Law Commons^™

An 'Unconventional Truth': Conflict Of Laws Issues Arising Under The Cisg, Antonin I. Pribetic

Antonin I. Pribetic

This article discusses the applicability of the CISG from a Canadian conflict of laws perspective - both in terms of jurisdiction and choice of law. The analysis is framed by providing an outline of the key jurisdictional and choice of law principles developed within Canadian jurisprudence. Following a brief contextual overview of the CISG, Articles 1(1) (a) and 1(1) (b) and Article 6 of the CISG are highlighted, with specific reference to recent Canadian and foreign judicial decisions and foreign arbitral awards involving Canadian parties. The article concludes with a clarion call to justice stakeholders, particularly, Canadian commercial lawyers and …

The Trouble With Putting All Of Your Eggs In One Basket: Using A Property Rights Model To Resolve Disputes Over Cryopreserved Embryos, Bridget M. Fuselier

Bridget M Fuselier

“The Trouble With Putting All of Your Eggs in One Basket:

Using a Property Rights Model to Resolve Disputes Over Cryopreserved Embryos”

Bridget M. Fuselier

ABSTRACT

This article covers a very current and relevant topic in today’s legal environment. Previous articles have merely discussed competing models or coverage of the disputes in the case law. My article embarks upon a comprehensive look at the specific problem presented and then goes on to offer a specific model with proposed legislation to address these disputes in a fundamentally more efficient manner.

As evidenced by current efforts in a number of states, the …

Crowning The New King: The Statutory Arbitrator And The Demise Of Judicial Review, Michael H. Leroy

Michael H LeRoy

Judicial review of arbitration awards is highly deferential, but when does it become rubber stamping? Using original data, I find that federal courts vacated only 4.3 percent of 162 disputed awards. Nearly the same result was observed for a sub-sample of 44 employment discrimination awards under Title VII. By comparison, federal appeals courts in 2006 reversed 12.9 percent of 5,917 rulings made by civil court judges on the merits of legal claims.

Why are the rulings of Article III judges scrutinized more than the awards of citizen-arbitrators? What does this mean when companies can avoid Article III court rulings by …

Contract Formation And The Entrenchment Of Power, Danielle K. Hart

Danielle K Hart

Conventional wisdom has it that modern contract law evolved at least in part to address problems created (or ignored) by the classical legal system. Consequently, modern contract law is different from classical contract in ways that make the current system work better than the regime it ostensibly replaced. For this to be true, however, the changes made by modern contract have to be effective in rectifying the problems engendered by classical contract law. But herein lays the problem. Modern contract identified coercion in the bargaining process that produces a bad bargain as a problem serious enough to warrant a solution. …

Contractual Purgatory For Sexual Marginorities: Not Heaven, But Not Hell Either, Martha M. Ertman

Martha M. Ertman

No abstract provided.

Race Treason: The Untold Story Of America's Ban On Polygamy, Martha M. Ertman

Martha M. Ertman

Legal doctrines banning polygamy grew out of nineteenth century Americans’ view that Mormons betrayed the nation by engaging in conduct associated with people of color. This article reveals the racial underpinnings of polygamy law by examining cartoons and other antipolygamy rhetoric of the time to demonstrate Sir Henry Maine’s famous observation that the move in progressive societies is “from status to contract.” It frames antipolygamists’ contentions as a visceral defense of racial and sexual status in the face of encroaching contractual thinking. Polygamy, they reasoned, was “natural” for people of color but so “unnatural” for whites as to produce a …

Selling Goods Internationally: The Scope Of The 1980 United Nations Convention On Contracts For The International Sale Of Goods (Cisg), Susan J. Martin-Davidson

Susan J Martin-Davidson

What is an international sale of goods? The answer to this question is critically important to trillions of dollars worth of transactions that are now governed by the UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods. Lawyers facing an issue in the interpretation of the CISG must consult a daunting body of conflicting and minimally informative resources in many languages. The interpretive difficulties are particularly acute in deciding the scope of the Convention and the transactions to which it applies. This article examines the unresolved ambiguities in terms such as “sale of goods,” “place of business,” and “validity,” …

The Impact Of Government-Mandated Public Access To Biomedical Research: An Analysis Of The New Nih Depository Requirements, Kristopher A. Nelson

Kristopher A Nelson

On December 26, 2007, President Bush signed the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2008. The bill, which became Public Law 110-161, contained a new requirement that manuscripts developed through funding by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) be made available to the public, free of charge, within one year after publication. This new mandatory requirement struck a compromise position between the existing pay-to-access model of private journal publishers and the potential free-for-all of the public domain. But did it go far enough? Should Congress have adopted a more aggressive policy of opening access to research? Alternatively, did Congress go too far, …

Manipulating Court Doctrine For The Good Of The Common Law And Compulsory Arbitration, Richard L. Barnes

richard l barnes

No abstract provided.

