13203 research outputs found
Sort by
The False Allure of Settlement Pressure
Get PDFThe threat of “blackmail” or “in terrorem” settlements have shaped the law, leading courts to conclude that if the plaintiff does not appear likely to win the case, then the litigation should be halted at an early stage. This Article questions the established logic of settlement pressure. After clarifying the concept and presenting the strongest case for it, I show that it cannot serve as the basis for wide-ranging civil procedure doctrines. Doing so has perverse results, such as privileging the defendant’s idiosyncratic tastes and helping corporate managers hide important facts from their shareholders. In addition, settlement pressure is not the serious problem that it has been characterized as: rather than being blackmail, it is more analogous to litigation insurance or hiring expensive attorneys. The doctrines based on settlement pressure, therefore, lack a sound justification, and settlement pressure is not a dire threat that the law must step in to counteract. Even in the context of class actions, the most favorable circumstances for settlement pressure arguments, a case where the plaintiffs seem unlikely to prevail should be allowed to proceed, provided it sets out a coherent, bona fide class claim. A number of prominent decisions, such as Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. Dukes, ultimately depend on settlement pressure, and therefore ought to be reconsidered
Martin, Ghana, and Global Legal Studies
Get PDFThis brief essay uses global legal studies to reconsider Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.\u27s activism after Gayle v. Browder. During this undertheorized portion of King\u27s career, the civil rights leader traveled the world and gained a greater appreciation for comparative legal and political analysis. This essay explores King\u27s first trip abroad and demonstrates how King\u27s close study of Kwame Nkrumah\u27s approaches to law reform helped to lay the foundation for watershed moments in King\u27s own life. In To Redeem the Soul of America: The Southern Christian Leadership Conference and Martin Luther King, Jr., renowned civil rights scholar and author, Adam Fairclough, offered penetrating and important assessments of Dr. King\u27s civil rights activism from 1957 to 1959. Fairclough asserted that the Montgomery Bus Boycott captured the world\u27s imagination, with King becoming a figure of national and international significance, easily overshadowing the South\u27s other black leadership. Yet after the U.S. Supreme Court\u27s decision in Gayle v. Browder, Fairclough rightfully notes, King attempted, but was unable, to spark Montgomery-style, mass protests elsewhere. The minister\u27s newly established Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) also had serious difficulty in sustaining a formidable political agenda. King\u27s inexperience with organizational management, and more importantly, the organization\u27s loose, top-down structure undermined the SCLC\u27s effectiveness and eventually led to the group\u27s decline. The late 1950s, in Fairclough\u27s view, were the civil rights leader\u27s fallow years. In the wake of Gayle, the racial icon traveled the globe. In 1957, King flew to Accra to celebrate Ghana\u27s independence as a guest of Prime Minister Kwame Nkrumah. But King\u27s first trip abroad took him far beyond the festivities in Accra. The minister\u27s itinerary was stacked with other foreign capitals. King trekked across West Africa, stopping over in Monrovia, Dakar, and Kano, and he crisscrossed Western Europe, exploring Lisbon, London, Paris, Rome, and Geneva. In 1959, King made a pilgrimage to the land of Gandhi at the request of India\u27s Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. And again, King used the foreign leader\u27s invitation as a chance to tour the world. Before King returned to the United States, he ventured to Karachi, Athens, Beirut, Jerusalem, and Cairo. King\u27s overseas travels allowed him to participate in major global events, provided him respite from the day-today toils of the Southern struggle, and gave him the ability to forge stronger transnational ties with other liberation movements. And while King\u27s foreign stays are underappreciated, his close study of these nations\u27 legal and political systems are even more so. These travels created new opportunities for the recently minted Ph.D. to examine foreign law and affairs and apply the lessons he learned abroad to the burgeoning civil rights at home. Martin, Ghana, and Global Legal Studies is part of a larger project which details King\u27s interest in comparative law and politics. This brief essay examines how King used Nkrumah\u27s early approach to constitutional politics in the former Gold Coast to frame his own commitment to the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Such a reappraisal of King\u27s experiences in Ghana, in turn, offers a fresh understanding of King\u27s fallow years
The Global Person: Pig-Human Embryos, Personhood, and Precision Medicine
Get PDFChimeras, in the form of pig-human embryos engineered by CRISPR-Cas9 and other biotechnologies, have been created as potential sources of organs for transplantation. Against that background, and in an era of precision medicine, this Article examines the concept of the global genetically modified person and asks whether humanness and personhood are being eroded, or finding new boundaries in intellectual property and constitutional law
