Law Commons^™

Valuation Averaging: A New Procedure For Resolving Valuation Disputes, Keith Sharfman

Rutgers Law School (Newark) Faculty Papers

In this Article, Professor Sharfman addresses the problem of "discretionary valuation": that courts resolve valuation disputes arbitrarily and unpredictably, thus harming litigants and society. As a solution, he proposes the enactment of "valuation averaging," a new procedure for resolving valuation disputes modeled on the algorithmic valuation processes often agreed to by sophisticated private firms in advance of any dispute. He argues that by replacing the discretion of judges and juries with a mechanical valuation process, valuation averaging would cause litigants to introduce more plausible and conciliatory valuations into evidence and thereby reduce the cost of valuation litigation and increase the …

Roundtable With Former Directors Of The Bureau Of Economics, Jonathan Baker

Presentations

The roundtable commemorates the 100th anniversary of the FTC's predecessor agency, the Bureau of Corporations. It was sponsored by the FTC's Bureau of Economics (BE) and focused on BE history and contributions of BE and economic analysis to antitrust and consumer protection enforcement, and to research and economic knowledge and policy. BE was featured because the original functions of the Bureau of Corporations were to collect information, to conduct industry and policy research, to prepare reports at the request of the Congress and the President. The panelists for the roundtable consisted of former BE Directors and Acting Directors from the …

Opening Statement -- Making It Stick, Ronald L. Carlson, Michael S. Carlson

Popular Media

Every lawyer who sits down to plan her opening remarks for a coming trial has the same question: How far can I go in arguing my case during the opening statement? Can I mention the law? What about drawing a diagram of the accident on a blackboard? Will my opponent be able to stop me from displaying a couple of my dramatic exhibits to the jury?

Making one's theory of the case "stick" from the very start of the trial depends mightly on how far the lawyer can go in opening statement. Where the defense is primarily a legal or …

Moot Court Teams 2003-2004, Kellie Casey Monk

Materials from All Student Organizations

No abstract provided.

Empirical Research And Civil Jury Reform, Valerie P. Hans, Stephanie Albertson

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

In January 2003, President George W. Bush invoked the supposed failings of the civil jury as the rationale for sweeping changes to the civil justice system. In a speech given at the University of Scranton, in Pennsylvania, a state where skyrocketing costs of medical malpractice insurance had created a political crisis, President Bush said, "Excessive jury awards will continue to drive up insurance costs, will put good doctors out of Scranton, Pa." Among the changes he proposed were a decrease in the time that patients would have to sue their doctors, a national cap on pain and suffering awards at …

“Black People’S Money”: The Impact Of Law, Economics, And Culture In The Context Of Race On Damage Recoveries, Regina Austin

All Faculty Scholarship

“’Black People’s Money’: The Impact of Law, Economics, and Culture in the Context of Race on Damage Recoveries” is one of a series of articles by the author dealing with black economic marginalization; prior work considered such topics as shopping and selling as forms of deviance, street vending, restraints on leisure, and the importance of informality in loan transactions. This article deals with the linkage between the social significance of black people’s money and its material value. It analyzes the construction of “black money,” its association with cash, and the taboos and cultural practices that assure that black money will …

What Is A Reasonable Attorney Fee? An Empirical Study Of Class Action Settlements, Theodore Eisenberg, Geoffrey P. Miller

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Determining an appropriate fee is a difficult task facing trial court judges in class action litigation. But courts rarely rely on empirical research to assess a fee’s reasonableness, due, at least in part, to the relative paucity of available information. Existing empirical studies of attorney fees in class action cases are limited in scope, and generally do not control for important variables. To help fill this gap, we analyzed data from all state and federal class actions with reported fee decisions from 1993 to 2002 in which the fee and class recovery could be determined with reasonable confidence.

We find …

Agenda: Water Negotiation Workshop, University Of Colorado Boulder. Natural Resources Law Center, William & Flora Hewlett Foundation

Water Negotiation Workshop (June 4-5)

"Sponsored by: The Natural Resources law Center of the University of Colorado Law School; Funding provided by: The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation."

"Facilitators: Lucy Moore and Steve Snyder."

"June 4 and 5, 2003, Community House, Chautauqua Park, Boulder, Colorado."

Contents:

Agenda -- Roster of workshop participants -- Biographies of workshop participants -- Maps of Klamath basin -- Key water-related events in the upper Klamath basin -- Federal-state decisionmaking on water : applying lessons learned / David J. Hayes -- Turbulence in the Klamath River basin / Sharon Levy

Maps Of The Klamath Basin And Key Water-Related Events In The Upper Klamath Basin, University Of Colorado Boulder. Natural Resources Law Center

Water Negotiation Workshop (June 4-5)

5 pages.

