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Contract law resources, information, and news for the academic community.
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Weekly Top Ten
Posted on November 18, 2009TOP 10 Papers for Journal of Contracts & Commercial Law September 19, 2009 to November 18, 2009 Rank Downloads Paper Title 1 485 Foreclosure, Subprime Mortgage Lending, and the Mortgage Electronic Registration System Christopher Lewis Peterson, University of Utah -...
A Dickensian Contract
Posted on November 17, 2009I was amused to come across this 19th-century account of how "refined" people concluded contracts in the 19th century. It comes from Little Dorrit, by Charles Dickens (left). The exchange is between William Dorrit, recently released from the debtors prison...
Contract or Extortion?
Posted on November 16, 2009Last month, we speculated a bit on the relationship between blackmail and contract. Last week, Am Law Litigation Daily reported on a case in point. Plaintiff Robert Eringer is suing Prince Albert II of Monaco (pictured) for $60,000 that plaintiff...
AALS Program and Print Symposium on Teaching Contracts
Posted on November 14, 2009The AALS Section on Contracts invites you to attend our Annual Meeting program on New Approaches to Teaching Contracts: A Teach-In and solicits additional proposals for a companion symposium issue to appear in the Washington Law Review. The Topic: Responding...
AALS Program and Print Symposium on the Principles of the Law of Software Contracts
Posted on November 14, 2009The AALS Section on Commercial and Related Consumer Law invites you to attend our Annual Meeting program on The Principles of the Law of Software Contracts: A Phoenix Rising from the Ashes of Article 2B and UCITA? and solicits additional...
Now in Print: Catching Up (Round 1)
Posted on November 14, 2009I began drafting this post on September 22, but delayed sending it because several new items had just come across the transom. As other responsibilities kept interfering with returning my attention to this post, more time passed and more new...
A Corollary to the Totten Doctrine: Wilson v. CIA
Posted on November 13, 2009As previously discussed on the blog, the Totten doctrine requires dismissal of a case when "the very subject-matter" of the case is a state secret. Today's New York Times reports that the Second Circuit has dismissed Valerie Wilson's suit against...
Activision Avatar Update: I'm Just a.... Honky Tonk Woman
Posted on November 13, 2009We had previously mentioned Courtney Love?s threatened lawsuit against Activision for breach of contract ? namely, for creating a game ?Band Hero? that allows players to use a Kurt Cobain avatar to sing other artists? songs. Now, the band No...
Celebrities, Sex Tapes, Contracts and a Public Service Announcement [Also: JLo Gets a TRO]
Posted on November 11, 2009Last week, Carrie Prejean settled her lawsuit against Miss California USA (previously mentioned here and here) for next to nothing. Why? A sex tape surfaced. This week, ContractsProf Blog reads that Jennifer Lopez has sued her ex-husband for attempting to...
Weekly Top Ten
Posted on November 11, 2009TOP 10 Papers for Journal of Contracts & Commercial Law September 12, 2009 to November 11, 2009 Rank Downloads Paper Title 1 611 The Death of Big Law Larry E. Ribstein, University of Illinois College of Law, Date posted to...
Review Sessions
Posted on November 09, 2009I hold two two-hour review sessions for my four-credit contracts course. I spend most of the time just outlining the course for my students. The last half hour is spent walking them through a model answer to a practice essay...
Tribute to Contracts Prof., Richard E. Speidel
Posted on November 06, 2009The University of San Diego School of Law and the San Diego Law Review have announced the publication of a tribute issue for Professor Richard E. Speidel. The authors and their topics included in the tribute issue, in alphabetical order,...
Weekly Top Ten
Posted on November 04, 2009Following are the ten most-downloaded new papers from the SSRN Journal of Contract and Commercial Law for the 60 days ending November 4, 2009. Rank Downloads Paper Title 1 493 The Death of Big Law Larry E. Ribstein, University of...
Tribute to the Onion: 21 Stinking Years
Posted on November 03, 2009We often start or conclude our posts with something like "We couldn't make this up if we tried," and believe me we couldn't. So, I think it's only fitting that we recognize an organization that has been making stuff up...
