Contracts Commons^™

An Estate Plan For Kanye West, Thomas E. Simmons

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

One inventory item in megastar Kanye West's vast portfolio of assets merits a unique sort of care and safeguarding his right ofpublicity. The right ofpublicity is a property interest which represents the commercial value of a celebrity's name, image, and likeness. In some states, including California, the right survives the celebrity's death and is freely alienable and devisable. A protective arrangement, such as a trust, is often pursued to impose postmortem use and transferability restrictions on property that has particular importance to the testator. This Article proposes a noncharitable purpose trust as a means by which Kanye West's right of …

The Secrets Behind Reality Television Shows And Their Unconscionable Contracts, Stephanie Rimberg

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

The note argues that reality television show contracts are often unconscionable due to the significant imbalance of power between producers and participants. These contracts frequently classify participants as independent contractors, despite their integral role in the show, and include provisions that are procedurally and substantively unfair, such as disclaimers of liability and arbitration clauses. The author contends that these contracts violate California contract law and public policy, advocating for participants to be reclassified as employees and for contracts to be amended to protect their rights.

Partnership, Democracy, And Self-Rule In Jewish Law, Daniel J.H. Greenwood

Touro Law Review

Liberal political theory has long relied on a metaphor of contract: autonomous adults coming together to agree, by unanimous consent, on the basic structure of a just society. But contract is a strange metaphor with which to explain society. Contract law is based on a morality of strangers acting at arms-length. In contrast, decent societies and the governments they set for themselves must be based on a commitment of mutual responsibility. What makes us fellow citizens—fellows of any variety—is accepting that we are all in this together. Jewish legal and midrashic traditions can be a useful corrective to the atomistic …

The Efficient Breach Theory In International Investment Law, Sangwani Patrick Ng’Ambi

Northwestern Journal of International Law & Business

When a State unilaterally abrogates its contractual obligations, it is under a duty to compensate the investor. The aim of the compensation regime under International Investment Law is to restore the investor to a position he or she would have been in had the breach not taken place. Thus, the award of compensation should not only include sunk costs (damnum emergens) but also lost future profits (lucrum cessans).

In this article it is argued that the rules relating to compensation promote efficiency, as per the ‘efficient breach theory’ because they dissuade governments from unilaterally abrogating concession agreements, unless they can …

The Separation Of Voting And Control: The Role Of Contract In Corporate Governance, Gabriel Rauterberg

Faculty Scholarship

The default rules of corporate law make shareholders’ control rights a function of their voting power. Whether a director is elected or a merger is approved depends on how shareholders vote. Yet, in private corporations shareholders routinely alter their rights by contract. This phenomenon of shareholder agreements — contracts among the owners of a firm — has received far less attention than it deserves, mainly because detailed data about the actual contents of shareholder agreements has been lacking. Private companies disclose little, and shareholder agreements are thought to play a trivial or nonexistent role in public companies.

I show that …

A Right For Retirement Unconscionable Contracts, The Right (Not) To Associate, And Citizens United, Paul S. Miller

American University Law Review

The doctrine of unconscionable contracts is an equity doctrine. As such, it does not ask whether an agreement is or is not an enforceable contract; legality has no bearing. Rather, the doctrine asks whether it would be it be fit and proper . . . would it be fair . . . for a court to enforce such a contract. Using the doctrine, courts examine whether the price paid for a good or service far outstrips any benefit gained.

What if that price is the surrender of a basic right, the Right (Not) to Associate? The Supreme Court says that …

Preserving Procreative Potential With A Smart Prenuptial Agreement, Lynda Wray Black, Chelsea E. Caldwell

FIU Law Review

No abstract provided.

Contract Law In The Agri-Food Supply Chain, Bianca Gardella Tedeschi

FIU Law Review

No abstract provided.

Understanding University Fee Litigation: A Few Lessons About The Perils Of Imprudence For Higher Ed Plan Sponsors, Maria O'Brien, Calvin Utter

Faculty Scholarship

Beginning in August 2016, a series of class action lawsuits were filed on behalf of participants and beneficiaries of 403(b) employee retirement plans sponsored by major American colleges and universities. These plans are regulated by the 1974 Employee Retirement Income Security Act (“ERISA”), which sets minimum standards to protect the participants and beneficiaries of voluntarily established retirement and health plans. The allegations in the several lawsuits have centered primarily around breaches of fiduciary duties by those charged with administering the plan.

These cases are all class action lawsuits brought on behalf of the participants and beneficiaries of the plans in …

Obsolescence: The Intractable Production Problem In Contract Law, Alan Schwartz, Robert E. Scott

Faculty Scholarship

Contract law has long suffered from an institutional problem: Which legal institution can best create an efficient law for commercial contracts that can overcome "obsolescence” – the persistence of rules that only solve yesterday’s contracting problems? Until the early 20th century, contract law was largely created by common law courts. The law's default rules were efficient when created and courts updated them as commerce changed. But there were few rules and the common law process is slow. In response, the 20th century saw public and private lawmaking bodies enact commercial statutes in discrete legal areas such as secured credit, commercial …

Smart Contracts: Will Fintech Be The Catalyst For The Next Global Financial Crisis?, Randall Duran, Paul Griffin

