Phillips Petroleum v. Shutts involved a lawsuit by a class of gas royalty owners (folks who own the rights to income from gas produced on land) against an oil company. The royalty owners brought their class action in Kansas state court, alleging that Phillips Petroleum had not paid them on time, and so they
rhetoric
Outrage and the Class Action
It’s no secret that plaintiffs often choose cases, not so much because of the merits of the rulings, but because of the outrage they can generate. (Indeed, some plaintiffs’ counsel openly discuss how they picture either how a particular cross-examination or closing argument will sound.)
As it turns out, a nine-year old lecture by Cass…
Classic Scholarship – The Class Action Device in Antisegregation Cases
This month, in our piece of classic scholarship looks at an old University of Chicago Law Review comment on how to use class action. The Class Action Device in Antisegregation Cases, 20 U. Chi. L. Rev. 577 (1953). (JSTOR link here.)
The Comment takes a plaintiffs’ view of how to use class actions to…
Rhetoric – Advocacy Revalued
Law professor Geoffrey Hazard is well-known in legal and academic circles as an expert on civil procedure and legal ethics. So when he (with co-author Dana Remus) writes an article on the use of rhetoric in civil litigation, it’s well worth reading, even if it never mentions class actions specifically.
The problem that Hazard…
Supreme Court Hands Loss to Bayer, But Good Opinion to Defendants
Earlier today, the Supreme Court issued its opinion in Smith v. Bayer Corp. In a unanimous opinion authored by Justice Kagan, it held that a federal court cannot enjoin a state court from re-litigating a class action that had been denied certification in federal court. In doing so, it barred a tactic that…
Rhetoric – Entities, Entrepreneurs, and Rogues
As I’ve discussed before, there are few areas of law as polarized as class actions. The plaintiff and defense bars in class-action law rarely agree on anything, from the proper scope of Rule 23 to what a class action is in the first place. And I’m not the only one to have noticed this divide. …
Restricting Objectors and Open-Minded Strategy
Last year, class-action plaintiffs’ lawyer (and author of the New Jersey Appellate Law Blog) Bruce Greenberg published an article in the St. John’s Law Review on "Restricting Objectors." (The cite is 84 St. John’s L. Rev. 949; the Law Review appears to be a few issues behind in posting articles on its site.) Not…
Rhetoric and Class Actions – The Pathetic Appeal
As this blog has progressed, I’ve posted a few entries about how rhetoric and class actions interact. I’ve mostly assumed that everyone had a least a basic grounding in rhetorical techniques. But let’s back up briefly. I’ll start with a recommendation: if you’e interested in practical rhetoric, pick up Jay Heinrich’s Thank You For …
Rhetoric – Does Size Matter?
When the Supreme Court granted certioriari in Dukes v. Wal-Mart Inc., the Vanderbilt Law Review grabbed a number of law professors who study mass torts and asked them to contribute essays to its En Banc feature. One of these–Richard Nagareda’s Common Answers for Class Certification–was one of the most interesting articles published…
Rhetoric and Class Actions – Shorter Works
Class-action lawyers like long fact sections with many details.
But Ernest Hemingway wrote a moving story using just six words:
For sale: baby shoes, never worn.
And Scottish comic-book team Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely told a famous superhero’s origin in only eight:
Sometimes, if they’re chosen properly, just a few words are…