Litigation Commons^™

Mass Tort Litigation And Inquisitorial Justice, Howard M. Erichson

Faculty Scholarship

In the past decade, settlement class actions have become increasingly popular in mass tort litigation, having been used successfully in cases such as the Dalkon Shield litigation, the Bjork-Shiley heart valve litigation, and the orthopedic bone screw litigation. Although the Supreme Court's opinion in Amchem has engendered some confusion over the continued viability of mass tort settlement class actions, it appears that such settlements remain a dominant approach to resolving mass tort lawsuits. With increasing frequency, plaintiffs and defendants come to court holding hands, and courts must launch their own vigorous inquiries into the merits of the parties' proffered settlement. …

Treating Sexual Harassment With Respect, Anita Bernstein

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Provisional Relief In Transnational Litigation, George A. Bermann

Faculty Scholarship

In this article, Professor Bermann identifies and analyzes the principal problems raised by the rapidly growing phenomenon of transnational provisional relief National courts are facing serious challenges in organizing such interventions, but as yet lack a sufficiently comprehensive framework of analysis. The author begins with the clarifying distinction that provisional relief may be transnational either because of its significant effects abroad or because it lends support to protective measures ordered by foreign courts, and draws on the experiences of U.S. and foreign courts in determining the costs of both granting and withholding provisional relief He concludes that, despite the very …

The Civil Rights Remedy Of The Violence Against Women Act: Legislative History, Policy Implications & Litigation Strategy, Elizabeth M. Schneider

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Allocating The Burden Of Proof In Sales Litigation, Alex Stein

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Presumptions And Burdens Of Proof As Tools For Legal Stability And Change, Tamar Frankel

Faculty Scholarship

Presumptions and burdens of proof are used, among other purposes, to maintain legal stability and at the same time effect change. By imposing the burden of proof on the party asserting a certain outcome, courts can calibrate burdens of proof and substantive rules until experience points to rule retention or amendment. As agents of change, presumptions and burdens of proof are far more flexible and less brittle than rules.¹

This Article tells the story of presumptions and burdens of proof in litigation between corporate shareholders and managements. This litigation is replete with volatile presumptions and innovative burdens of proof, …

Recovery For Economic Loss Following The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill, Victor P. Goldberg

Faculty Scholarship

The physical cleanup following one of the worst oil spills in history, that of the Exxon Valdez, is done. The legal cleanup, however, has barely begun. Over 100 law firms participating in over 200 suits in federal and state courts involving more than 30,000 claims are presently engaged in litigation. Fishermen, cannery workers, fishing lodges, tour boat operators, oil companies whose shipments were delayed, and even California motorists facing higher gasoline prices have filed claims against Exxon and its fellow defendants.

Most claimants face a formidable roadblock, the so-called Robins doctrine. Under Robins Dry Dock & Repair Co. v. Flint …

Haymarket: Whose Name The Few Still Say With Tears, A Dramatization In Eleven Scenes, Michael E. Tigar

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Will A New Restatement Help Settle Troubled Waters: Reflections, Aaron Twerski, J. A. Henderson

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Longterm Strategies In Japanese Environmental Litigation, Setsuo Miyazawa

Faculty Scholarship

Japan's reputation for unusually strong emphasis on the avoidance of public conflict and therefore for de-emphasis of legal institutions suggests an arid, hostile environment for litigators, especially those who lack substantial resources. In a study of a quasi-class action lawsuit by Japanese air pollution victims, we find that litigation can be developed as a tool in the pursuit of a social movement's wider objectives despite the paucity of resources within the Japanese legal system. Our research documents the many ways in which the delays, obstacles, and costs that characterize the litigation environment in Japan have been either neutralized or turned …

Case Management In The Eastern District Of Virginia, In Symposium, Civil Litigation In The 1990'S, Part Ii, A. Kimberley Dayton

Faculty Scholarship

Part I of this Article describes the administrative structure of the Eastern District of Virginia and its case management practices. Part II demonstrates that, despite the Eastern District of Virginia's status as one of the busiest federal district courts, it has consistently been one of the most efficient and effective federal courts in the nation. As a result, in Part III, this Article concludes that the experience of the Eastern District of Virginia raises many questions about the premises underlying the Civil Justice Reform Act, the proposed amendments to the Federal Rules, and the means by which Congress and the …

The Supreme Court, 1991 Term - Leading Cases, Ernest A. Young

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Hare And Hounds: The Fugitive Defendant's Constitutional Right To Be Pursued, Bruce A. Green

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Use Of Risk Assessment Evidence To Prove Increased Risk And Alternative Causation In Toxic Tort Litigation, Gary E. Marchant, Michael S. Baram

Faculty Scholarship

Due to the difficulties of proving causation in most toxic tort suits, plaintiffs and defendants in toxic tort litigation have begun to develop and use scientifically sophisticated risk assessments as evidence in proving or disproving causation. This use has led to two new trends in tort liability. First, there is the trend in which risk assessment is used by plaintiffs to buttress claims for future injury or increased risk. Second, there is the trend in which risk assessment is used by defendants to establish that other factors caused, in whole or in part, plaintiffs’ injuries.

