The NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw is running stories on excesses in the U.S. litigation system all week. (Pete Williams, “Civil wars: Class actions”, NBC News, Dec. 9; Jeannie Ohm, “Small town on the brink”, NBC News, Dec. 7 (Reeds Spring, Mo., brought to brink of bankruptcy by slip-and-fall verdict)).
Chronicling the high cost of our legal system
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Point of Law- State of play on Alien Tort litigationLee G. Dunst of Gibson Dunn, writing in the New York Law Journal (PDF), reviews recent cases and concludes that the courts are tending to dismiss most actions filed under the Alien Tort Claims Act (also known as the Alien... […]Walter Olson
- Higher punitives for wealthier malefactorsIra Stoll at Future of Capitalism has some doubts about that new $300 million tobacco verdict.... […]Walter Olson
- The price of New York ethics, cont'dIra Stoll, Future of Capitalism: The New York state attorney general, Andrew Cuomo, won't accept campaign contributions from people with matters before his office. Conveniently enough, however, he will, and does, accept such contributions from their lawyers, Bloomberg News reports.... […]Walter Olson
- USDC: Corrupt PA Judges Have Civil ImmunityA federal district court judge has just ruled that two disgraced Pennsylvania state court judges, Michael T. Conahan and Mark A. Ciavarella Jr., are protected by immunity from facing legal action for courtroom acts that consisted of over 6000 corrupt... […]Michael Krauss
- Around the web, November 23Tide turning against drug-pricing suits? Glaxo SmithKline beats back Kentucky case [Longstreth, AmLaw Daily] Court in Australia deems litigation funding pact improper as "unregistered managed investment scheme" [New Lawyer] Should docs be careful what they ask for? Michelle Mello... […]Walter Olson
- State of play on Alien Tort litigation
- Volokh
- NYT Policy on Illegally Acquired DocumentsThe NYT’s environmental blog, Dot Earth, covered the disclosure of e-mails and other files from the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit, noted that the files are available on various other website, but did not reproduce any files on its site. As Andrew Revkin explained in the post: The documents appear to have been acquired [...] […]Jonathan H. Adler
- Cato brief in McDonald v. ChicagoAvailable here. An outstanding brief, as one might expect. The bulk of the brief (21 pages, comprising Part I) shows that from the Founding Era into through the framing of the Fourteenth Amendment, national citizenship was paramount to state citizenship. Part II briefly argues that Slaughterhouse violated canons of constitutional construction–such as by in […]David Kopel
- NYT: “Wave of Debt Payments Facing U.S. Government”Wait, you mean we’re expected to pay all that money back? Copyright © 2009 This feed is for personal, non-commercial use only. The use of this feed on other websites breaches copyright. If this content is not in your news reader, it makes the page you are viewing an infringement of the copyright. (Digital Fingerprint: [...] […]Orin Kerr
- Puffery PlaintiffsThe NYT reports that more companies are challenging claims made in competitors’ ads. Companies that were once content to fight in grocery-store aisles and on television commercials are now choosing a different route — filing lawsuits and other formal grievances challenging their competitors’ claims. Longtime foes like Pantene and Dove, Science Diet and […]Jonathan H. Adler
- WaPo on Climate E-mails (and More)The Washington Post covers the disclosure of e-mails from the University of East Anglia Climate Research Unit — e-mails that appear to have been subject to an FOI request and that were either hacked by an outsider or stolen and released by an insider. In one e-mail, the center’s director, Phil Jones, writes Pennsylvania State University’s [...] […]Jonathan H. Adler
- NYT Policy on Illegally Acquired Documents
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