Interpretation And Disclosure In Insurance Contracts, David Schwartz

David Schwartz

This Essay has two goals: one descriptive and one normative. Descriptively, it explicates the connection between interpretation of insurance contracts and the Insurer’s disclosure duty. Disclosure duties and interpretation rules constitute a two way street. The interpretation of insurance contracts by courts, ex post, influences the incentives of insurance companies to disclose information consumers, ex ante. Correspondingly, the scope of ex ante disclosure by insurance companies impacts the willingness of courts to use overwrite insurance contracts by broadly interpreting provision to increase the liability of insurance companies. To illustrate this claim, the Essay discusses the two principal interpretive tools used …

The Perils Of Foreign Contracating In China, Debra J. Reed

Debra J Reed

QUESTION PRESENTED

Whether a business contract executed between a foreign party and a Chinese party is enforceable in the courts of the People’s Republic of China?

BRIEF ANSWER

Probably not. Foreign party reliance on Chinese courts to enforce their contracts is premature because China is not yet a rule of law country. Chinese courts do not exercise judicial independence. Political domination by the Chinese Communist Party, CCP, over the courts, and Chinese local protectionism both influence the outcome of cases. Moreover, the Chinese legal system is wrought with corruption. Because inexperienced judges adopt new laws at varying speeds and apply …

Electronic Contracting In China, Debra J. Reed

Debra J Reed

QUESTION PRESENTED

Whether an electronically signed business contract between a Chinese and foreign party is legally valid under the 2005 Electronic Signature Law of the People’s Republic of China and is enforceable in China’s courts?

BRIEF ANSWER

An electronically signed business contract between a Chinese and foreign party is legally valid under the 2005 Electronic Signature Law of the People’s Republic of China, PRC. Statutorily, Chinese law enables electronic contracting by giving the same legal force to electronic signatures and data messages, as to traditional ink signatures and paper documents. Lack of payment systems, high costs to businesses of adopting …

Is Arbitration Under Attack? Exploring The Recent Judicial Skepticism Of The Class Arbitration Waiver And Innovative Solutions To The Unsettled Legal Landscape, Ramona L. Lampley

Ramona L. Lampley

This article explores the hotly debated field of enforcing arbitration clauses with binding class-action waivers. While the enforcement of arbitration clauses generally, and those with class-action waivers specifically, has undergone much debate in the past three years in both the academic and judicial fora; this article casts a new look on the analysis. Instead of advocating simply for or against the enforcement of the class-action waiver, this article analyzes the dialogue between the consumer products industry and the consuming public, via the court system. This dialogue has resulted in a “new wave” of consumer products arbitration agreements: agreements that are …

Restitutionary Disgorgement As A Moral Compass For Breach Of Contract, Caprice L. Roberts

Caprice L. Roberts

A quiet revolution is underway. A new rule proposed in the forthcoming Restatement (Third) of Restitution seeks to deter conscious wrongdoers from retaining profits from “opportunistic” breaches of contract. The proposed disgorgement remedy for defendant’s opportunistic breach of contract will have fundamental consequences for contract theory and practice. This contractual remedy is gain-based rather than compensatory. Restitutionary disgorgement, rooted in unjust enrichment, may shift the conventional paradigm of contract law. This article examines whether a restitutionary disgorgement remedy for certain breaches of contract is compatible with traditional contract principles such as Justice Holmes’s choice principle. Recall his oft-repeated declaration, “The …

Repairing (The Doctrine Of) Irreparable Harm: Economic Analysis Of Preliminary Injunctions, Barak Medina, Ofer Grosskopf

Barak Medina

In deciding whether to grant a preliminary injunction courts compare the expected irreparable harm if the injunction is not issued to the irreparable harm that would result if the injunction is issued. An injury is considered irreparable only as far as it “cannot be cured by a remedy after trial.” This Article demonstrates that to maximize social welfare (“efficiency”) the definition of irreparable harm must be modified. From a social-welfare perspective, harms to one party which do not correlate to corresponding benefits to the other party are deadweight-losses, regardless of the availability of a remedy that may merely reallocate them …

