Law Commons^™

The Class Of Injuries Test: A Unifying Proposal To Determining Duty, Proximate Cause, And Superseding Cause In Negligence Claims, Judge Leonard J. Feldman, Julia Doherty

Seattle University Law Review

While there seems to be universal agreement that liability in tort cannot be unlimited, there is widespread disagreement regarding the various tests that courts utilize to limit such liability. We assume here that breach can be proven: the defendant failed to conduct themself in accordance with the salient standard of conduct (for example, failure to exercise reasonable care under all the circumstances). In the ensuing litigation, the court and jury are asked to decide several issues that each limit liability for negligence. Here, we focus on three oft-debated issues: duty, proximate cause, and superseding cause. The tests for each are …

Foreseeability And Duty In Washington Negligence Law: Leaving The Road Less Traveled By, Leo Linder

Seattle University Law Review

Washington negligence law is a confusing labyrinth of foreseeability that not even Ariadne’s string could guide plaintiffs out of. Foreseeability is implicated in four distinct analyses, several of which overlap considerably. Doctrines that were once questions of law are now questions of fact, and vice versa. Something needs to change.

Washington has taken the novel approach of bifurcating the duty element into two parts—duty’s mere existence, which is a question of law for the court to determine; and duty’s scope, which is a question of fact handed off to the jury to determine. Foreseeability impacts both of these assessments, but …

Toward The Search For The Proper Liability Rule For Harms Resulting From Sources Of Risk: A Different Approach To The Choice Between Strict Liability And Fault-Based Regime, Wen-Hsuan Yang

Maurer Theses and Dissertations

An important issue in Taiwan today concerns the rising tension between strict liability and negligence. Article 191-3 of the Civil Code of Taiwan imposes a fault-based standard of liability on persons conducting dangerous activities. On the other hand, the majority of scholars believe that to afford greater protection, this rule should be changed into a strict liability rule.

Traditionally, three arguments make it preferable to impose strict liability under certain circumstances. First, strict liability induces more safety incentives on the part of the defendant. Second, fairness requires that one who benefits from conducting dangerous activities should bear the risk of …

Contemporary Soviet Criminal Law: An Analysis Of The General Principles And Major Institutions Of Post-1958 Soviet Criminal Law, Chris Osakwe

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Material Contribution To Risk In The Canadian Law Of Toxic Torts, Lynda M. Collins

Chicago-Kent Law Review

Causation is acknowledged as the single biggest hurdle to recovery for plaintiffs in toxic tort actions in Canada (and elsewhere). Scientific uncertainty involving questions of both generic and specific causation has frequently precluded recovery for plaintiffs even where defendants have negligently exposed them to toxic risk. Three types of uncertainty have been identified: plaintiff indeterminacy (where we know that the defendant has harmed some proportion of a particular population but no individual can prove causation); defendant indeterminacy (where we know that a group of defendants has harmed a particular plaintiff or plaintiffs but each can escape liability by pointing the …

Product Liability Law In Japan: An Introduction To A Developing Area Of Law, Younghee Jin Ottley, Bruce L. Ottley

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

International Mass Tort Litigation: Forum Non Conveniens And The Adequate Alternative Forum In Light Of The Bhopal Disaster, Stephen L. Cummings

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

The European Directive On Products Liability: The Promise Of Progress?, Lawrence C. Mann, Peter R. Rodrigues

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Recovery For Mental Injuries That Are Accompanied By Physical Injuries Under Article 17 Of The Warsaw Convention: The Progeny Of Eastern Airlines, Inc. V. Floyd, Jean-Paul Boulee

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Chernobyl And Sandoz One Decade Later: The Evolution Of State Responsibility For International Disasters, 1986-1996, Devereaux F. Mcclatchey

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

What The United States Taught The Commonwealth About Pure Economic Loss: Time To Repay The Favor, Bruce Feldthusen

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Liability Of Bias: A Comparative Study Of Gender-Related Interests In Negligence Law, Yifat Bitton