This article evaluates these two …

The Use Of Anti-Suit Injunctions In International Litigation, George A. Bermann

Faculty Scholarship

Of the various forms of provisional relief in the context of inter-national litigation, none has sparked as much interest and controversy as the international anti-suit injunction. In many ways the international anti-suit injunction, an instrument by which a court of one jurisdiction seeks to restrain the conduct of litigation in another jurisdiction, resembles more conventional forms of international provisional relief such as the foreign attachment or preliminary injunction. Like them, the anti-suit injunction affords courts an important opportunity to affect the course and significance of litigation abroad. However, such intervention strongly implies – and often actually creates – jurisdictional conflict …

The Devolution Of The Legal Profession: A Demand Side Perspective, Ronald J. Gilson

Faculty Scholarship

Economic analysis has not played a significant role in the increasingly intense debate over the decline of professionalism among lawyers.Economists' lack of interest in the issue may be understandable. The lawyers' lament is that the legal profession is devolving into the business of law. That this concern has not captured the economists' attention may reflect only that economists do not view the label "business" as a pejorative. If becoming a business means efficiently rendering an important service in a competitive environment, then of what is there to complain?

Lawyers, more directly concerned with maintaining their professional status, would find little …

The Influence Of Litigation Costs On Deterrence Under Strict Liability And Under Negligence, Keith N. Hylton

Faculty Scholarship

This paper examines the influence of litigation costs on deterrence under strict liability and under negligence. By deterrence, I refer to the effect of the threat of liability on the care exercised by potential injurers. More precisely, this paper takes litigation costs as given and examines the social desirability of the levels of care exercised under negligence and under strict liability.

Voices Heard In Jury Argument: Litigation And The Law School Curriculum, Michael E. Tigar

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Market Share - A Tale Of Two Centuries, Aaron Twerski

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Under Advisement: Attorney Fee Forfeiture And The Supreme Court, Stacy Caplow

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Integration Of Professional Skills Into The Law School Curriculum: Where We've Been And Where We're Going, Elizabeth M. Schneider

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Through A Glass, Darkly: How The Court Sees Motions To Disqualify Criminal Defense Lawyers , Bruce A. Green

Faculty Scholarship

Although raised frequently in the lower courts, the question of what the trial judge's role is in conflict-of-interest cases has, for nearly half a century, lurked in the background of the Supreme Court's decisions concerning the scope of a criminal defendant's right to the undivided loyalty of his attorney. Last term, as its conflict-of-interest jurisprudence reached middle age, the Court had the opportunity to articulate its views on that question. In Wheat v. United States, the Court held that a trial judge has discretion to disqualify defense counsel, even over the defendant's objection, if a serious possibility for a conflict …

Task Force Reports On Women In The Courts: The Challenge For Legal Education, Elizabeth M. Schneider

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Lesbians, Gays And Feminist At The Bar: Translating Personal Experience Into Effective Legal Argument - A Symposium, Elizabeth M. Schneider

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Personal Jurisdiction And The Stream Of Commerce, A. Kimberley Dayton

Faculty Scholarship

This article evaluates the stream of commerce theory of personaljurisdiction in light of existing precedent and the constitutionalimperative of due process. Part II briefly describes the factualbackground of Asahi and the various opinions rendered in the case.Part m outlines the development of jurisdictional doctrine since International Shoe, emphasizing the meaning of "purposeful availment" and its fluid role in the due process equation governing statecourt jurisdiction. Part IV then traces the evolution of the stream of commerce theory since International Shoe. Part V examines and rejects criticisms of the stream of commerce theory, and concludes that under any reasonabre interpretation of …

Use Of Comparative Risk Methods In Regulatory And Common Law, Michael S. Baram

Faculty Scholarship

Several persistent problems afflict risk decisionmaking. In the regulatory context, agencies confront the problems of how to prioritize risks for best use of their limited resources and how to determine "how safe is safe enough," or a risk limit, when action is to be taken on a particular risk.

In the trial courts hearing toxic tort actions, the jury must often determine whether an activity is "unreasonably dangerous" or a product is "defective" because of its risk attributes.

To resolve these problems, many have proposed the use of risk comparisons. Now that we can quantify risks, why not compare them …

The Trial Of John Peter Zenger, Michael E. Tigar

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Confidence In Probability: Burdens Of Persuasion In A World Of Imperfect Knowledge, Neil B. Cohen

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Taking Bureaucracy Seriously, Henry Paul Monaghan

Faculty Scholarship

The Federal Courts: Crisis and Reform can be viewed as not one but two "books." "Book I" (pp. 1-192), which reflects Judge Posner's well-known commitment to the interplay of law and economics, adds to the literature on the explosive and unremitting growth of litigation in the inferior federal courts during the last quarter-century. Noting this situation with alarm, Judge Posner seeks to identify the dimensions of the "crisis," to evaluate some current proposals for reform, and to advance some of his own. “Book II” (pp. 192-340) is quite different. Considerably less reliant upon law and economics, it addresses the substance …

Institutional Litigation In The Post-Chapman World, Susan Herman

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.