Judges Commons^™

The Court And The Private Plaintiff, Elizabeth Beske

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

Two seemingly irreconcilable story arcs have emerged from the Supreme Court over the past decade. First, the Court has definitively taken itself out of the business of creating private rights of action under statutes and the Constitution, decrying such moves as relics of an “ancient regime.” Thus, the Supreme Court has slammed the door on its own ability to craft rights of action under federal statutes and put Bivens, which recognized implied constitutional remedies, into an ever-smaller box. The Court has justified these moves as necessary to keep judges from overstepping their bounds and wading into the province of the …

Litigation As Integration And Participation: The Role Of Lawsuits In The U.S. Environmental Justice Movement, Tomas Sebastian Forman

Senior Projects Spring 2022

What is, has been, and could be the role of litigation in the U.S. environmental justice movement? To what ends do Indigenous communities, federally-recognized tribes, and rural Black communities choose to engage with the U.S. legal system, an institution which has, over history, consistently subjugated and dispossessed them? How do these groups' particularistic relationships to natural and built environments, conceptions of justice and fairness, and understandings of what effective environmental regulation look like inform that choice? This paper draws from in-depth qualitative research to demonstrate the following things: (1) how environmental justice lawsuits differ from canonical environmental and civil rights …

Parity As Comparative Capacity: A New Empirics Of The Parity Debate, Meredith R. Aska Mcbride

University of Cincinnati Law Review

In 1977, Burt Neuborne published an article in the Harvard Law Review proclaiming that parity was a “myth”—that state courts could not be trusted to enforce federal constitutional rights. For the next 15 years, the question of parity (the equivalence of state and federal courts in adjudicating federal causes of action) was at the forefront of federal courts scholarship. But in the early 1990s, the parity debate ground to a halt after important commentators proclaimed it an empirical question that, paradoxically, could not be answered by any existing empirical methods. This article argues that proposition was unfounded at the time …

Rwu Law News: The Newsletter Of Roger Williams University School Of Law 04-2021, Michael M. Bowden, Barry Bridges, Political Roundtable

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

2nd Annual Women In Law Leadership Lecture: A Fireside Chat With Debra Katz, Esq. 03-03-2021, Roger Williams University School Of Law

School of Law Conferences, Lectures & Events

No abstract provided.

Law School News: Professor Gonzalez Is 2020 Rhode Island Lawyer Of The Year 01/11/21, Barry Bridges, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

Rethinking Appeals, Uri Weiss

Touro Law Review

This paper makes the point that a court decision that is open to an appeal is akin to a take-it-or-leave-it settlement proposal for both parties. For the case to not be appealed, both parties need to “take,” i.e., accept, this proposal. Thus, on one hand, if both parties cannot achieve a settlement by themselves, they usually benefit from the right to appeal. On the other hand, a right to appeal activates the regressive effects that characterize settlements, which also applies to lower-court decisions. For example, legal uncertainty has a regressive effect on lower-court decisions: if the judge wishes to block …

Assertion And Hearsay, Richard Lloret

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

This article explores the characteristics and functions of assertion and considers how the term influences the definition of hearsay under Federal Rule of Evidence 801. Rule 801(a) defines hearsay by limiting it to words and conduct intended as an assertion, but the rule does not define the term assertion. Courts and legal scholars have focused relatively little attention on the nature and definition of assertion. That is unfortunate, because assertion is a robust concept that has been the subject of intense philosophic study over recent decades. Assertion is not a mere cypher standing in for whatever speech or conduct one …

Trump V. Mazars Usa, Llp: The Case Of The Chief Justice And The Congressional Subpoenas, Rodger D. Citron

Scholarly Works

No abstract provided.

Judges As Agents Of The Law, Daniel Harris

Mitchell Hamline Law Journal of Public Policy and Practice

No abstract provided.

Guidelines And Best Practices For Large And Mass-Tort Mdls (Second Edition), Bolch Judicial Institute

Bolch Judicial Institute Publications

Mass-tort MDLs dominate the federal civil docket, yet they present enormous challenges to transferee judges assigned to manage them. There is little official guidance and no rules specific to the management of mass-tort MDLs, often requiring the transferee judge to develop procedures out of whole cloth.

Beginning in 2013, the Bolch Judicial Institute (then the Center for Judicial Studies) sought to address this issue through a series of annual bench-bar conferences. From these conferences came the Guidelines and Best Practices for Large and Mass-Tort MDLs document — now in its Second Edition — which is designed to help judges and …

Rwu First Amendment Blog: David Logan's Blog: Donald Trump And The Full-Employment-For-Lawyers Presidency, David A. Logan

Law School Blogs

No abstract provided.

