Law Commons^™

Throwing Out The Baby With The Bathwater: A Reply To Professor Twerski, Richard W. Wright

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Once Is Enough: A Proposed Bar Of The Injured Employee's Cause Of Action Against A Third Party, Philip D. Oliver

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Case Against All Encompassing Federal Mass Tort Legislation: Sacrifice Without Gain, Aaron Twerski, R. A. Sedler

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Jury's Response To Business And Corporate Wrongdoing, Valerie P. Hans

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Some of the most vociferous criticisms of the jury relate to its performance in cases involving business and corporate wrongdoing. The jury's competence in such cases is assaulted on a variety of fronts. Critics question the jury's factfinding ability in cases with business and corporate parties, and doubt whether lay jurors can understand the often complex and esoteric evidence of business wrongdoing. Others claim that bias and prejudice, rather than evidence, determine jury decisions about businesses and corporations. The presumed biases cut both ways. The generally positive regard in which the public holds business is credited with creating leniency toward …

Market Share - A Tale Of Two Centuries, Aaron Twerski

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Exception Clauses And Negligence-The Influence Of Contract On Bailment And Tort, Andrew B.L. Phang

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Judgments at first instance have rarely been the subject of comment.' The recent decision of Steyn J in Singer Co (UK) Ltd v Tees and Hartlepool Port Authority,2 however, merits consideration for at least three reasons. First, it focuses upon important issues in the law of bailment, at least one of which has hitherto only been considered at first instance in any event. Secondly, the decision provokes thought on the much broader issue of the effect of exception clauses upon the general duty of care in tort, in particular whether the reasoning in the bailment context could be extended and …

The Baby Swallowed The Bathwater: A Rejoinder To Professor Wright, Aaron Twerski

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Joint Tortfeasor Legislative Revolt: A Rational Response To The Critics, Aaron Twerski

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Responses To Corporate Versus Individual Wrongdoing, Valerie P. Hans, M. David Ermann

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

For many years, researchers assumed that the public was indifferent to corporate wrongdoing, but recent surveys have discovered evidence to the contrary. Taking insights from these data a step further, this study employed an experimental design to examine whether people responded differently to corporate versus individual wrongdoers. We varied the identity of the central actor in a scenario involving harm to workers. Half the respondents were informed that a corporation caused the harm; the remainder were told that an individual did so. Respondents applied a higher standard of responsibility to the corporate actor. For identical actions, the corporation was judged …

The Moral Foundations Of Punitive Damages, David G. Owen

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

What Shapes Perceptions Of The Federal Court System?, Theodore Eisenberg, Stewart J. Schwab

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Two hundred years is a long time. It is too long after formation of a court system to ask such basic questions as (1) what cases occupy the system, and (2) whether even informed professionals have a reasonable picture of what goes on within the system. Nonetheless, continuing debate about the volume and makeup of litigation in general and of federal court litigation in particular requires legal scholars to address these questions. Professor Marc Galanter's work on the litigation explosion questions central assumptions about the nature and growth of the federal docket. Our prior work undermines widely held views about …

Judicial Backpedaling: Putting The Brakes On California's Law Of Wrongful Termination, Lawrence C. Levine

McGeorge School of Law Scholarly Articles

No abstract provided.

The Warranty Of Quality In Sale Of Goods Under The Perspective Of The American And French Law, Renaud Baguenault De Puchesse

LLM Theses and Essays

While the United States’ common law system is characterized by diversity due to each state having its own set of rules, in certain areas there are nationwide legislative attempts of unification and standardization. One such attempt is the adoption of the Uniform Commercial Code which governs the sale of goods law in the United States. The French civil law system generally differs greatly from the American system in that it is primarily based upon statutes and codes. However, the American Uniform Commercial Code and the French Civil Code provide tangible, comparable bases to assess similarities and differences between American and …

Neoclassical Difficulties: Tort As Deterrence For Latent Injuries, Peter Siegelman, W.L.F. Felstiner

