Punitive Damages: New Twists in Torts

1991 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 269-291 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clarence C. Walton
Keyword(s):  
Tort Law ◽  
The United States ◽  
Punitive Damage ◽  
Punitive Damages ◽  
The Public ◽  
Public Purse ◽  
Local Organizations ◽  
Compensation Systems ◽  
Tort System ◽  
American Law

While jurisprudence in the United States has been cast in the general mode of the English common law, modifications over time have produced enough significant variations that American law has a distinctive quality. To illustrate: The exclusionary rule in criminal cases prohibiting the use of evidence (even from reliable witnesses) acquired through illegal search, is not followed in Britain—or, for that matter, in Canada, Germany, and Israel. The punitive-damage concept (PD) in tort law is also a jurisprudential novelty. Punitive damages are imposed in addition to compensatory awards given to tort victims to warn manufacturers and sellers to be careful in their safety and marketing practices. PDs are society's warning signals: Seller beware! Because they are one of society's ways to protect itself, PDs have recently been considered as fines which, to prevent excesses, should be under the rubric of the Eighth Amendment.This essay introduces new elements into the discussion on torts by hypothesizing (1) PDs are fines which belong to the public purse; (2) that expenditures from the public purse should be given to local organizations (like orphanages and inner-city hospitals) which provide vital services for those unable to pay; and (3) that the victim (or the victim's survivor) has a right to designate what local organizations should benefit from his or her punitive-damage awards.The hypotheses require reexamination of the concepts of citizenship, community, and work, respectively.Tort law is an integral part of the American law of injuries, a body of judicial doctrine and legislation and a set of legal arrangements that also include compensation systems and safety legislation. It would have been unthinkable as recently as twenty-five years ago that the tort system would become a source of bitter contention. Today, however, it generates sharp rhetoric and dramatic proposals for change to address its contested problems, as well as strong views in favor of continuing the system essentially intact so as not to disturb its contended benefits.

scholarly journals The Law of Obligations

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Lobban
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Tort Law ◽  
The United States ◽  
Contract Law ◽  
Public Law ◽  
The Other ◽  
Economic Changes ◽  
American Law ◽  
Anglo American ◽  
Unifying Principles

The Anglo-American law of obligations was profoundly reshaped in the two centuries after 1800, driven by social and economic changes, and changes in legal institutions and doctrines. In contract law, nineteenth-century jurists increasingly sought to put the rules of law into a coherent rational framework (inspired by continental models resting on will theory), though they soon found that this theory could not explain many contractual doctrines. In tort law, jurists were also divided over whether unifying principles underlying tort could be uncovered, with formalist efforts to find such principles being challenged by Realists who argued that tort was in effect ‘public law in disguise’. The quest for underlying principles was also pursued by scholars of unjust enrichment, first in the United States and subsequently in England; though as in the other areas of obligations, by the end of the twentieth century, there was no consensus on whether this was possible.

The Positive Economic Theory of Tort Law

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark F. Grady
Keyword(s):  
Economic Theory ◽  
Tort Law ◽  
The United States ◽  
Positive Theory ◽  
Norman Conquest ◽  
Legal Rules ◽  
System P ◽  
Tort System ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Fresh Insight

Tort law is part of the common law that originated in England after the Norman Conquest and spread throughout the world, including to the United States. It is judge-made law that allows people who have been injured by others to sue those who harmed them and collect damages in proper cases. Since its early origins, tort law has evolved considerably and has become a full-fledged “grown order,” like the economy, and can best be understood by positive theory, also like the economy. Economic theories of tort have developed since the early 1970s, and they too have evolved over time. Their objective is to generate fresh insight about the purposes and the workings of the tort system. The basic thesis of the economic theory is that tort law creates incentives for people to minimize social cost, which is comprised of the harm produced by torts and the cost of the precautions necessary to prevent torts. This thesis, intentionally simple, generates many fresh insights about the workings and effects of the tort system and even about the actual legal rules that judges have developed. In an evolved grown order, legal rules are far less concrete than most people would expect though often very clear in application. Beginning also in the 1970s, legal philosophers have objected to the economic theory of tort and have devised philosophical theories that compete. The competition, moreover, has been productive because it has spurred both sides to revise and improve their theories and to seek better to understand the law. Tort law is diverse, applicable to many different activities and situations, so developing a positive theory about it is both challenging and rewarding.

scholarly journals Of Medicine, Race, and American Law: The Bubonic Plague Outbreak of 1900

1988 ◽  
Vol 13 (03) ◽  
pp. 447-513 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles McClain
Keyword(s):  
The United States ◽  
Bubonic Plague ◽  
Court Records ◽  
Circuit Court ◽  
Surgeon General ◽  
The Public ◽  
Health Authorities ◽  
Northern District ◽  
American Law ◽  
Complex Events

