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Asymmetric Empirical Similarity
Get PDFThe paper offers a formal model of analogical legal reasoning and takes the model to data. Under the model, the outcome of a new case is a weighted average of the outcomes of prior cases. The weights capture precedential influence and depend on fact similarity (distance in fact space) and precedential authority (position in the judicial hierarchy). The empirical analysis suggests that the model is a plausible model for the time series of U.S. maritime salvage cases. Moreover, the results evince that prior cases decided by inferior courts have less influence than prior cases decided by superior courts
Mass Litigation Governance in the Post-Class Action Era: The Problems and Promise of Non-removable State Actions in Multi-district Litigation
Get PDFGiven a string of decisions restricting the use and availability of the class action device, the world of mass litigation may well be moving into a post-class action era. In this era, newer devices of aggregation—perhaps principally among them multi-district litigation (“MDL”)—increasingly will be called upon to meet the age-old mass litigation goal of achieving global peace of numerous claims arising out of a related, widespread harm. Indeed, coordination of pretrial proceedings in the MDL frequently facilitates the achievement of this peace, given the reality that cases, once consolidated in the MDL, often settle en masse.
However, one clear obstacle to the achievement of aggregate peace in the MDL, one that also plagues the achievement of that peace in the class action world, is our federal system of substantive and procedural law. In the MDL context, the problem arises because litigation involving state-law claims and non-diverse parties, which are not removable from state court, cannot be transferred to the MDL court. Despite their prevalence, little scholarly attention has been devoted to non-removable state-court actions in MDL. The few responses to this issue have largely focused upon the efficiencies that could be gained through increased, and perhaps total, consolidation of all related cases or, short of consolidation, through heightened coordination of pre-trial proceedings between state and federal judges.
This article questions whether these responses have led reform proposals in the wrong direction, and instead takes a different view. Rather than argue for increased consolidation, I offer for further consideration the possible ways in which the happenstantial existence of parallel tracks of related state and federal cases actually hold promise, if properly harnessed, as mechanisms for achieving the goals of aggregate litigation and for disciplining the contours of global settlements of mass disputes. In particular, I explore the possibility that the existence of parallel state and federal cases—frequently viewed as an obstacle to global resolution of claims unable to be consolidated in a single forum—may well fortuitously provide an opportunity to achieve the sorts of mass litigation resolution envisioned but unsuccessfully attempted in the class action context. In so doing, this article adds new thoughts and theories to the specific debate regarding parallel state and federal claims in MDL, as well as to the larger debate about mass litigation governance in a post-class action world
Global Rules for Global Health: Why We Need An Independent, Impartial WHO
Get PDFOver the past few years the World Health Organization (WHO) has been undergoing a significant reform process. The immediate trigger was a budget crisis in 2010 that spurred massive lay-offs at the global agency. But at a more fundamental level, deeper systematic changes in global health governance have made reform imperative. While WHO reform draws relatively little attention outside diplomatic circles in Geneva, at stake are critical issues that will impact public health everywhere. This article’s key messages are: Recent outbreaks of MERS highlight the need for a global response to infectious disease The WHO has had a crucial role in developing rapid information sharing on new infectious threats and fair arrangements for access to drugs and vaccines and to research and development The WHO is the only international agency that can broker such global rules but is badly underfunded to perform this core function The MERS outbreaks offer an opportunity to reform WHO financin
The President’s National Security Agenda Curtailing Ebola, Safeguarding the Future
Get PDFA clear lesson of the Ebola epidemic in West Africa is the need for strong public health systems globally, including in the United States. Ebola has highlighted the dangers of weak public health systems, from the immense shortage of health workers in West Africa to the budget cuts at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In response to Ebola and the broader threat of infectious disease, President Obama has proposed a $6.2 billion supplemental funding request to Congress. The supplemental would surge resources for containing and treating Ebola in West Africa -- including a reserve of funds to enable a robust, flexible response going forward--enhance prevention and detection of, and response to, Ebola in the United States, and buttress U.S. and partner country health systems to respond rapidly and flexibly to all infectious disease hazards in the future.
The additional resources the supplemental would devote to the ongoing Ebola crisis is critically important. So is the supplemental request\u27s funding to prepare for the future, including developing treatment centers in the United States that would provide advanced care and isolation facilities, and funding for research and development for vaccines and medicines for Ebola and other novel infections. The request would also provide the first significant batch of funding to the Global Health Security Agenda, which President Obama unveiled in February 2014. The Global Health Security Agenda takes an all-hazards approach to building greater global capacity to prevent, detect, and respond to infectious diseases, from zoonotic diseases and antibiotic resistant bacteria to biosecurity and bioterror threats.