Faculty Articles and Papers

Economists often claim that the tort system leads firms to provide consumers and workers with the socially optimal level of safety. Moreover, in the case of work-related hazards, employers are alleged to have another source of incentives to take precautions. If wages are sensitive to job-related risks, employers should spend money to reduce such risks when, by doing so, they can save more in wage costs than the costs of the precautions taken. Whatever their merits in other settings, in the case of latent injuries such as workplace exposure to asbestos neither tort nor market are likely to provide an …

Joint And Several Liability Minnesota Style, Michael K. Steenson

Faculty Scholarship

This article examines the rule of joint and several liability as it was adopted, modified, and applied in Minnesota circa 1989. The article first examines the judicial origins and applications of the rule in Minnesota. It then analyzes the impact of the comparative negligence and fault legislation on the rule of joint and several liability, including the limitations imposed on the rule in 1978, 1986, and 1988. Finally, it makes some suggestions for interpreting joint and several liability legislation that are consistent with the legislative history of the legislation as well as with Minnesota Supreme Court decisions concerning aggregation under …

Statutory Damage Caps Are An Incomplete Reform: A Proposal For Attorney Fee Shifting In Tort Actions, Gregory A. Hicks

Articles

The premise of this article is that the currently unsettled status of noneconomic damage awards offers an opportunity to reexamine the function of such awards, and to move tort law in the direction of more stable and rational remedies, something that could not be achieved either under recently adopted damage cap statutes or through the reinstatement of unrestricted compensation of noneconomic losses.

This article has two parts. In the first part, the ambiguous role of noneconomic damages, that is, their function as makeweight compensation for noncompensable litigation expenses and as compensation for real intangible injuries, is described. This ambiguity has …

The Legal Community And The Transformation Of Disputes: The Settlement Of Injunction Actions, James B. Atleson

Journal Articles

Lawyers in cases involving injunctions against picketing represent clients in situations of great immediacy. A significant number of injunction actions are settled with reductions in picketing despite a seemingly restrictive statute and a highly organized workforce. This study of legal culture examines the role of lawyers in striving to create predictability, especially in regard to judges and the police, and in transforming conflicts of value into disputes over interests that can be resolved without resort to formal adjudication.

A Break In The Silence: Including Women's Issues In A Torts Course, Lucinda M. Finley

Journal Articles

No abstract provided.

Comments On Why Punitive Damages Don't Deter Corporate Misconduct Effectively, Michael Wells

Scholarly Works

Professor Elliott begins his Article by proclaiming that “a fundamental revolution has reshaped the intellectual underpinnings of tort law.”

The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act And Act Of State, Malvina Halberstam

Articles

No abstract provided.

The Qualified Immunity Doctrine In The Supreme Court: Judicial Activism And The Restriction Of Constitutional Rights, David Rudovsky

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Schlemmer V. Fireman's Fund Insurance Co.: A Case For Rethinking Arkansas' Choice-Of-Law Rule For Interstate Torts, L. Lynn Hogue

Faculty Publications By Year

No abstract provided.

Section 1983 And Constitutional Torts, Charles F. Abernathy

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

We have long recognized that the resurrection of section 1983 converted the fourteenth amendment from a shield into a sword by providing a civil action for vindication of constitutional rights and, to the extent that damages have gradually become the authorized remedy for section 1983 violations, we have easily come to think of such actions as constitutional torts-civil damage remedies for violations of constitutionally defined rights. There is, however, a subtler and greater reality to what has transpired, for the mere procedural vehicle of constitutional enforcement has, in retrospect, changed the substance of constitutional law itself. Section 1983 has not …

Hiring Ruled Contractual, Bill Gore, Douglas A. Kahn, Stan Shields

Articles

On December 29, 1988, the California Supreme Court decided Foley vs. Interactive Data Corp., perhaps the most eagerly awaited state supreme court decision in years. The Foley ruling, which immediately was hailed as a tremendous victory for California employers, eliminated punitive damage awards for many wrongfully terminated employees. That was good news for the employers. The decision, however, also provided employers with sobering news. Most significantly, the court ruled that employment relationships essentially are contracts, with terms created by the reasonable expectation of the parties. Thus, the majority of California employees now have a right to sue for breach …