In March of 1900 several cases of bubonic plague were discovered in San Francisco's Chinatom. In response the health authorities, at the instance of the Surgeon General of the United States, sought to implement a series of extraordinarily coercive measures aimed at the city's Asian inhabitants. The measures provoked an uproar among the Chinese, and they determined to challenge them in the federal Circuit Court for the Northern District of California. This essay, based on extensive research in court records, the archives of the U.S. Public Health Service, and press accounts in English and Chinese, documents the complex events that gave rise to the cases of Wong Wai v. Williamson and Jew Ho v. Williamson and the cases themselves as they unfolded in the courts. The cases raised new and dificult questions of fact and of law and tested as few other cases have before or since a court's capacity to act as arbiter between individual rights (and the rights of an ostracized minority at that) and the public interest in a period of acute health emergency.

Product Liability: Florida Jury Finds that Cigarettes Caused Smoker's Disease

2000 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 197-197
Author(s):  
Matthew Morton
Keyword(s):  
Health Risks ◽  
Tobacco Industry ◽  
Product Liability ◽  
Class Action ◽  
Punitive Damage ◽  
Punitive Damages ◽  
The Public ◽  
Former Smokers ◽  
Compensatory Damages ◽  
First Time

On April 7,2000 a Florida jury ordered the tobacco industry to pay $12.7 million in compensatory damages to three former smokers who were chosen to represent hundreds of thousands of Florida residents in an unprecedented class action lawsuit. The decision not only marks the first time that a jury has found on behalf of smokers in a class action lawsuit, it also sets the stage for a huge punitive damage award against the industry. The awards followed a finding by the same jury last July that the cigarette manufacturers have “acted with reckless disregard” and “engaged in extreme and outrageous conduct” while conspiring to mislead the public about the health risks of smoking. These previous findings make it likely that there will be punitive damages levied against the tobacco companies when the jury reconvenes in May.

No-Fault Versus Strict Liability Compensation Systems in Medical Malpractice Law in Vietnam in Comparision with Belgium, France, and England

2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Thi Bao Anh Nguyen
Keyword(s):  
Medical Malpractice ◽  
Strict Liability ◽  
Tort Law ◽  
Compensation System ◽  
Compensation Systems ◽  
Malpractice Law ◽  
Tort System ◽  
Pain And Suffering ◽  
Fault Compensation ◽  
Uniform Manner

Abstract Medical malpractice is a form of professional negligence and such a negligence forms part of the law of tort. As an alternative to the tort or fault-based system in medical malpractice, a no-fault compensation system has been viewed as having the potential to overcome problems inherent in the tort system. This is through the provision of fair, speedy and adequate compensation for medically injured victims. A no-fault compensation system allows patients to be compensated without proof of provider’s fault or negligence. Similar to no-fault schemes, the strict liability system is not fault-based although it belongs to tort law. Successful claims are paid in a uniform manner using a fixed benefits schedule and include compensation for both economic and non-economic (pain and suffering losses) without the necessity of proving negligence through a tort claim. This study focuses on the comparison of no-fault compensation systems versus strict liability systems between Vietnam to Belgium, France, and England. The distinctions in Belgium, France, and England can be the lessons for the development of a no-fault compensation system as well as strict liability system in Vietnam.

International Sanctions and American Law

1925 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
pp. 505-516 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Whitla Stinson
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
British Empire ◽  
The United States ◽  
Public Law ◽  
The Public ◽  
General Law ◽  
Law Of Nations ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
American Law ◽  
Constitutional Jurisprudence

Mr. J. Holmes had told us that the object of the study of law is to make the prophecies of precedent more precise, to generalize them into a thoroughly connected system; that that object is “the prediction of the incidence of the public force through the instrumentalities of courts.” The framers of our constitutional jurisprudence were clearly concerned with the incidence of just principles upon governmental powers. Kent declares that when the United States ceased to be a part of the British Empire, and assumed the character of an independent nation, they became subject to that system of rules, which reason, morality and custom had established among the civilized nations of Europe, as their public law. It was recognized that the law of nations prescribed “what one nation may do without giving just cause for war, and what of consequence, another may or ought to permit without being considered as having sacrificed its honor, its dignity, or its independence.” Story avers that the general law of nations is “equally obligatory upon all sovereigns and all states." It is "the umpire and security of their rights and peace,” declared Jefferson. It is a law which “binds all nations,” declared the Supreme Court of the United States in 1794.