"Smile, You're On Cellphone Camera!": Regulating Online Video Privacy In The Myspace Generation, Jacqueline D. Lipton

Jacqueline D Lipton

In the latest Batman movie, Bruce Wayne’s corporate right hand man, Lucius Fox, copes stoically with the death and destruction dogging his boss. Interestingly, the last straw for him is Bruce’s request that he use digital video surveillance created through the city’s cellphone network to spy on the people of Gotham City in order to locate the Joker. Does this tell us something about the increasing social importance of privacy, particularly in an age where digital video technology is ubiquitous and largely unregulated? While much digital privacy law and commentary has focused on text files containing personal data, little attention …

Reisurance: The Silent Regulator?, Aviva Abramovsky

Aviva Abramovsky

Abstract This Essay suggests that a discussion on insurance regulation should include a consideration of the effect reinsurance may have on the behavior of insurers. The Essay reviews the traditional types of reinsurance, and considers the ability of private reinsurance contracts to produce insurer action. This essay suggests if reinsurance is not included in a holistic examination of the field, its realities have the capacity to misdirect insurance regulatory assumptions. Moreover, reinsurance works as a source of independent and often unexamined contractual influence on insurer activity, and as a potential source of interference with regulatory proposals. Even though reinsurance is …

Failure's Futures: Controlling The Market For Information In Corporate Reorganization, Jonathan C. Lipson

Jonathan C. Lipson

This Article identifies and explores an important gap in bankruptcy theory and policy, with significant implications for the coming wave of major business failures: How to manage information about financially distressed businesses?

The paper makes three claims. First, Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code plays a unique informational role, as it creates mechanisms to explain a debtor’s failure and to promote reinvestment. Second, the information functions performed by this system face internal and external threats. Internally, bankruptcy reorganization increasingly resembles an unregulated securities market, dominated by sophisticated, wealthy investors whose motives and strategies are often highly opaque. Their …

Reaffirming The Rights Of Foreign Investors To The Protection Of Icsid Arbitration: Sempra Energy International V. The Argentine Republic, Daniel Krawiec

Daniel A Krawiec II

Earlier this decade, the Argentine government responded to a substantial domestic economic crises by passing several emergency laws and unilaterally changing the terms of its investment agreements with foreign investors. Sempra v. Argentine Republic is an important case because the tribunal decisively reaffirmed the right to ICSID arbitration for American investors harmed by Argentina’s actions. Furthermore, the tribunal held that the U.S.-Argentina bilateral investment treaty provided substantial substantive investment protection.

La Clausula Paramount, Salvador Francisco Ruiz Medrano

Salvador Francisco Ruiz Medrano

Paramount clause acts as a referral clause or reference to a certain set of standards, and achieved that in maritime transport, the charterer is subject to the mandatory regime of responsibilities established in the agreement to bring the clause. However, it must be noted that the grade you receive this clause may be varied, so is can be seen as the rule of autonomy of the parties, or as alleged incorporation by reference or even as a possible standard required application.

Transatlanticism: The Trade In Legal Ideas In The Formation Of European Private Law, Fernanda G. Nicola

Fernanda G. Nicola

King Solomon’S Solution To The Disposition Of Embryos: Recognizing A Property Interest And Using Equitable Division, Kansas R. Gooden

Kansas R Gooden

In your family law class, your professors have probably not lectured on the area of embryo disposition in divorce proceedings. Were you aware that courts across the country have ruled that the right not to procreate trumps the right to procreate in these situations? When divorce and IVF combine, it results in a complex legal battle. When a couple that used IVF divorces, who should get the remaining embryos? This article asserts that embryos should be considered property. The elements of ownership, possession, use, and exclusion, otherwise known as the bundle of sticks, are present. American law has taken an …

A Strategic Functionalist Approach To International Commercial Mediation, Antonin I. Pribetic

Antonin I. Pribetic

Mediation in the international context is a relatively recent phenomenon. As an Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) mechanism, third-party neutral mediation is firmly entrenched in the legal ethos and procedural rules of most common law jurisdictions; such as the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada. However, in the rest of the world, including many European, Latin American and Asian nations with civil law traditions, mediation remains an elusive concept. Some commentators suggest this may be due in part to differences in systemic (i.e. adversarial vs. inquisitorial) and cultural (i.e. mediation vs. conciliation) orientations.