Contents:

Maps of Klamath Basin -- Key water-related events in the Upper Klamath Basin

Excerpted from: Ron Hathaway & Teresa Welch, Water Allocation in the Klamath Reclamation Project, 2001: An Assessment of Natural Resource, Economic, Social, and Institutional Issues with a Focus on the Upper Klamath Basin 31-34, 43 (Oregon State University, University of California, reprinted May 2003). Full report available in Klamath Waters Digital Library at http://digitallib.oit.edu/cdm/ref/collection/kwl/id/9442.

The Economics Of Litigation And Arbitration: An Application To Franchise Contracts, Keith N. Hylton, Christopher R. Drahozal

Faculty Scholarship

If we define the deterrence benefits from contract enforcement as avoided harms net of avoidance costs, we should expect contracting parties to choose the dispute resolution forum that provides the greatest difference between deterrence benefits and dispute resolution costs for every type of dispute. We apply this general framework to franchise contracts and conduct an empirical analysis of the determinants of arbitration agreements among franchising parties. Although it is obvious that contracting parties have an incentive to choose arbitration in order to reduce dispute-resolution costs, there have been no studies of the importance of deterrence concerns. We examine the deterrence …

Why Do Distressed Companies Choose Delaware? An Empirical Analysis Of Venue Choice In Bankruptcy , Kenneth M. Ayotte, David A. Skeel Jr.

All Faculty Scholarship

We analyze a sample of large Chapter 11 cases to determine which factors motivate the choice of filing in one court over another when a choice is available. We focus in particular on the Delaware court, which became the most popular venue for large corporations in the 1990s. We find no evidence of agency problems governing the venue choice or affecting the outcome of the bankruptcy process. Instead, firm characteristics and court characteristics, particularly a court's level of experience, are the most important factors. We find that court experience manifests itself in both a greater ability to reorganize marginal firms …

Jurors' Evaluations Of Expert Testimony: Judging The Messenger And The Message, Sanja Kutnjak Ivkovic, Valerie P. Hans

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Jurors are laypersons with no specific expert knowledge, yet they are routinely placed in situations in which they need to critically evaluate complex expert testimony. This paper examines jurors' reactions to experts who testify in civil trials and the factors jurors identify as important to expert credibility. Based on in-depth qualitative analysis of interviews with 55 jurors in 7 civil trials, we develop a comprehensive model of the key factors jurors incorporate into the process of evaluating expert witnesses and their testimony. Contrary to the frequent criticism that jurors primarily evaluate expert evidence in terms of its subjective characteristics, the …

Lay Participation In Legal Decision Making: Introduction To Law & Policy Special Issue, Valerie P. Hans

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

United States scholarship on lay participation revolves around one predominant form of lay participation, the jury (Hans & Vidmar forthcoming 2004). However, in the legal systems of many countries, laypeople participate as decision makers in other ways. Laypersons serve as judges (Provine 1986), magistrates (Diamond 1993), and private prosecutors (Perez Gil 2003). Lay and law-trained judges may also decide cases together in mixed tribunals (Kutnjak Ivkovi6 2003; Machura 2003; Vidmar 2002). Although diverse in structure, these methods share with the jury a set of animating ideas about lay involvement in legal decision making.

Many of these ideas appear to be …

The Government As Litigant: Further Tests Of The Case Selection Model, Theodore Eisenberg, Henry Farber

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

We develop a model of the plaintiff's decision to file a lawsuit that has implications for how differences between the federal government and private litigants translate into differences in trial rates and plaintiff win rates at trial. Our case selection model generates a set of predictions for relative trial rates and plaintiff win rates, depending on the type of case and whether the government is defendant or plaintiff. To test the model, we use data on about 474,000 cases filed in federal district court between 1979 and 1994 in the areas of personal injury and job discrimination, in which the …

Race And The Georgia Courts: Implications Of The Georgia Public Trust And Confidence Survey For Batson V. Kentucky And Its Progeny, George W. Dougherty, Randy Beck, Mark D. Bradbury

Scholarly Works

Put simply, there is a perception among many Georgians that the court system treats minorities worse than whites. This Essay considers implications of the Georgia findings for a line of United States Supreme Court decisions designed to prevent racial discrimination by trial lawyers in the selection of trial juries.

The Gatekeeping Role In Civil Litigation And The Abdication Of Legal Values In Favor Of Scientific Values, Neil B. Cohen

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Fundamental Principles For Class Action Governance, Alexandra Lahav

Faculty Articles and Papers

Class actions face a crisis of governance. The form of governance provided by Rule 23, governance by representative parties, is both vague in theory and ignored in practice. Instead, by a combination of procedural rules, judicial interpretation and common practice, the class is governed by a regime of attorney dictatorship with limited judicial oversight. This regime neither reflects the basic insight that the class and attorney do not have a traditional attorney-client relationship nor performs the task of transforming the inchoate collectivity of the class into an organization that protects and is responsive to the will of class members. This …

Reconciling Federal And State Interest In Securities Regulation In The United States And Europe, Roberta S. Karmel