Michelle Triola Marvin, Mother of Palimony, Dead at 76
Posted on November 02, 2009Michelle Triola Marvin, who lived with Lee Marvin for six years and then sued for her share of the income he had earned during the relationship, has died at the age of 76. Ms. Marvin was the plaintiff in the...
Contracts Icebreaker: Bowling
Posted on November 02, 2009There is nothing like teaching students in the first semester of law school. They are excited to be there and eager to learn. They are not shy about sharing their knowledge and their opinions, and crucially, as they have not...
Cosmic Contracts: Forever and Throughout the Universe
Posted on October 29, 2009Great article in today's WSJ titled "Lawyerese Goes Galactic as Contracts Try to Master the Universe." Read it. Here's a taste: Decked out in sequined black and gold dresses, Anne Harrison and the other women in her Bulgarian folk-singing group...
The New Yorker, Blackmail & Contract
Posted on October 29, 2009The October 19, 2009 issue of The New Yorker had an interesting little ?Talk of the Town? item by Lizzie Widdicombe on the whole David Letterman blackmail issue. Northwestern Law School?s James Lindgren (unfortunately not a ContractsProf) wonders why blackmail...
Wow: Does the UCC List Kidnapping and Murder as Buyer?s Remedies?
Posted on October 28, 2009This gets filed in ?Whacky Stories? and/or ?Chutzpah!? Apparently, buyer and N.Y. seller have a contract for the construction and sale of an ice cream truck for a price of $18,000. Buyer requests a refund; seller refuses. Buyer makes the...
Important Consumer Alert: Baby Einstein DVDs Might Not Make Kids Smarter
Posted on October 28, 2009Disney, which makes the Baby Einstein series of children?s DVDs, has ?set the record straight? with an announcement that it does not advertise the videos as ?educational.? Consumer rights groups had accused the company of deceptive advertising because there is...
Alan White on In-Class Exercises
Posted on October 26, 2009The Fifth in a Series of Posts by Guest Blogger, Alan White: Two of my favorite in-class exercises, one on unconscionability and one on remedies, highlight one of the fundamental difficulties of thinking like a lawyer. Law is incredibly frustrating...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Dunnebacke v. Pittman
Posted on October 26, 2009As I told my students, this Limerick makes history. It is the first time that a famous line of iambic pentameter has been slipped into a Limerick. The case to which it relates is a fairly simple one. Mr. Pittman...
Marcus Jordan: A Pair of Shoes, Family Ties and a University's Exclusive Contract
Posted on October 22, 2009The Orlando Sentinel reports this interesting contracts story, involving Michael Jordan's son: A pair of shoes could end up costing the University of Central Florida nearly $3 million. UCF promised Marcus Jordan, son of NBA legend Michael Jordan, that he...
Update on Franken Amendment: Jamie Leigh Jones interview
Posted on October 22, 2009We previously mentioned the "Franken Amendment" to the 2010 Defense Appropriations bill, which would withhold defense contracts from companies like Halliburton if their contracts restrict employees from suing in court for claims such as sexual assault, battery and discrimination...
Was Carrie Prejean Unjustly Enriched? (Nudge Nudge Wink Wink)
Posted on October 21, 2009You'll undoubtedly recall that, back in May, we mentioned that Miss California USA (aka Donald Trump) might terminate then-Miss California Carrie Prejean for breach of contract. Prejean was in fact de-crowned, and she sued the pageant organizers for a whole...
Executive Compensation Mystery at Sotheby's
Posted on October 20, 2009The New York Times reports that the Sotheby's auction house has refused to provide government regulators with information on bonuses paid to Sotheby's executives. Sotheby's justifies this refusal by pointing out that if that information were to become public, its...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Market Street Associates v. Frey
Posted on October 19, 2009There has been a lot of interest on the blog lately in the topic of contracts law and morality, e.g. here and here. Our comments section has been unusually active, which is terrific. A recent comment got me to thinking...
Jon & Kate Plus Attorneys
Posted on October 19, 2009Many regular readers have written to complain about the blog's non-existent coverage of the greatest drama of the 21st century thus far, the War of the Gosselins. The truth is, we were barred from writing about "other reality television programs"...