Pills and the Public Purse

1981 ◽  
Author(s):  
Milton Silverman ◽  
Philip R. Lee ◽  
Mia Lydecker
Keyword(s):  
The Public ◽  
Public Purse

Verán ustedes las chozas más humildes. El discurso de pobreza en la diplomacia pública cardenista dirigida a Estados Unidos

2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 255-281
Author(s):  
Sylvia Dümmer Scheel
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
New Deal ◽  
Public Diplomacy ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Poor ◽  
The Face ◽  
The Government ◽  
Lazaro Cardenas ◽  
The New Deal

El artículo analiza la diplomacia pública del gobierno de Lázaro Cárdenas centrándose en su opción por publicitar la pobreza nacional en el extranjero, especialmente en Estados Unidos. Se plantea que se trató de una estrategia inédita, que accedió a poner en riesgo el “prestigio nacional” con el fin de justificar ante la opinión pública estadounidense la necesidad de implementar las reformas contenidas en el Plan Sexenal. Aprovechando la inusual empatía hacia los pobres en tiempos del New Deal, se construyó una imagen específica de pobreza que fuera higiénica y redimible. Ésta, sin embargo, no generó consenso entre los mexicanos. This article analyzes the public diplomacy of the government of Lázaro Cárdenas, focusing on the administration’s decision to publicize the nation’s poverty internationally, especially in the United States. This study suggests that this was an unprecedented strategy, putting “national prestige” at risk in order to explain the importance of implementing the reforms contained in the Six Year Plan, in the face of public opinion in the United States. Taking advantage of the increased empathy felt towards the poor during the New Deal, a specific image of hygienic and redeemable poverty was constructed. However, this strategy did not generate agreement among Mexicans.

27. Immigration and other evils: A profile of Dr. C. K. Clarke and the eugenics movement in Canada

2007 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 41
Author(s):  
L. Lee
Keyword(s):  
Mentally Ill ◽  
The United States ◽  
Cornell University ◽  
The Public ◽  
Canadian Population ◽  
Historical Figures ◽  
The Social ◽  
Eugenics Movement ◽  
The Government ◽  
Mental Defectives

Dr. C.K. Clarke (1857-1924) was one of Canada’s most prominent psychiatrists. He sought to improve the conditions of asylums, helped to legitimize psychiatry and established formal training for nurses. At the beginning of the 20th Century, Canada experienced a surge of immigration. Yet – as many historians have shown – a widespread anti-foreigner sentiment within the public remained. Along with many other members of the fledgling eugenics movement, Clarke believed that the proportion of “mental defectives” was higher in the immigrant population than in the Canadian population and campaigned to restrict immigration. He appealed to the government to track immigrants and deport them once they showed signs of mental illness. Clarke’s efforts lead to amendments to the Immigration Act in 1919, which authorized deportation of people who were not Canadian-born, regardless of how many years that had been in Canada. This change applied not only to the mentally ill but also to those who could no longer work due to injury and to those who did not follow social norms. Clarke is a fascinating example of how we judge historical figures. He lived in a time where what we now think of as xenophobia was a socially acceptable, even worthy attitude. As a leader in eugenics, therefore, he was a progressive. Other biographers have recognized Clarke’s racist opinions, some of whom justify them as keeping with the social values of his era. In further exploring Clarke’s interest in these issues, this paper relies on his personal scrapbooks held in the CAMH archives. These documents contain personal papers, poems and stories that proclaim his anti-Semitic and anti-foreigner views. Whether we allow his involvement in the eugenics movement to overshadow his accomplishments or ignore his racist leanings to celebrate his memory is the subject of ongoing debate. Dowbiggin IR. Keeping America Sane: Psychiatry and Eugenics in the United States and Canada 1880-1940. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1997. McLaren A. Our Own Master Race: Eugenics in Canada 1885-1945. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1990. Roberts B. Whence They Came: Deportation from Canada 1900-1935. Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press, 1988.

Rediscovering Blackstone: wpływ Williama Blackstone’a na rozwój amerykańskiej nauki prawa w recepcji Alberta W. Alschulera

2017 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 175-185
Author(s):  
Edyta Sokalska
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
Common Law ◽  
The United States ◽  
Law School ◽  
Large Measure ◽  
American Colonies ◽  
Late 18Th Century ◽  
American Law ◽  
The Common

The reception of common law in the United States was stimulated by a very popular and influential treatise Commentaries on the Laws of England by Sir William Blackstone, published in the late 18th century. The work of Blackstone strengthened the continued reception of the common law from the American colonies into the constituent states. Because of the large measure of sovereignty of the states, common law had not exactly developed in the same way in every state. Despite the fact that a single common law was originally exported from England to America, a great variety of factors had led to the development of different common law rules in different states. Albert W. Alschuler from University of Chicago Law School is one of the contemporary American professors of law. The part of his works can be assumed as academic historical-legal narrations, especially those concerning Blackstone: Rediscovering Blackstone and Sir William Blackstone and the Shaping of American Law. Alschuler argues that Blackstone’s Commentaries inspired the evolution of American and British law. He introduces not only the profile of William Blackstone, but also examines to which extent the concepts of Blackstone have become the basis for the development of the American legal thought.

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