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The Effects Of Jury Ignorance About Damage Caps: The Case Of The 1991 Civil Rights Act, Rebecca E. Hollander-Blumoff, Matthew T. Bodie
The Effects Of Jury Ignorance About Damage Caps: The Case Of The 1991 Civil Rights Act, Rebecca E. Hollander-Blumoff, Matthew T. Bodie
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The 1991 Civil Rights Act revolutionized employment discrimination litigation by allowing for compensatory and punitive damages. At the same time, however, the Act capped those damages and forbade courts from informing jurors about the cap. This Article explores the effects of this imposed secrecy on the jury deliberation process and on the jury system itself. First, our article delves into the wealth of psychological literature about jury decision-making to determine how disclosing or hiding the caps might affect the jury's damage calculations. We explore decision-making biases and heuristics that might systematically affect the jurors' judgment about damage awards, and discuss …
The Allure And Danger Of Practicing Law As Taxonomy, Marcia L. Mccormick
The Allure And Danger Of Practicing Law As Taxonomy, Marcia L. Mccormick
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In this article, I hope to contribute to the ongoing debate on how our society treats the problem of discrimination. Many scholars have criticized the types of antidiscrimination statutes we have enacted as well as the ways in which the courts have interpreted those laws. While I agree with many of these critiques, rather than tackle those very large issues at the outset, I focus on the test the courts currently use to evaluate the evidence to determine whether an inference can be made that discrimination has occurred. I argue that lawyers and courts have become so caught up in …