The Benefits of Teaching Across the Curriculum
Posted on October 15, 2009This year, for the first time since I have been teaching at the VU School of Law, my colleague JoEllen Lind gave her students a contracts-based hypothetical in the pleading exercise she does with them every year for Civil Procedure....
Just in Time for Halloween: Stambovsky v. Ackley revisited?
Posted on October 14, 2009Previously on this blog, Eric Goldman provided a wonderful compilation of resources for Stambovsky v. Ackley -- the haunted house case. Maybe the West Village will get a haunted house case all of its own. The Daily News Reports: A...
Nobel Prize in Economics goes to Academics Who Pay Attention to ?What Happens in the Real World? and Contracts
Posted on October 14, 2009Elinor Ostrom and Oliver Williamson were awarded the Nobel Prize in economics earlier this week. The WSJ describes both of their work has ?highlight[ing] areas where standard approaches of economics are inadequate at explaining what actually occurs.? Further, the WSJ...
Twelve Year Old Girl Bests Phillies' Slugger
Posted on October 12, 2009In order to try to pump some energy into their dull sport, baseball announcers are constantly reminding their viewers that they are witnessing history: "You saw it here first, folks! That is the first time a third baseman has thrown...
A Narrow Proposal Aimed at Mandatory Arbitration in the Contracts of Employees of Government Contractors
Posted on October 07, 2009The broadly drawn Arbitration Fairness Act, which would invalidate pre-dispute arbitration clauses in employment, franchise and consumer contracts, has been milling about Congress. Supporters of the Act have often pointed to the unbelievably grim story of Jamie Leigh Jones, an...
Alan White on Public Policy and Pedagogy:
Posted on October 07, 2009The Fourth in a Series of Posts by Guest Blogger, Alan White One of the things I took away from Elizabeth Mertz?s interesting book The Language of Law School was that Contracts professors have a tendency to squelch their students?...
Can Mad Men Bring Sexy Back to Contracts?
Posted on October 07, 2009I am late to the hit AMC series Mad Men; just last week, I started watching the first season on DVD. I am enjoying the show, and tolerating the unrelenting misogyny as a representation of the period. That aside, the...
Affirmative Defenses in Arkansas
Posted on October 06, 2009NB: An earlier version of this post identified the case as coming from Alabama rather than Arkansas. Many thanks to the attentive reader who caught the error. The Eighth Circuit decided a contracts issue last week in All-Ways Logistics, Inc....
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Brackenbury v. Hodgkin
Posted on October 05, 2009I promised last week that I would discuss Brackenbury v. Hodgkin, 102 A.2d 106 (1917), and provide a companion Limerick to go with Fitzpatrick v. Michael. In that case, I suggested that specific performance might have led the parties to...
One for the Contracts Profs ? With a little Statute of Frauds and a little Varney v. Ditmars
Posted on October 05, 2009Back in April 2007, the WSJ Law Blog declared Snyder v. Bronfman ?the best tabloid suit? of that year. The lawsuit may not have lived up to that superlative (didn?t Anna Nicole Smith die that year?), but it certainly should...
Bonus Limerick: Totten v. United States
Posted on October 01, 2009I decided to bolster the section of my Contracts course devoted to public policy issues by introducing students to the Totten doctrine and the states secrets privilege, which we will discuss without reading any cases. In Totten, a the administrator...
7 Crucial Words: "Except as otherwise specified in this Agreement...."
Posted on September 30, 2009In sexier law subjects, you might discuss the 7 dirty words. Here, at ContractsProf Blog, we talk about 7 crucial words: "Except as otherwise specified in this Agreement..." On ocassion, we've mentioned Dan Rather's breach of contract suit against CBS...
The Sucker Theory of Contract
Posted on September 29, 2009Do individuals view breach of contract as a moral harm? Dave Hoffman (Temple) and Tess Wilkinson-Ryan (UPenn) explore this question by way of psychology and offer an explanatory theory of contract: we view the unrequited promisee as a sucker. Their...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Fitzpatrick v. Michael
Posted on September 29, 2009The Law in Action casebook includes two nicely contrasting cases in its section on the Statute of Frauds and problems that arise in enforcing contracts in the family setting. The first is Fitzpatrick v. Michael, 9 A.2d 639 (Maryland, 1939),...
