Civil Procedure Commons^™

National Juries For National Cases: Preserving Citizen Participation In Large-Scale Litigation, Laura G. Dooley

Law Faculty Publications

Procedural evolution in complex litigation seems to have left the civil jury behind. Reliance on aggregating devices, such as multidistrict litigation and class actions, as well as settlement pressure created by “bellwether” cases, has resulted in cases of national scope being tried by local juries. Local juries thus have the potential to impose their values on the rest of the country. This trend motivates parties to forum-shop, and some commentators suggest eliminating jury trials in complex cases altogether. Yet the jury is at the heart of our uniquely American understanding of civil justice, and the Seventh Amendment mandates its use …

The E.U. Leniency Program And U.S. Civil Discovery Rules: A Fraternal Fight?, Roberto Grasso

Michigan Journal of International Law

This Note provides a European perspective on the issues raised by In re Rubber Chemicals Antitrust Litigation (Rubber Chemicals), and expresses concern regarding the inconsistent approach taken by U.S. courts to the discoverability of the Leniency submissions. This Note also warns that this inconsistency may have a chilling effect on participation in the E.U. Leniency Program and may thus impede enforcement of European anti-cartel law.

Not Dead Yet, Richard L. Marcus

Oklahoma Law Review

No abstract provided.

Making Effective Rules: The Need For Procedure Theory, Robert G. Bone

Oklahoma Law Review

No abstract provided.

Default Judgment In Montana: The Costs Of Inexcusable Neglect Or The Death Of Trial On The Merits?, Sara F. Tappen

Montana Law Review

Default Judgment

Bellwether Trials, Alexandra Lahav

Faculty Articles and Papers

At the core of the controversy over mass torts lies a fundamental question: what justifies collective litigation? Scholars considering this question make one of two arguments. They either argue that collective justice must be limited by a process-based right to participation based on autonomy values, or they argue that collective justice is justified by utilitarian values and dismiss participation altogether. This Article presents a third alternative: that the democratic nature of the jury trial validates group typical justice, a subset of collective justice. The Article re-envisions the trial as a democratic enterprise, rather than solely an atomistic one. An innovative …

Boundary Waters Treaty Of 1909 As A Model For Interjurisdictional Water Governance, Robert H. Abrams

Journal Publications

In an age of increasing interjurisdictional water conflict and water management concern, the list of accomplishments of the Boundary Water Treaty of 1909 (BWT), reached in a harmonious manner, raises the possibility that, perhaps, the management mechanisms of the BWT might beneficially be used in other contexts. This Article will take up that possibility in the context of three contemporary American interstate water allocation disputes. These disputes are (1) a relatively simple cross-border complaint by a downstream state, South Carolina, that North Carolina cities are using too much water of the Catawba River; (2) the basin-wide dispute regarding water use …

Pro Se Litigation: Best Practices From A Judge's Perspective, Hon. Beverly W. Snukals, Glen H. Sturtevant Jr.

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Class Certification And Interlocutory Review: Rule 23(F) In The Courts, Lori Irish Bauman

The Journal of Appellate Practice and Process

No abstract provided.

Foreigners' Fate In America's Courts: Empirical Legal Research, Kevin M. Clermont, Theodore Eisenberg

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

This article revisits the controversy regarding how foreigners fare in U.S. courts. The available data, if taken in a sufficiently big sample from numerous case categories and a range of years, indicate that foreigners have fared better in the federal courts than their domestic counterparts have fared. Thus, the data offer no support for the existence of xenophobic bias in U.S. courts. Nor do they establish xenophilia, of course. What the data do show is that case selection drives the outcomes for foreigners. Foreigners’ aversion to U.S. forums can elevate the foreigners’ success rates, when measured as a percentage of …

Discovering Discovery: Non-Party Access To Pretrial Information In The Federal Courts 1938-2006, Seymour Moskowitz

Law Faculty Publications

In the modern era, the pretrial process is critical to the disposition of almost all litigation. The vast majority of cases never go to trial. Those which are contested at trial and upon appeal are often decided upon the results of the information gather before trial. This is true in both private litigation and in public interest cases where "private attorneys general" may only function effectively with court-enforced discovery. Despite the significance of the Article III courts to our society, transparency in their processes for resolving civil disputes has been severely compromised. Threats to openness emanate from multiple sources. This …

Loud Rules, Wendy Gerwick Couture

Articles

No abstract provided.

