Law Commons^™

Family Lawyering With Planned Early Negotiation, John M. Lande

Faculty Publications

Whether you know it or not, you may already be using planned early negotiation (PEN). As the term suggests, this process involves planning to negotiate your cases at the earliest appropriate time. Normally you can be ready to negotiate long before you are ready for trial.

This article summarizes PEN procedures based on interviews with excellent lawyers about how they handle their cases. For example, one lawyer said that he “prepares for settlement from day one of the lawsuit” and that he engages in a “constant process of evaluating the claim” throughout the litigation. Planning to negotiate from the outset …

Good Pretrial Lawyering: Planning To Get To Yes Sooner, Cheaper, And Better, John M. Lande

Faculty Publications

Although the ostensible purpose for pretrial litigation is to prepare for trial, such preparation is inextricably intertwined with negotiation because the expected trial outcome is a major factor affecting negotiation. Indeed, since most litigated cases are settled, good litigators prepare for negotiation at least as much as trial. The lawyers interviewed for this article, who were selected because of their good reputations, described how they prepare for both possibilities. They recommend taking charge of their cases from the outset, which includes getting a clear understanding of clients and their interests, developing good relationships with counterpart lawyers, carefully investigating the cases, …

Learning From Cooperative Negotiators In Wisconsin, John M. Lande

Faculty Publications

To negotiate constructively from the outset of a matter, some lawyers use a "Cooperative" process, giving parties an additional process option, especially if parties believe that mediation or Collaborative practice is not suitable. Cooperative practice offers parties the opportunity to have lawyers represent them in an interest-based process governed by a negotiation agreement-while retaining ready access to litigation if needed, without losing their lawyers as in Collaborative practice. Cooperative practice can increase interest-based negotiation in direct negotiation between lawyers, increase efficiency and satisfaction with negotiation, and influence the general legal culture to incorporate problem-solving in everyday practice more often.

How Much Justice Can We Afford: Defining The Courts' Roles And Deciding The Appropriate Number Of Trials, Settlement Signals, And Other Elements Needed To Administer Justice, John Lande

Journal of Dispute Resolution

This article discusses how the court system can function optimally given declining trial rates and the limited resources available. It does not provide a detailed analysis of court financing but rather discusses broad issues relating to the role of trials in the legal system.

Understanding Settlement In Damages (And Beyond), Chris Guthrie

Journal of Dispute Resolution

The purpose of this article is to introduce these academic accounts of settlement and to consider whether they provide insight into the settlement of the Sabias' litigation against Humes and Norwalk. I believe these accounts are largely complementary rather than competing, so my own view is that each sheds some light on litigation and settlement behavior in most civil cases (including the Sabia case).

Mediating Preferences: Litigant Preferences For Process And Judicial Preferences For Settlement, Judith Resnik

Journal of Dispute Resolution

In the 1980s, as a consultant to RAND's Institute for Civil Justice, I joined Deborah Hensler, Allan Lind, Robert MacCoun, William Felstiner, Tom Tyler, and Patricia Ebener in seeking to learn how litigants viewed their experiences with courtbased processes. We surveyed litigants whose cases had been resolved through trials, court-annexed arbitrations, judge-run settlement conferences, and bi-lateral negotiations between lawyers.' We found that litigants cared about process: they reported less satisfaction with processes in which they took no part and more satisfaction with processes in which they could participate. Contrary to some lore that litigants were alienated by trial-like procedures, the …

Exceptional Circumstances Justifying Vacatur When Lower Court Decision Mooted By Settlement: Repeat Litigants Slide Into Home With Second Circuit Decision - Major League Baseball Properties, Inc. V. Pacific Trading Cards, Inc., S. Kristina Starke

Journal of Dispute Resolution

At heart in the scholarship advocating Alternative Dispute Resolution are two interests: one, that using processes such as negotiation, mediation, and arbitration conserve public and private resources otherwise expended on litigation; and two, that in certain circumstances, these alternative processes may provide better justice than would occur in litigation.' However, once litigation of a case has commenced, and an adverse judgment has been made against one party, that party may not be willing to settle the case unless the adverse judgement is vacated.4 Historically, most state and federal courts would routinely grant vacatur when requested by litigants who settled their …

Class Action Settlement Bars, Cross Claims, And Co-Defendants: The Search For A Uniform Standard - In Re U.S. Oil & (And) Gas Litigation, Craig Richard Heidemann,

Journal of Dispute Resolution

Prior to the U.S. Oil & Gas decision, the federal courts had only considered settlement bars as related to non-settling defendants. In the U.S. Oil & Gas case, all of the defendants sought to settle with the plaintiff. 2 Only one settling defendant chose to contest the entry of the bar order. 3 In U.S. Oil & Gas, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals was faced with a defendant who settled with the plaintiff but opposed an order barring its seemingly independent claims against the third-party defendant who also settled. For this reason it was a case of first impression. …

Settlement In Securities Fraud: Is Settlement Promoting Litigation - In Re Jiffy Lube Securities Litigation, Brian R. Hajicek

Journal of Dispute Resolution

In the complex securities fraud arena, partial pretrial settlement in cases involving multiple defendants would appear to reduce litigation in the dispute. However, conflict over the proper method of allocating responsibility for a damage award among settling and non-settling defendants can in fact increase litigation. Federal courts disagree as to which method most fairly and equitably apportions damage liability. In re Jiffy Lube Securities Litigation is the most recent case that touches upon the issue of damage allocation among settling and non-settling defendants. This Note will address competing policy considerations which drive courts to choose different allocative methods.