This paper considers whether International Mediation is …

Are Contingent-Fee Attorneys Deterred?: How Courts Can More Effectively Police Adhesive Arbitration Agreements, Kenyon Harbison

Kenyon D Harbison

If you’re like me, you become bound by a new arbitration agreement almost every day, sometimes without even knowing it. They are included with banking and credit card statements, in most employment contracts, and in most purchase agreements. When we make purchases online we ‘click’ our assent to them without reading them. When we receive them in the mail we signal our assent by failing to opt out. But what happens when we are injured, defrauded, or cheated, try to sue, and find we are instead subject to arbitration? What standards can we expect courts to apply if we challenge …

Impracticability Under The U.C.C. For Wartime Contracts, Jennifer S. Martin

Jennifer S. Martin

This Article addresses the following question: when should a seller of goods who delays delivery or cancels altogether under a wartime contract be able to claim excuse under U.C.C. Article 2? Failure of delivery or delay due to dangers created by insurgents in Iraq has become common for wartime contractors, and the ground situation for contractors remains unsafe. After presenting representatives factual situations involving well known wartime contractors, the Article describes the typical approach to the excuse question. This approach may deny the seller the right to excuse the failure of delivery in many instances where there the wartime risk …

Section 1981 And The Alchemy Of Race And Contract, Eyal Diskin

Eyal Diskin

Many antidiscrimination laws regulate contract relations. They impose certain duties on contracting partners with the hope that the availability of legal sanctions would transform the nature of those market interactions. Yet these antidiscrimination statues, considered a staple of public law, are conceived by many first and foremost as a vehicle to fight racism, not design contracts. Little attention has so far been given to how antidiscrimination laws support a certain way for conducting contract relations. This article addresses this gap by putting forward the claim that antidiscrimination laws which pertain to contract relations do not only regulate the public sphere …

Collaboration, Innovation, And Contract Design, Matthew C. Jennejohn

Matthew C Jennejohn

The rise of the network as a form of economic organization renders problematic our standard understanding of how capitalism is governed. As the governance of production shifts from vertical integration to horizontal contract, a puzzle arises: how do contracts, presumed to be susceptible to hold-up problems due to incompleteness, control production arrangements that by their nature invite opportunism? Relying on publicly-available contracts taken from a number of industries, I argue that firms govern their collaborations through a number of new contract mechanisms, the summation of which is a novel governance system. Because traditional theories of contractual control struggle to fully …

A "Fair Contracts" Approval Mechanism: Reconciling Consumer Contracts And Conventional Contract Law, Shmuel I. Becher

Shmuel I Becher

Consumer contracts diverge from the traditional paradigm of contract law in various conspicuous ways. They are pre-drafted by one party; they cannot be altered or negotiated; they are executed between unfamiliar contracting parties unequal in their market power and sophistication; they are offered frequently by agents who act on behalf of the seller; and promisees (i.e., consumers) do not read or understand them. Consumer contracts are thus useful in modern markets of mass production, but they cast doubt on some fundamental notions of contract law. To reframe the long-lasting debate over consumer contracts this Article develops a superior legal regime …

Old Habits Are Hard To Change: Evidence From Israeli Real Estate Contracts, Doron Teichman

Doron Teichman

This paper presents a unique case study on the persistent dollarization norm in Israeli real estate contracts. Using an array of theoretical tools from both psychology and economics, it explains this puzzling phenomenon, and demonstrate why persistent inefficient contracting norms may remain surprisingly stable within contracting communities. Finally, the paper will address some of the general policy recommendations that can be learned from this case study.

Contracts As Plans, Curtis Bridgeman

Curtis Bridgeman

This paper offers an original theory of contract law that draws from recent work in the philosophy of action and legal theory. Human beings are essentially planning creatures. Making plans and following through with them is crucial to everyday practical reasoning both for individuals acting alone and individuals acting together. This somewhat intuitive point was not fully appreciated in the philosophy of action as recently as twenty years ago, when Michael Bratman began to point out the inadequacies of the then-dominant view of rationality. Recently, Scott Shapiro has been applying Bratman’s insights on practical reasoning to debates in legal theory …