Annual Survey of International & Comparative Law

This article examines a feminist argument concerning the gendered structure of tort law in which interests that can be identified as gendered are subject to different levels of recognition resulting from gender bias. Using a comparative methodology, the article contends that negligence law regarding pure-economic loss and indirect-emotional harm is constructed along lines of gender bias. The argument is underlined by the notion of gender-related interests, establishing pure-economic loss as male-related and indirect-emotional harm as female-related. On its first comparative analysis, the similarities and differences between these two harms as perceived by tort conventions and principles should have yielded leverage …

Colpa E Legge Fra Oriente E Occidente, Pier Giuseppe Monateri

Pier Giuseppe Monateri

The Fault and the Law between East and West. In this article Monateri traces an unpreviewed parallel between two absolutely western paradigms and two remarkably chinese thoughts. First a parallel between Carl Schmitt and Xun Zi when the latter writes that “The superior man is the source of the Law” Secondo economic analysis and Lao Zi theory of law a san emerging order not a predetermined one.

A Proposal For Comparative Responsibility Analysis In Comparative Negligence Jurisdictions, Joel Leslie Terwilliger

LLM Theses and Essays

Part II of this thesis discusses the common law background of the assumption of risk and how it fits into the scheme of negligence principles as an affirmative defense. Part II also examines the background of assumption of risk and parallels its development with contributory negligence principles. Part III looks at how the assumption of risk has been redefined and narrowed in its application as comparative fault principles gained favor. It includes an examination of statutory erosion and in modern judicial activism. Next, Part IV examines how the assumption of risk, particularly the secondary form, conflicts with comparative fault and …

Responsabilité Des Sujets Atteints De Troubles Mentaux En Italie Et En Common Law, Mauro Bussani

Mauro Bussani

The aim of this paper is to challenge the traditional principle of Western negligence law according to which, whatever a person’s characteristics are, his/her behavior should be judged against the standard of care expected from the so-called ‘reasonable person’. In particular, the paper focuses on a special category of subjects who are ‘weaker’ than the average because suffering from a psychological disability. Through the comparative analysis of Italian, English, and American tort law rules involving these persons, the paper shows how courts are acutely aware of the need to introduce some degree of flexibility into the median fault parameter.

Faiblesse Oblige, Mauro Bussani

Mauro Bussani

A general principle of Western negligence law is that, whatever a person’s characteristics, (dis)abilities, strengths and weaknesses, his/her behavior should be judged against the standard of care expected from the ‘reasonable person’. The latter is a person allegedly endowed with average knowledge, conventional musculature, ordinary reactions, commonplace skills, and normal intelligence and memory – a ‘person without quality’. The aim of this paper is to offer comparative evidence to the fact that the ‘person without quality’ rule (ought not be, and) actually is not imposed upon below-average defendants – that is, persons who are weaker than the ‘reasonable person’, like …

Comment On Structure And Theory, Jerome Hall

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

The Victim's Fault In Wrongful Death Actions In French Law, Wencelas J. Wagner

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Some Notes On The Malayan Law Of Negligence, A. E. S. Tay, J. H. M. Heah

Cleveland State Law Review

In the annals of the spread of the common law to other lands and other ways, Malaya may deserve a modest place, but, as the selection here no doubt shows, so far it has made no significant contribution to the intellectual content of that law. It has neither produced nor harboured a Cardozo or a Dixon. At best, its judges have applied common law principles simply but soundly; they have never, at least in tort, been subtle or illuminating. Its legal history is of interest for its own sake; its legal achievement awaits us in the future, not in the …

Atoms And The Law, E. Blythe Stason, Samuel D. Estep, William J. Pierce

Books

Early in 1951 a group of interested members of the faculty of The University of Michigan Law School conceived the idea of a research project, the purpose of which would be to investigate the principal unique legal problems being created and likely to be created in the future by peaceful uses of atomic energy. The group planned the preparation and publication of a series of manuscripts which might ultimately emerge as one or more printed volumes dealing with the legal problems affecting this new form of energy. Many phases of the subject were scrutinized, including the rule-making and licensing powers …