Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Law Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Articles 1 - 5 of 5

Full-Text Articles in Law

Overruling The Jury: Duncan V. Gmc And Appellate Treatment Of Hostile Work Environment Judgments, Dara Purvis Jan 2006

Overruling The Jury: Duncan V. Gmc And Appellate Treatment Of Hostile Work Environment Judgments, Dara Purvis

Journal Articles

In 2002, the Eighth Circuit reversed a one million dollar jury award to the plaintiff in a sexual harassment suit against General Motors Corporation. This reversal demonstrates the danger of appellate review of such verdicts, limiting sexual harassment verdicts to the lowest common denominator in that circuit.


The Need For A Revitalized Common Law Of The Workplace, William R. Corbett Jan 2003

The Need For A Revitalized Common Law Of The Workplace, William R. Corbett

Journal Articles

No abstract provided.


License To Harass Women: Requiring Hostile Environment Sexual Harassment To Be “Severe Or Pervasive” Discriminates Among “Terms And Conditions Of Employment, Judith J. Johnson Jan 2003

License To Harass Women: Requiring Hostile Environment Sexual Harassment To Be “Severe Or Pervasive” Discriminates Among “Terms And Conditions Of Employment, Judith J. Johnson

Journal Articles

Title VII was intended to remedy discrimination; thus, it is ironic that the courts themselves discriminate among "terms and conditions of employment" by treating hostile environment discrimination less favorably, most commonly in sexual harassment cases. As the Supreme Court said in its first sexual harassment case, hostile environment harassment must be "severe or pervasive" to be actionable. However, many lower courts have used this language to excuse harassment against women. This Article suggests that the problem originates in the Court's continued use of the phrase "severe or pervasive" to describe actionable conduct. This rather dramatic terminology in fact overstates the …


Faragher, Ellerth, And The Federal Law Of Vicarious Liability For Sexual Harassment By Supervisors: Something Lost, Something Gained, And Something To Guard Against, William R. Corbett Jan 1999

Faragher, Ellerth, And The Federal Law Of Vicarious Liability For Sexual Harassment By Supervisors: Something Lost, Something Gained, And Something To Guard Against, William R. Corbett

Journal Articles

In this Essay, the author faces his nightmare exam question: he must define "sexual harassment" to the satisfaction of several potential graders with different perspectives on sexual harassment law. His valiant effort to justify his response leads him to a discussion of the federal law of vicarious liability for sexual harassment by supervisors after the Supreme Court's recent rejection of tort law respondeat superior analysis for such claims under Title VII. The author argues that, while the rejection of the tort standard for vicarious liability in Title VII claims removes the longstanding connection between Title VII law and state tort …


A Paradigm For Sexual Harassment: Toward The Optimal Level Of Loss, Marie T. Reilly Jan 1994

A Paradigm For Sexual Harassment: Toward The Optimal Level Of Loss, Marie T. Reilly

Journal Articles

This article proposes a paradigm that draws from the common-law rule of negligence. It defines actionable sexual conduct in the workplace in terms of the cost of precautionary conduct and the increased safety such precaution would have yielded. Like the rule of negligence, the proposed paradigm creates incentives for men and women to take steps to prevent sexual conduct loss to the point at which the cost of an additional increment of precaution is equal to the value of the reduction in risk of loss. This point is the optimal level of precaution. After this point, additional precaution might further …