From environmental degradation to increased human-animal interchange, the threats are only increasing. Strong public health systems at home and globally are our best defense. Congress should support the President\u27s supplemental funding request, furthering a bipartisan U.S. tradition of support for global health, continuing U.S. global leadership in the Ebola response, and preparing our country and our world for disease threats of the future
Russia’s Contract Arbitrage
Get PDFUkraine is poised to restructure its debt, but Russia may hold the best cards in the negotiation. Russia bought $3 billion in Ukrainian Eurobonds in late 2013 to prop up a political ally, since-deposed. As Russian President Vladimir Putin himself has pointed out, these bonds have unique terms that let Russia call for early repayment, putting it ahead of Ukraine’s private creditors. Meanwhile, Russia and its proxies hold enough bonds to block a restructuring vote or hold out, sticking more losses on other creditors. Russia has refused to restructure the bonds in the Paris Club of government-to-government creditors, claiming that they are commercial debt. In all, Russia has effectively arbitraged the prevailing sovereign debt regime, where public and private lending to sovereigns are separated by legal form and restructuring institutions. Because the bonds in question are governed by English law, the U.K. Parliament can limit the scope for abuse by making them unenforceable. Such legislation has ample precedent, and would compare favorably to traditional sanctions. Uniquely among sanctions, it would not only punish Russia, but could deliver immediate financial relief for Ukraine
Voluntary Commitments as Emerging Instruments in International Environmental Law
Get PDFToday we confront a critical environmental challenge: how to protect the human environment for ourselves and future generations in the face of our unprecedented capacity to alter fundamental physical cycles with global and longrange implications for the robustness of our planet.
Scientists observe that we are leaving the stable Holocene Epoch, embarking on a new geological epoch, the Anthropocene, in which humans are the major force for change to the planet. There is evidence that the fundamental carbon and nitrogen cycles are accelerating significantly, and that the hydrological cycle is speeding up. The latter can lead to devastating impacts from more frequent and intense storms, floods and severe droughts. These developments inherently raise issues of intergenerational equity
Tax, Command -- or Nudge?: Evaluating the New Regulation
Get PDFThis Article compares for the first time the relative economic efficiency of “nudges” and other forms of behaviorally-inspired regulation against more common policy alternatives, such as taxes, subsidies, or traditional quantity regulation. Environmental economists and some legal commentators have dismissed nudge-type interventions out of hand for their failure to match the revenues and informational benefits taxes can provide. Similarly, writers in the law and economics tradition argue that fines are generally superior to non-pecuniary punishments.
Drawing on prior work in the choice-of-instruments literature, and contrary to this popular wisdom, I show that nudges may out-perform fines, other Pigouvian taxes, or subsidies in some contexts. These same arguments may also imply the superiority of some traditional “command and control” regulations over their tax or subsidy alternatives. I then apply these lessons to a set of contemporary policy controversies, such as New York City’s cap on beverage portion sizes, climate change, retirement savings, and charitable contributions
An Inference about Interference: A Surprising Application of Existing International Law to Inhibit Anti-Satellite Weapons
Get PDFThis article presents a thesis that most readers will find surprising, in an effort to develop a novel, simultaneous solution to three urgent, complex problems related to outer space. The three problems are: a) the technical fact that debris in outer space (the accumulated orbital junk produced by decades of space activities) has grown to present a serious hazard to safe and effective exploration and exploitation of space; b) the strategic fact that many countries (notably the United States, China and Russia, but others, too) continue to demonstrate a misguided interest in pursuing anti-satellite weapons, which can jeopardize the security of space; and c) the political fact that attempts to provide additional legal regulation of outer space (via new bilateral or multilateral international agreements) have failed, with little prospect for prompt conclusion of meaningful new accords.
The proposed solution is to adapt existing international law in an unforeseen way. Specifically, numerous current and historical arms control treaties provide for verification of parties’ compliance via “national technical means” (NTM) of verification, which prominently include satellite-based sensory and communications systems. These treaties routinely provide protection for those essential space assets by requiring parties to undertake “not to interfere” with NTM. The argument developed here is that additional tests in space of debris-creating anti-satellite weapons would already be illegal, even without the conclusion of any dedicated new treaty against further weaponization of space, because in the current crowded conditions of space, a new cloud of orbital debris would, sooner or later, impermissibly interfere with NTM satellites.