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Purpose: This paper aims to examine the risks associated with smart contracts, a disruptive financial technology (FinTech) innovation, and assesses how in the future they could threaten the integrity of the global financial system. Design/methodology/approach: A qualitative approach is used to identify risk factors related to the use of new financial innovations, by examining how over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives contributed to the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) which occurred during 2007 and 2008. Based on this analysis, the potential for similar concerns with smart contracts are evaluated, drawing on the failure of The DAO on the Ethereum blockchain, which involved the loss …

Commentary On Gruen V. Gruen, Richard H. Chused

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

The Billion Dollar Industry That Has Never Paid Its Money-Makers: The Ncaa’S Attempt At Compensation Through Names, Images And Likeness, Christopher Palmieri

Touro Law Review

The National Collegiate Athletic Association (“NCAA”) has regulated collegiate sports for over one hundred years. The NCAA has long relied upon the principle of amateurism to prohibit college athletes from profiting from their name, image and likeness (“NILs”). However, recently this principle has drawn a lot of attention and has all but crumbled. States across the nation have passed legislation that will soon come into effect to bypass the NCAA bylaws and allow student athletes to profit from their NILs, even the United States Supreme Court has called the NCAA’s business model into question. This has left the NCAA with …

Arthur Linton Corbin, Gregory Klass

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This chapter on Arthur Linton Corbin will appear in the forthcoming collection, Scholars of Contract Law. The chapter provides a brief summary of Corbin’s life, then discusses five topics: Corbin’s Socratic approach to the classroom and his introduction of the caselaw method at Yale; Corbin’s analytic approach, which was inspired by Hohfeld and is illustrated by Corbin’s definitions of “contract” and “consideration”; Corbin’s evolutionary theory of the common law, his understanding of the relationship between law and social mores, and his insistence that legal rules always be treated as mere “working rules”; Corbin’s occasional appeal, despite his general aversion …

The Domains Of Loyalty: Relationships Between Fiduciary Obligation And Intrinsic Motivation, Deborah A. Demott

Faculty Scholarship

Recent scholarly inquiry into fiduciary law predominantly focuses on whether the subject is a coherent field and not a piecemeal assortment of doctrinal detail. This Article looks to the future and to relationships between the formal domain of fiduciary law and other factors that shape conduct. These include intrinsic motivation, markets for professional services, and forces like the operation of reputation. The Article demonstrates that looking across domains, from the legal to the extralegal, casts in sharp relief the reasons why fiduciary law is distinctive. These stem from the specific qualities of relationships to which fiduciary law applies, as well …

The Cost Of Guilty Breach: Willful Breach In M&A Contracts, Theresa Arnold, Amanda Dixon, Madison Whalen Sherrill, Hadar Tanne, Mitu Gulati

Faculty Scholarship

The traditional framework of United States private law that every first-year student learns is that contracts and torts are different realms—contracts is the realm of strict liability and torts of fault. Contracts, we learn from the writings of Justice Holmes and Judge Posner, are best viewed as options; they give parties the option to perform or pay damages. The question we ask is whether, in the real world, that is indeed how contracting parties view things. Using a dataset made up of one thousand mergers and acquisitions (M&A) contracts and thirty in-depth interviews with M&A lawyers, we find that there …

Sneak In Contracts, Shmuel I. Becher, Uri Benoliel

Georgia Law Review

Consumer contracts are a pervasive legal tool that govern
many of our daily activities. Yet, consumer contracts are
routinely modified by businesses after customers accept them.
Common modifications include, for example, a change in fees,
alteration of a dispute resolution clause, or revision to the firm’s
privacy policy. In fact, unilateral modifications can affect
virtually every aspect of a contract.
While the literature widely discusses the problem of ex ante
consent to consumer contracts, it does not adequately address
the problem of ex post consent to unilateral modifications. But
the practice of unilateral changes to consumer form contracts
comes with …

Would Reasonable People Endorse A ‘Content-Neutral’ Law Of Contract?, Aditi Bagchi

Faculty Scholarship

This essay raises two challenges to Peter Benson’s compelling new account of contract law. First, I argue that Benson’s use of the concept of reasonableness goes beyond the Rawlsian account to require that we impute to others a capacity to transcend their contingent circumstances in the context of contractual choice. In fact, our choices in contract are driven by external contingencies and it is only reasonable to take those constrains on other people’s choices into account. Second, I contest Benson’s related claim that contract law should be, and largely is, content-neutral. I argue to the contrary that the justice of …

Getting Real About Procedure: Changing How We Think, Write And Teach About American Civil Procedure, Suzette M. Malveaux

Publications

No abstract provided.

Error-Resilient Consumer Contracts, Danielle D'Onfro

Scholarship@WashULaw

When firms contracting with consumers make mistakes, people get hurt. Inaccurate billing, misapplied payments, and similar problems push lucky consumers into kafkaesqe customer-service queues and unlucky ones off the financial cliff. Despite significant regulatory interventions, firms contracting with consumers continue to struggle to accurately bill customers, update accounts, and process payments. Firms largely rely on technology, especially databases and software, to discharge these servicing obligations. This technology must accommodate firms’ innovations in their contracts, shifting regulations, and unpredictable consumer behavior. Given the complexity of servicing, the technology will inevitably produce mistakes even when firms invest in technology. When firms skimp …