Class Actions And The Counterrevolution Against Federal Litigation, Stephen B. Burbank, Sean Farhang

All Faculty Scholarship

In this article we situate consideration of class actions in a framework, and fortify it with data, that we have developed as part of a larger project, the goal of which is to assess the counterrevolution against private enforcement of federal law from an institutional perspective. In a series of articles emerging from the project, we have documented how the Executive, Congress and the Supreme Court (wielding both judicial power under Article III of the Constitution and delegated legislative power under the Rules Enabling Act) fared in efforts to reverse or dull the effects of statutory and other incentives for …

Class Actions And The Counterrevolution Against Federal Litigation, Stephen B. Burbank, Sean Farhang

Sean Farhang

In this article we situate consideration of class actions in a framework, and fortify it with data, that we have developed as part of a larger project, the goal of which is to assess the counterrevolution against private enforcement of federal law from an institutional perspective. In a series of articles emerging from the project, we have documented how the Executive, Congress and the Supreme Court (wielding both judicial power under Article III of the Constitution and delegated legislative power under the Rules Enabling Act) fared in efforts to reverse or dull the effects of statutory and other incentives for …

The Function Of The International Court Of Justice In The World Community, Ernest A. Gross

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Police Misconduct - A Plaintiff's Point Of View, Part Ii, John Williams

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Qualified Immunity When Facts Are In Dispute, Leon Friedman

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Section 1983 Custom Claims And The Code Of Silence, Myriam Gilles

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Problems Concerning Litigating Custom And Practice Cases, Steve Ryals

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Cautionary Look At A Cautionary Doctrine, Andrew W. Fine

Brooklyn Journal of Corporate, Financial & Commercial Law

Optimism is an indispensable element of effective salesmanship. It is therefore quite natural for the directors of public companies to want to optimistically tout the potential long-term benefits of investing in their companies. After all, directors of public companies must be empowered to attract the attention and money of American investors. But what happens if these long-term projections fail to come true? Who is to blame for long-term projections that are simply unrealistic? A doctrine called the “bespeaks caution” doctrine has emerged in order to govern these inquiries, and holds that these optimistic forward-looking statements are legally immunized provided that …

Dismissing Provenance: The Use Of Procedural Defenses To Bar Claims In Nazi-Looted Art And Securitized Mortgage Litigation, Christian J. Bromley

Christian J Bromley

The litigation surrounding an estimated 650,000 works looted by the Nazis in the Second World War and the millions of securitized mortgages foreclosed in the wake of the Great Recession converge on a fundamental legal principle: who really holds rightful title? Seemingly worlds apart, these separate yet remarkably similar forms of property challenge the American judiciary to allocate property rights between adversaries steadfast in their contention of rightful ownership. The legal fulcrum in this allocation often rests not on the equity or righteousness of either parties’ claim—whether museum versus heir or bank versus former homeowner—but instead on procedural defenses that …

Complexity In Litigation: A Differential Diagnosis, Curtis E.A. Karnow

Curtis E.A. Karnow

This note examines complex litigation with the goal of providing practical options for its management. It is written from a judge’s perspective. I review the definition of a “complex” case and explain its emphasis on the need for a judge to manage the case, with a focus on enabling settlement. I address a series of specific characteristics or aspects of complex cases, explaining how these affect the progress of the case. Then the note explores the many tools and techniques judges have to manage and ameliorate difficult aspects of complex cases. {Pre-print. Final article as published differs substantially and is …

Can We Learn Anything About Pleading Changes From Existing Data?, Jonah B. Gelbach

All Faculty Scholarship

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 Adversarial System, Three Lemons, And Cocaine: The Role Of Confirmation Bias, Curtis E.A. Karnow

Curtis E.A. Karnow

A short note on confirmation bias and cognitive dissonance as it affects decision making by lawyers and judges.

Complex Litigation In The New Era Of The Ijury, Andrew J. Wilhelm

Pepperdine Law Review

This Comment argues for a comprehensive approach to legitimizing the lay jury—an approach involving education, attorney adaptation, courtroom renovations, and judicial knowledge—and a better understanding of how legal professionals can fairly and most effectively transmit knowledge to the average American. The lay jury can remain a vital, unique part of the American judicial system if the bench and bar take seriously their responsibilities and adapt to today’s new reality. Part II examines the background of three basic components of a successful contemporary trial: technology, litigation, and the jury. Part III explores how these three components have evolved in the modern …

Tell Us A Story, But Don't Make It A Good One: Resolving The Confusion Regarding Emotional Stories And Federal Rule Of Evidence 403, Cathren Page

Cathren Page

Abstract: Tell Us a Story, But Don’t Make It A Good One: Resolving the Confusion Regarding Emotional Stories and Federal Rule of Evidence 403 by Cathren Koehlert-Page Courts need to reword their opinions regarding Rule 403 to address the tension between the advice to tell an emotionally evocative story at trial and the notion that evidence can be excluded if it is too emotional. In the murder mystery Mystic River, Dave Boyle is kidnapped in the beginning. The audience feels empathy for Dave who as an adult becomes one of the main suspects in the murder of his friend Jimmy’s …

Rethinking Summary Judgment Empirics: The Life Of The Parties, Jonah B. Gelbach

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Fixable Flaws Of America's Civil Justice System, James Maxeiner

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Administrative Law Judges Under Fire: Association Of Administrative Law Judges, Inc. V. Heckler, David J. Agatstein

Journal of the National Association of Administrative Law Judiciary

No abstract provided.

Timeless Trial Strategies And Tactics: Lessons From The Classic Claus Von Bülow Case, Daniel M. Braun

Daniel M Braun

In this new Millennium -- an era of increasingly complex cases -- it is critical that lawyers keep a keen eye on trial strategy and tactics. Although scientific evidence today is more sophisticated than ever, the art of effectively engaging people and personalities remains prime. Scientific data must be contextualized and presented in absorbable ways, and attorneys need to ensure not only that they correctly understand jurors, judges, witnesses, and accused persons, but also that they find the means to make their arguments truly resonate if they are to formulate an effective case and ultimately realize justice. A decades-old case …