Law Commons^™

Reparations And Unjust Enrichment, Emily Sherwin

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Despite an initial appearance of superior doctrinal fit, restitution is not an appropriate vehicle for reparations claims based on slavery and similar large-scale historical injustices. The justifying principle behind restitution—prevention of unjust enrichment—lacks the moral force necessary to resolve a controversial public dispute about moral rights and obligations among segments of society. At its core, a claim to restitution is an attempt to right a wrong not by alleviating the adverse consequences to oneself, but by diminishing the position of others. In other words, the notion of unjust enrichment is a comparative idea that draws on resentment and the desire …

Corrective Justice, Equal Opportunity, And The Legacy Of Slavery And Jim Crow, David B. Lyons

Faculty Scholarship

Chattel slavery was a brutally cruel, repressive, and exploitative system of racial subjugation. When it was abolished, the former slaveholders owed the freedmen compensation for the terrible wrongs of enslavement. Ex-slaves sought reparations, especially in the form of land, but few received any sort of recompense. The wrongs they suffered were never repaired.

No one alive today can be held accountable for the wrongs of chattel slavery, and those who might now be called upon to pay reparations were not even born until many decades after slavery ended. For some scholars, the lack of accountable parties makes current reparations claims …

Introduction, Hanoch Dagan, Keith N. Hylton, Anthony J. Sebok

Faculty Articles

No abstract provided.

Two Concepts Of Injustice In Restitution For Slavery, Anthony J. Sebok

Faculty Articles

This article, which will appear in a symposium issued of the Boston University Law Review titled "The Jurisprudence of Slavery Reparations," criticizes attempts to secure legal redress for slavery through lawsuits based on unjust enrichment. The article has three parts. First, it compares the recent efforts to litigate the wrongs of caused by American slavery to other recent "mass restitution" lawsuits, namely the states' unjust enrichment suits against the tobacco industry and the suits against banks and corporations for unjust enrichment arising out of the Holocaust. Second, the article questions the fit between the structure of restitution and the interests …

A Framework For Reparations Claims, Keith N. Hylton

Faculty Scholarship

These remarks, prepared for the Boston College Third World Law Journal Reparations Symposium, compare the goals and viability of reparations claims as tort suits. I contrast two approaches observed in the claims: a "doing justice" model, which involves seeking compensation in important cases of uncorrected uncompensated injustice, and a "social welfare" model that seeks to change the distribution of wealth. Claims under the first category are far more consistent with tort doctrine and likely to meet their goals than social welfare-based claims.

Slavery And Tort Law, Keith N. Hylton

Faculty Scholarship

This paper evaluates the claim for slavery reparations from a torts perspective. I start with an examination of the injuries inflicted on slaves, and the extent to which tort law provides a vehicle for redressing these injuries. I then take up the question of derivative claims, claims brought by someone other than the direct victim, a category which covers the reparations complaint. Lastly, I discuss the accounting demand by the reparations plaintiffs. The derivative status of reparations claims presents special obstacles for plaintiffs. However, applying today's law to slavery should be viewed as bringing law to a regime from which …