If sustained, this thesis can provide a new rationale for opposition to the development, testing, and use of anti-satellite weapons. It a legal reinforcement for the political instincts to avoid activities that further undercut the optimal usability of outer space, and it demonstrates how creative re-interpretation of existing legal provisions can promote the advancement of the rule of international law, even in circumstances where the articulation of new treaties is blocked
The Responsibility to Solve: The International Community and Protracted Refugee Situations
No full textToday, more than half of the world\u27s nearly twelve million refugees are in protracted refugee situations and the vast majority are not on the road to a durable solution. We contend that the international community has a legal and moral duty to seek solutions to long-term refugeehood. We call this duty the Responsibility to Solve (R2S) and present three arguments for its recognition. The first flows from the human harms imposed on those left in the limbo of ref ugee status for an extended period of time; the second focuses on principles that underlie the international refugee regime, of the centrality of solutions and the necessity of burden-sharing, and the third derives from peafic commitments of members of the UN General Assemby and signatories to the Refugee Convention to cooperate with UNHCR in seeking solutions. Recognition of R2S would provide a rhetoric and a moral fulcrum for renewed attention to solutions, in turn leading to enhanced funding for returns and local integration as well as more resettlement opportunities. It would also remind us that the principle of non-refoulement - while at the core of refugee protection - is not the ultimate goal of the international refugee regime. The responsibility of the international community to refugees is not simply to support camps or other arrangements that provide assistance to refugees; it is to end the condition of being a refugee
The Necessary and Proper Clauses
Get PDFThe Article\u27s main purpose is to provide a new and more accurate account of the origins of the Necessary and Proper Clauses. I refer to the Necessary and Proper “Clauses” rather than to the Necessary and Proper “Clause” to emphasize that the relevant constitutional text is comprised of three distinct provisions, only the first of which concerns the enumerated powers in Article I, Section 8: “Congress shall have Power . . . To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers” “Congress shall have Power . . . To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution . . . all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States” “Congress shall have Power . . . To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution . . . all other Powers vested by this Constitution in . . . any Department or Officer [of the United States]”
James Wilson was probably the most skilled and accomplished lawyer at the constitutional convention, and he appears to have devoted great care and attention to drafting these clauses for the Committee of Detail. Just why he drafted these clauses in this manner and how they influenced the subsequent development of American constitutional law are the primary subjects of this Article and of the broader research project of which it forms a part.
Among other things, the Article contends that the second Necessary and Proper Clause is particularly important for understanding the basic design of the Constitution. Unless it is treated as surplusage, this second clause indicates that the Constitution vests powers in the Government of the United States that are not merely identical or coextensive with the powers vested in Congress or other Departments or Officers of the United States. Because these additional powers are not specified or enumerated in the Constitution, they must be understood to be implied or unenumerated powers. The existence of implied or unenumerated powers is thus explicitly recognized by the precise text of the Constitution, much like the existence of unenumerated rights. Moreover, these “other powers” are distinct from the powers encompassed by the first Necessary and Proper Clause, which by its terms are limited to whatever instrumental powers are necessary and proper to carry into effect the “foregoing powers” vested in Congress by Article I, Section 8.
The second Necessary and Proper Clause was intended to achieve precisely this objective: to declare and to incorporate into the Constitution the doctrines of implied and inherent powers that Wilson, Robert Morris, Gouverneur Morris, Alexander Hamilton, and other prominent nationalists at the convention had advocated throughout the previous decade, and that Wilson, in particular, had defended on behalf of the Bank of North America in 1785. Recent scholarship on the Necessary and Proper Clause has tended to skip over this preconvention history, but it is essential for understanding why the nationalists were so committed to implied powers, and how they managed to ensure that the Constitution delegated both express and implied powers to the United States.
Part I introduces the central theme of the Article by distinguishing the main components of the Necessary and Proper Clause and by recalling some of the distinct roles these provisions played during the formative era of American constitutional law. Part II explores the intellectual origins of these provisions by examining the genesis of Resolution VI of the Virginia Plan and by tracing some of the important links between its key legislative proposal and the political philosophy of the nationalists. Part III takes a close look at the drafting history of the Necessary and Proper Clause in the Committee of Detail, focusing on the contributions of Wilson, which previous scholarship has frequently ignored. Drawing on extensive historical research, Part IV examines the eighteenth-century origins of the phrases “necessary and proper” and “all other powers,” demonstrating inter alia that these were familiar features of the sweeping clauses in corporate charters and other legal instruments with which Wilson and other framers were intimately acquainted.
In sum, the Article contends that the basic design of the Constitution and the influential debates over the scope of federal power that occurred during the founding era cannot be understood properly unless one recognizes that there are three Necessary and Proper Clauses, not merely one or two. The framers could easily have drafted a Necessary and Proper Clause that gave Congress the authority “to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in any Department or Officer of the United States.” The fact that they did not do so requires us to come to grips with the exact language they did adopt, and to ask a simple but penetrating question that goes to the heart of the framers’ constitutional design: What powers are vested by the Constitution in the Government of the United States? Whatever answer is given to this question, it cannot be adequate or sufficient merely to point to the enumerated powers of Congress in Article I, Section 8; the other powers vested by the Constitution in the Departments or Officers of the United States; and the instrumental powers to carry all of these powers into execution, which are given to Congress by the Necessary and Proper Clause. To remain faithful to the text, structure, and history of the Constitution, one must also provide a convincing account of the “other powers” vested by that Constitution in the Government of the United States, to which the second Necessary and Proper Clause refers