The Unseen Track Of Erie Railroad: Why History And Jurisprudence Suggest A More Straightforward Form Of Erie Analysis, Donald L. Doernberg

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This Article proceeds in four parts. Part I discusses federal law as a new category of law after ratification of the Constitution and what that connotes for the time before federal law existed. Part II examines the shift from the natural law perspective, which had dominated jurisprudence into the late nineteenth century, to legal positivism. It was that change more than anything else that doomed the doctrine of Swift v. Tyson, which controlled vertical choice-of-law questions in the federal courts for ninety-six years until the Erie Court declared it unconstitutional. Part III canvasses the development of the Erie doctrine in …

The Relationship Between Defense Counsel, Policyholders, And Insurers: Nevada Rides Yellow Cab Toward "Two-Client" Model Of Tripartite Relationship. Are Cumis Counsel And Malpractice Claims By Insurers Next?, Jeffrey W. Stempel

Scholarly Works

It happens constantly in civil litigation. An insurance company hires a lawyer to defend its policyholder from a third party’s claim of injury. But just who is the lawyer’s “client?” Is it the policyholder who is the named defendant in the case and is “represented” in court proceedings? Or is it the insurer who, in most cases, selected the attorney, pays the attorney, supervises the litigation, and has (by the terms of the liability insurance policy) the right to settle the case, even over the objections of the policyholder? Ordinarily, the liability insurer has both the duty to defend a …

Lawyer Professional Responsibility In Litigation, Jeffrey W. Stempel

Scholarly Works

A perennially-vexing litigation issue concerns the limits of permissible attorney argument. More than a few lawyers have been tripped up by the occasional fuzziness of the line between aggressive advocacy and improper appeals to passion or prejudice. See Craig Lee Montz, Why Lawyers Continue to Cross the Line in Closing Argument: An Examination of Federal and State Cases, 28 Ohio N.U. L. Rev. 67 (2001-2002)(problem of violations results from lack of uniformity and clarity of ground rules as well as errors of counsel). In Cohen v. Lioce, 149 P.3d 916 (Nev. 2006) the Nevada Supreme Court both provided significant guidance …

Reassessing Damages In Securities Fraud Class Actions, Elizabeth Chamblee Burch

Scholarly Works

No coherent doctrinal statement exists for calculating open-market damages for securities fraud class actions. Instead, courts have tried in vain to fashion common-law deceit and misrepresentation remedies to fit open-market fraud. The result is a relatively ineffective system with a hallmark feature: unpredictable damage awards. This poses a significant fraud deterrence problem from both a practical and a theoretical standpoint.

In 2005, the Supreme Court had the opportunity to clarify open-market damage principles and to facilitate earlier dismissal of cases without compensable economic losses. Instead, in Dura Pharmaceuticals v. Broudo, it further confused the damage issue by (1) perpetuating the …

Constructing Class Action Reality, Debra Lyn Bassett

BYU Law Review

No abstract provided.

Reassessing Charitable Immunity In Virginia, Carl Tobias

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Trial Practice And Procedure, John O'Shea Sullivan, Ashby L. Kent

Mercer Law Review

The 2005 survey period yielded several noteworthy decisions relating to federal trial practice and procedure, many of which concerned issues of first impression in the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals. This Article analyzes several recent developments in the Eleventh Circuit, including significant rulings in the areas of arbitration, civil procedure, statutory interpretation, personal jurisdiction, subject matter jurisdiction, and other issues of interest to the trial practitioner.