Shackling The Secretary's Hands: Limits To Authorizing Whistle-Blower Settlements Under Section 210 Of The Energy Reorganization Act - Macktal V. Secretary Of Labor, Jay M. Dade

Journal of Dispute Resolution

In seeking to encourage nuclear industry employees to report safety concerns, Section 210 of the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974 (ERA) acts to protect such "whistle-blowers" in the event they are terminated or discriminated against because of their whistle-blowing activities.2 When an employee and an employer negotiate a Section 210 "whistle-blower" complaint and subsequently submit the settlement for approval, the Secretary of Labor faces certain encumbrances when reviewing the agreement . This limitation on review arises when certain provisions may be in violation of public policy.4 In Macktal v. Secretary of Labor, the United States Court of Appeals for the …

Is Settlement Conditioned On Vacatur An Option - Should It Be, Elizabeth L. Anstaett

Journal of Dispute Resolution

Currently, whether a court grants or denies a motion to vacate resulting from settlement depends more on the particular court in which the request is made, than on the facts of the case and the effect of vacatur. Courts not permitting vacatur have expressed the fear that parties sensing they are going to lose will "buy their way out of an unfavorable precedent often at the relatively cheap price asked by the single opponent they face in that appeal."1 Other courts routinely grant requests for vacatur. Settlements conditioned on the court's granting vacatur, and thereby avoiding precedent or issue preclusion, …

Valuation Of Cases For Settlement: Theory And Practice, Peter Toll Hoffman

Journal of Dispute Resolution

Trial lawyers frequently talk about the value of their cases when they are counseling clients' negotiating with opposing counsel, or conversing with their fellow attorneys. The term "value" may have several definitions when referring to cases, but most attorneys intend it to mean the amount at which they expect a case to settle. However, despite the frequency with which they speak of value, the subject remains cloaked with a miasma of lawyer folklore.

Public's Need To Know Vs. Effective Settlement Techniques: The First Amendment Confronts The Summary Jury Trial - Cincinnati Gas And Electric Co. V. General Electric Co., The, Anne E. Billings

Journal of Dispute Resolution

With the proliferation of alternative dispute resolution, the summary jury trial (SJT) has become popular in many federal courts as an alternative to litigation. 2 Because of the SJT's trial-like nature, members of the press argue that the first amendment 3 gives the press the right to report on SJT proceedings. In Cincinnati Gas and Electric Co. v. General Electric Co.,4 the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals addressed the issue of whether the first amendment right of access attaches to a SJT proceeding.

Effective Lawyering In Judicially Hosted Settlement Conferences, Wayne D. Brazil

Journal of Dispute Resolution

The purpose of this article is to describe in detail the most effective approaches and techniques that I have seen lawyers use in settlement conferences. Having hosted hundreds of negotiations, I have seen many different lawyering styles. In the pages that follow, I share with interested litigators my ideas (unconfirmed by scientific tests) about what works in the settlement dynamic and what does not. I write informally; the "you" that I address so often are the litigators I hope to reach.

Quality Of Settlements, The, Marc Galanter

Journal of Dispute Resolution

When I was a law student, some 30 years ago, I don't recall hearing much about settlement. I am sure that my teachers knew there were a lot of settlements, but they were not worthy of much attention. They were part of the realm of practical nuts and bolts detail that lay outside learning about the law; law school was about cases that were adjudicated.

Judge's Role In Settlement: Opinions From Missouri Judges And Attorneys, The, James A. Wall Jr., Dale E. Rude

Journal of Dispute Resolution

This study investigates judges' involvement in settlement, and the opinions that Missouri judges and attorneys hold toward that involvement. In a survey of 1,100 judges and 1,550 attorneys, we found that Missouri judges differ significantly from Missouri attorneys. Specifically, Missouri judges prefer less judicial involvement in settlement and they, in the cases sent to them, were less aggressive in facilitating settlement. Finally, judges and attorneys from Missouri's metropolitan areas were found to favor stronger involvement in settlement than were their counterparts from the non-metropolitan areas.

Dispute Resolution And Preventive Law: A Reply To Professor Brown, E. A. Dauer, J. D. Nyhard

Journal of Dispute Resolution

Within our discussion of scientific models and the processes of dispute resolution,' we suggested a single continuum along which the strategies of Preventive Law and of ADR (Alternative Dispute Resolution) could be arrayed. Beneath that synthesis lay a proposition which we may not have made entirely clear: That the two bodies of hitherto separate principles address problems which are not themselves distinct.

Thesis (Preventive Law), Antithesis (Adversarial Process), Synthesis (Settlement, Adr): A Comment On Nyhard And Dauer, Louis M. Brown

Journal of Dispute Resolution

In terms of the Nyhart-Dauer article, the goal which is to be attained is "the commercial exploitation of the coastal zone and continental shelf."' The legal system aids the accomplishment of that goal by permitting parties to enter into contracts which "define the measure of present exchange and provide the standards by which executory performance will later be judged... "2 The goal is achieved by performances in accord with "creative arrangements" developed "in such a way that their constituents will be most likely to accept and adhere to the undertakings to which they" are committed.3 It is performance that counts. …

Rhetoric And Reality In The Dispute Settlement Movement, Frederick E. Snyder

Journal of Dispute Resolution

Efforts to demystify and simplify the way disputes are settled in American society seem to have congealed into a nationwide movement within less than a decade: neighborhood justice centers, arbitration, divorce mediation, no-fault auto insurance, do-it-yourself probate, "plain English" land and rental agreements, government ombudsmen, consumer hot lines, community mediation of minor criminal cases. A growth industry, if there ever was one

Judicial Participation In Settlement, James A. Wall, Dale E. Rude, Lawrence F. Schiller

Journal of Dispute Resolution

In the following pages, we will briefly delineate the settlement process, enumerate the techniques currently utilized by judges to facilitate settlement, and discuss the perceived ethics of these techniques. Finally, we will consider the circumstances under which judges typically participate in settlement.