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Should Congress Repeal Securities Class Action Reform?, Adam C. Pritchard

Other Publications

The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 was designed to curtail class action lawsuits by the plaintiffs’ bar. In particular, the high-technology industry, accountants, and investment bankers thought that they had been unjustly victimized by class action lawsuits based on little more than declines in a company’s stock price. Prior to 1995, the plaintiffs’ bar had free rein to use the discovery process to troll for evidence to support its claims. Moreover, the high costs of litigation were a powerful weapon with which to coerce companies to settle claims. The plaintiffs’ bar and its allies in Congress have called …

Standing To Sue In Citizen Suits Against Air And Water Polluters Under Friends Of The Earth, Inc. V. Laidlaw Environmental Services (Toc), Inc., Steven A.G. Davison

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Does Lewis V. Casey Spell The End To Court-Ordered Improvement Of Prison Law Libraries?, Joseph L. Gerken

Law Librarian Journal Articles

The Supreme Court's decision in Lewis v. Casey raises the bar for advocates seeking court-ordered improvements in prison law libraries. Whether it dooms all such efforts to failure may well depend on the willingness of trial courts to take into account the realities of prisoners' pro se litigation.

Joseph Henry Lumpkin Inn Of Court Team Members 2003-2004, Kellie Casey Monk

Materials from All Student Organizations

No abstract provided.

National Order Of Barristers 2003, Kellie Casey Monk

Materials from All Student Organizations

No abstract provided.

Mock Trial Team Members 2003-2004, Kellie Casey Monk

Materials from All Student Organizations

No abstract provided.

How Employment-Discrimination Plaintiffs Fare In The Federal Courts Of Appeals, Kevin M. Clermont, Theodore Eisenberg, Stewart J. Schwab

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Employment-discrimination plaintiffs swim against the tide. Compared to the typical plaintiff, they win a lower proportion of cases during pretrial and after trial. Then, many of their successful cases are appealed. On appeal, they have a harder time in upholding their successes, as well in reversing adverse outcome.

This tough story does not describe some tiny corner of the litigation world. Employment-discrimination cases constitute an increasing fraction of the federal civil docket, now reigning as the largest single category of cases at nearly 10 percent.

In this article, we use official government data to describe the appellate phase of this …

Lawyer Ethics On The Lunar Landscape Of Asbestos Litigation, Roger C. Cramton

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Whiplash: Who's To Blame?, Valerie P. Hans, Juliet Dee

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Tom is sitting in his car at an intersection, waiting for the red light to change. Without warning, the car behind him, driven by a distracted mother named Elaine, slams into the rear of Tom's car. After the accident, Tom experiences severe neck pain, which interferes with his work and family life. Who's to blame?

If Tom suffered physical injury as a result, then under current legal principles she is responsible for compensating him for his injury. However, research on jury decision making in civil cases suggests that a constellation of psychological, legal and political factors operate together to focus …

Avoid Bald Men And People With Green Socks? Other Ways To Improve The Voir Dire Process In Jury Selection, Valerie P. Hans, Alayna Jehle

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

During jury selection, many courts adopt a minimal approach to voir dire questions, asking a small number of close-ended questions to groups of prospective jurors and requiring prospective jurors to volunteer their biases. This Article describes research evidence showing that limited voir dire questioning is often ineffective in detecting juror bias. To improve the effectiveness of voir dire, the authors make four recommendations: (1) increase the use of juror questionnaires; (2) incorporate some open-ended questions; (3) expand the types of questions that are asked; and (4) allow attorneys to participate in voir dire.

Nullificatory Juries, Kaimipono David Wenger, David A. Hoffman

All Faculty Scholarship

In this Article, we argue that current debates on the legitimacy of punitive damages would benefit from a comparison with jury nullification in criminal trials. We discuss critiques of punitive damages and of jury nullification, noting the surprising similarities in the arguments scholars use to attack these (superficially) distinct outcomes of the jury guarantee. Not only are the criticisms alike, the institutions of punitive damages and jury nullification also turn out to have many similarities: both are, we suggest, examples of what we call "nullificatory juries." We discuss the features of such juries, and consider recent behavioral data relating to …

Possibilities For Collaborative Law: Ethics And Practice Of Lawyer Disqualification And Process Control In A New Model Of Lawyering, John M. Lande

Faculty Publications

This article assesses the possibilities for collaborative law (CL) to promote problem-solving negotiation and analyzes the operation and effect of the CL disqualification agreement (DA), which CL leaders hold as essential to the process. In CL, the lawyers and clients agree to negotiate from the outset of the case using a problem-solving approach. Under CL theory, the process creates a metaphorical "container" by using a DA disqualifying both lawyers from representing their clients if either party chooses to proceed in litigation. This article argues that much CL theory and practice is valuable, including protocols of early commitment to negotiation, interest-based …