Increasing Transparency in the US Tax Court
Get PDFTransparency is a widely accepted judicial norm because it increases accountability. Access to U.S. Tax Court documents has long differed from access to the documents of other courts. For example, the Tax Court does not participate in PACER (Public Access to Court Electronic Records). This essay discusses some of the ways in which access to Tax Court documents has been restricted; areas in which the Tax Court has increased transparency over the years; upcoming changes; and where increased transparency is still needed, such as with respect to case statistics
Is Zero Tolerance the Solution? Using Non-Punitive Policies in the Workplace to Reduce Domestic Violence
Get PDFPrivate International Law\u27s Shadow Contribution to the Question of Informal Transnational Authority
Get PDFThis contribution attempts to approach informal transnational authority through the lens of critical private international law. It subscribes to the underlying idea within this volume, according to which the workings of the highly complex dynamic between the public and the private are cardinal to understanding contemporary global shifts in transnational authority, placing the rise of informal transnational authority at its epicenter. Expressions of private authority in the global arena take place outside formal legal discourse. Capital expanding beyond state boundaries has organized its own forms of authority, which arbitrate, enforce and legitimize new processes and structures beyond the state. To understand the ways in which this has taken place, the methodological dimensions of private international law, which have been central to these processes, require closer scrutiny
Transnational Private Authority in the Sphere of Education
Get PDFIt seems that an ever-shorter temporal rhythm is gaining ground with the end of the short twentieth century, \u27I challenging the modern temporal horizon. The emerging economy relies on a continuous stream of scientific and technical knowledge closely related to information technology and networks. The increasing compression of both time and space has major consequences for the governance of the economy and the setting of authoritative standards in this sphere. This paper explores the consequences for education and training and its governance, where continuing education has become crucial. It studies the setting of authoritative standards in the field of information and communication technology (ICT) training, which has become vital for the knowledgebased economy. I will show how the standardization of these trainings by way of third-party certifiers establishes a mode of private coordination between companies, sectors, and across national borders. A closer examination of competing claims to authority in this field provides interesting insights into the enabling conditions of this mode of coordination and also brings a geopolitical dimension to the fore
The Globalization of United States Debt: The Real Impact of China\u27s Rise as a Creditor State
Get PDFIn this Note, I seek to answer a simple question: By owning a large quantity of United States debt, can a foreign country influence United States policies at home or abroad? To answer, I apply scholarship in financial leverage theory to China-the largest foreign holder of U.S. debt. As a result, I find no plausible threat of China using financial leverage against the United States.
Instead, I argue that the true impact of China\u27s rise as a creditor state has been its ability to fundamentally undervalue its currency by investing in the sovereign debt of foreign nations. Such monetary policies run contrary to China\u27s obligations with the International Monetary Fund and expose the need for a more effective international enforcement mechanism for intentional currency devaluations. While the World Trade Organization\u27s Dispute Settlement Board may provide an alternative solution, I believe China\u27s emergence as a trading power will insulate it from international punishment.
In the end, I look to the market, or global invisible hand for solace. I argue that over the long term the global market will act as a regulator and will rein in China\u27s currency policies as the country liberalizes its markets and begins to shift away from a traditional export-driven economy
Circumvention Medical Tourism and Cutting Edge Medicine: The Case of Mitochondrial Replacement Therapy
Get PDF\u27Medical Tourism is the travel of patients from a home country to a destination country for the primary purpose of receiving health care. Circumvention Tourism is a sub-type of such travel where the motivation is circumventing a domestic prohibition on accessing a medical service. This Article focuses on such circumvention tourism for cutting-edge medicine. I use the recently reported case of travel to Mexico for Mitochondrial Replacement Therapy as a springboard for examining the legal and ethical issues raised by the practice and to discuss restrictive regulation in place in the United States.
This Article derives in part from the George P. Smith Lecture given at the Maurer School Law, Indiana University on March 22, 2016
US Design Patent Law: A Historical Look at the Design Patent/Copyright Interface
No full textProfessor Janis\u27 contribution, Chapter 10, is titled: US Design Patent Law: A Historical Look at the Design Patent/Copyright Interface. It is co-authored by Jason J. Du Monthttps://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/facbooks/1194/thumbnail.jp