Jurisdiction To Adjudicate: A Revised Analysis, A. Benjamin Spencer

Faculty Publications

Personal jurisdiction doctrine as articulated by the Supreme Court is in disarray. As a constitutional doctrine whose contours remain imprecise, the law of personal jurisdiction has generated confusion, unpredictability, and extensive satellite litigation over what should be an uncomplicated preliminary issue. Many commentators have long lamented these defects, making suggestions for how the doctrine could be improved. Although many of these proposals have had much to offer, they generally have failed to articulate (or adequately justify or explain) a simple and sound approach to jurisdiction that the Supreme Court can embrace. This Article revises the law of personal jurisdiction by …

Celotex Trilogy Revisited: How Misapplication Of The Federal Summary Judgment Standard Is Undermining The Seventh Amendment Right To A Jury Trial, David H. Simmons, Stephen J. Jacobs, Daniel J. O'Malley, Richard H. Tami

Florida A & M University Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Hybrid Class Action As Judicial Spork: Managing Individual Rights In A Stew Of Common Wrong, 39 J. Marshall L. Rev. 231 (2006), Jon Romberg

UIC Law Review

No abstract provided.

In The Service Of Secrets: The U.S. Supreme Court Revisits Totten, 39 J. Marshall L. Rev. 475 (2006), Douglas Kash, Matthew Indrisano

UIC Law Review

No abstract provided.

Designer Trials, Elizabeth G. Thornburg

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

This article considers the intersection of freedom of contract and the trials that have not vanished. Could contracting parties effectively agree in advance of a dispute that any litigation of the case will comply with certain rules? Would such an agreement be enforced even in a contract of adhesion? If so, parties with sufficient bargaining leverage could design away many of the characteristics of litigation that they find unappealing, without the need to resort to private processes. The result: a designer trial with the procedural deck stacked in favor of the party with the greatest pre-dispute bargaining power.

Such a …

Burda Media, Inc. V. Viertel, Aaron F. Miner

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Access To Justice And The Evolution Of Class Action Litigation In Australia, Bernard Murphy, Camille Cameron

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

The federal and Victorian class action regimes are intended to facilitate aggregation of multiple claims. Aggregation can improve efficiency by combining similar claims and can enhance access to justice by providing a mechanism to litigate small claims. This article considers whether these efficiency and access aims are being achieved. The authors argue that whilst some developments in class action jurisprudence have been consistent with these legislative aims, other have not. Several features of Australian class action jurisprudence and practice have hampered the healthy development of the legislative regimes, including adverse costs orders, unclear threshold requirements, evasive posturing and unresolved class …

Learning From Wal-Mart, Melissa Hart

Publications

This article considers the landmark gender discrimination class action, Dukes v. Wal-Mart Stores, both as a prototype of an emerging litigation strategy and also as a case that is entirely unique. As part of a growing trend of gender discrimination class claims, Dukes has the potential to push the boundaries of the law to confront the pervasive, tenacious stereotypes that continue to limit women's workplace opportunities. The plaintiffs' arguments - both the narrative of discrimination their evidence set out and the legal strategies they chose - are strikingly similar to claims that have been made in many class action …

Improving The Construction And Litigation Resolution Process: The 2005 Amendments To The Washington Condominium Act Are A Win-Win For Homeowners And Developers, Mark F. O'Donnell, David E. Chawes

Seattle University Law Review

On August 1, 2005, significant amendments to the Washington Condominium Act (WCA) became effective. These amendments were intended to substantially reduce water infiltration in multiunit residential buildings and to simplify the condominium construction dispute resolution process. The heart of the amendments is the implementation of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) procedures, as well as fee-shiftingprovisions which require the non-prevailing party to pay the attorney fees and costs of the prevailing party. A decade of lawsuits brought under the WCA by condominium owners associations against builders and developers, and in turn by builders against subcontractors, alleging defects in the ability of the …

Petition For A Writ Of Certiorari, Scott V. Johanns, No. 05-356 (U.S. Sept. 15, 2005), Scott L. Nelson, David C. Vladeck

U.S. Supreme Court Briefs

No abstract provided.

Appellate Practice And Procedure, K. Todd Butler

Mercer Law Review

This Article reviews federal appellate procedure developments in the Eleventh Circuit during the 2004 calendar yea. As is the case each year, perhaps the most important procedural matter the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals considered was its own federal subject matter jurisdiction and that of the district courts in the Eleventh Circuit. If a matter is within the subject matter jurisdiction of the federal courts, or the federal appellate jurisdiction of the Eleventh Circuit, then the final order rule, along with the exceptions to the final order rule, dominate the consideration of whether a decision is subject to review. The …