context, Robin A. Lenhardt Jan 2004

Understanding The Mark: Race, Stigma, And Equality In Context, Robin A. Lenhardt

Faculty Scholarship

In its Fourteenth Amendment jurisprudence, the Supreme Court regards intentional discrimination as the principal source of racial injury in the United States. In this Article, R.A. Lenhardt argues that racial stigma, not intentional discrimination, constitutes the main source of racial harm and that courts must take the social science insight that most racialized conduct or thought is unconscious, rather than intentional, into account in their constitutional analyses of acts or policies challenged on the grounds of race. Drawing on the social science work of Erving Goffman and the ground-breaking work of Charles H. Lawrence, Professor Lenhardt argues that courts should …


Executive Power Essentialism And Foreign Affairs, Martin S. Flaherty Jan 2004

Executive Power Essentialism And Foreign Affairs, Martin S. Flaherty

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.


The Coalition For Consumer Bankruptcy Debtor Education: A Report On Its Pilot Program, Susan Block-Lieb, Corinne Baron-Donovan, Karen Gross, Richard Wiener Jan 2004

The Coalition For Consumer Bankruptcy Debtor Education: A Report On Its Pilot Program, Susan Block-Lieb, Corinne Baron-Donovan, Karen Gross, Richard Wiener

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.


When Two Become One: Views On Fletcher's "Two Patterns Of Criminality", Deborah W. Denno Jan 2004

When Two Become One: Views On Fletcher's "Two Patterns Of Criminality", Deborah W. Denno

Faculty Scholarship

George Fletcher's Rethinking Criminal Law (“Rethinking”) is the ultimate cut-to-the-chase treatise. The book does not belabor the frailties of existing criminal law, but rather predicts an overhaul of much of its doctrine. This essay marks a tribute to Rethinking's influence by examining two of the book's well known “patterns of criminality”: (1) “manifest criminality,” which proposes that crimes are acts that any “objective” observer would clearly recognize as illegal without knowing anything about the mental state of the person committing those acts, and, in stark contrast, (2) “subjective criminality,” which suggests that crimes are consciously intended and experienced only by …


Causation In Antidiscrimination Law: Beyond Intent Versus Impact , Sheila R. Foster Jan 2004

Causation In Antidiscrimination Law: Beyond Intent Versus Impact , Sheila R. Foster

Faculty Scholarship

Antidiscrimination law and scholarship have long been engaged in the debate over whether a discriminatory intent or disparate impact test best captures the type of discrimination the law should, or can, prohibit. This Article suggests that we move beyond this dichotomous debate and focus instead on how courts reason about discrimination cases brought under both the intent and impact doctrines. This Article identifies a distinct pattern, or framework, in the way courts reason about discrimination in both types of cases that defies neat doctrinal labels. reasoning process, which I shorthandedly refer to as "causation," is at the heart of evidentiary …


Mississippi Class Actions And The Inevitability Of Mass Aggregate Litigation, Howard M. Erichson Jan 2004

Mississippi Class Actions And The Inevitability Of Mass Aggregate Litigation, Howard M. Erichson

Faculty Scholarship

It's not about whether there will be mass aggregate litigation, but how. As long as the economy features mass marketing, mass employment, mass entertainment, mass transportation, mass production of goods, and mass provision of services, disputes will arise in which a mass of claimants seek relief from a common defendant or set of defendants. Lawyers on both sides naturally handle such matters collectively rather than individually. With or without the judicial imprimatur of class certification, multi- claimant disputes routinely are litigated and resolved on a collective basis. The real question is not whether there will be mass litigation, but whether …


Challenge Of Environmental Justice, The, Sheila R. Foster Jan 2004

Challenge Of Environmental Justice, The, Sheila R. Foster

Faculty Scholarship

The residents of Camden, New Jersey do not live in a bustling city as do residents living across the Delaware River in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Instead, Camden's largely minority population lives in an environmentally and economically devastated neighborhood replete with two Superfund sites. Garbage incinerators, sewage treatment plants and polluting factories have been placed in Camden because the poor have historically been less likely to protest than wealthier communities. In 1997, concerned Camden residents formed the South Camden Citizens in Action ( SCCA ) association to confront the continued encroachment by polluting factories and sewage treatment centers threatening their lives and …


Legislating Accountability: Standards, Sanctions, And School District Reform , Aaron J. Saiger Jan 2004

Legislating Accountability: Standards, Sanctions, And School District Reform , Aaron J. Saiger

Faculty Scholarship

The “New Accountability” movement in American education purports to catalyze improvement in American education by setting clear state standards for academic performance, measuring performance against those standards, and disseminating information about results. This Article argues that the potential of state accountability programs lies not in their imposition of standards but in their imposition of a sanction - the disestablishment of school districts, which entails unseating the local superintendent and school board and replacing them with state officials or their designees - that is extremely painful for the targeted district but is also painful for states to impose. The first Part …


Speculation On The Future Of The Bank For International Settlements, A , Carl Felsenfeld, Genci Bilali Jan 2004

Speculation On The Future Of The Bank For International Settlements, A , Carl Felsenfeld, Genci Bilali

Faculty Scholarship

Financial crises around the globe place countries at risk. Not only do less developed countries like Mexico and Argentina tremble from the inadequacies of their banking systems, but large and developed economies such as Japan suffer similar apprehension. As a result, national financial authorities find themselves looking for a type of international financial entity that can coordinate the efforts of these authorities in maintaining safety and soundness in their respective financial and banking sectors. This being the case, financial markets need the assistance of an international institution that can regulate national banking systems and, in return, can avoid any future …


To Be Brown In Brazil: Education And Segregation Latin American Style Colloquium - Relearning Brown: Applying The Lessons Of Brown To The Challenges Of The Twenty-First Century, Tanya K. Hernandez Jan 2004

To Be Brown In Brazil: Education And Segregation Latin American Style Colloquium - Relearning Brown: Applying The Lessons Of Brown To The Challenges Of The Twenty-First Century, Tanya K. Hernandez

Faculty Scholarship

As a scholar who studies civil rights movements from a comparative perspective, the commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education1 decision causes me to query the power of Brown as a symbol of equality outside of the United States. Because there is a larger community of African descendants living in Latin America and the Caribbean than there is in the United States, examining the role of Brown in Latin America and the Caribbean is particularly worthwhile. Furthermore, focusing on the Latin American and Caribbean contexts is also relevant due to the significant influence of the …