Contracts Law & Injustice
Posted on September 22, 2009This year, more than any other year, my students are telling me that they hate contracts. It's nothing personal, or at least I don't think it is. That is, they don't dislike my course, but they find it frustrating because...
Guitar Hero, Nirvana, (Giving) Love (a Bad Name), and Contract Law
Posted on September 17, 2009Guitar Hero. I've never understood the fascination, but I do have a number of friends who've purchased it "for the kids." (Which, I must assume, is why one new iteration features the Beatles). Apparently the new version of the game...
Macaulay & Whitford on Hoffman v. Red Owl Stores
Posted on September 16, 2009When I first learned that Steward Macaulay and William Whitford had written a new ?Law Stories? article about Hoffman v. Red Owl Stores, all I could do was groan. I had already read Robert Scott?s piece on the case. How...
Blogging and Scholarship (More Self-Promotion)
Posted on September 15, 2009The ContractsProf Blog may be a gateway drug that can lead to serious scholarship. As depicted at left, it may have all started with an innocent conversation at Woodstock about contract law, party sophistication and the new formalism, and the...
NY Court of Appeals Hears Contract Damages Case
Posted on September 15, 2009The 2009-2010 term of the New York Court of Appeals begins today, and scheduled for oral argument is St Lawrence Factory Stores v. Ogdensburg Bridge and Port Authority, a case about contract damages. Here's the case summary prepared by Public...
Limerick of the Week: Leonard v. Pepsico, Inc.
Posted on September 14, 2009As most readers of this blog likely know, John Leonard saw a Pepsi commercial and then attempted to accept what he took to be Pepsi's offer of a Harrier Jet. The commercial seemed to indicate that one could get a...
A Simple Contract Issue or a Moral Issue? Ask a 5th grader.
Posted on September 09, 2009This week, it is back to school for 5th graders across the U.S. Maybe we should ask them who should win a legal battle that is heating up in Georgia. Kathy Cox, the superintendent of Georgia's schools, won $1 million...
Alan White on Drafting Exercises
Posted on September 09, 2009The Third in a Series of Posts by: Guest Blogger, Alan White Thanks to Professor Miller?s post on this blog, I became aware of the Goldberg v. (Paris) Hilton case, which fit nicely into this week?s discussions of uncertain expectation...
Teaching Filanto, S.p.A. v. Chilewich Int'l Corp.
Posted on September 08, 2009I like to give my students a little taste of the U.N. Convention on the International Sale of Goods (CISG), just so they know that it is out there and so they know that the outcome can be different if...
Save the Dates: February 26-27, 2010
Posted on September 08, 2009Having skipped 2009 because of scheduling conflicts at the intended host school, UNLV's William S. Boyd School of Law is planning to host the Fifth International Contracts Conference (or its likeness) on February 26 and 27, 2010. More details and...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Izadi v. Machado (Gus) Ford, Inc.
Posted on September 07, 2009As I mentioned in introducing last week?s Limerick, although Lefkowitz and Izadi cover much the same ground, I think they go well together. In fact, I also have the students read Leonard v. Pepsico., Inc., which is always good for...
Contract Law, Party Sophistication and the New Formalism [File this under: Self-Promotion]
Posted on September 04, 2009While I took a little break from blogging about the contract foibles of faded celebrities, I managed to get out a draft of "Contract Law, Party Sophistication and the New Formalism." Coming to a theater near you, courtesy of the...
UPDATE: Roxanne's Revenge: Not A True Story [File This Under Debunked Feel Good Stories]
Posted on September 03, 2009We previously mentioned a story reported in the Daily News about Roxanne's Revenge - the heartening story about a young rapper who got a PhD on Warner Music because of a clause promising to pay for her education "for life."...
More Bad News For Seasons Ticket Holders
Posted on September 03, 2009One issue in the dispute, discussed below, between Washington Redskins fans and the team is the team?s duty to mitigate damages when it resells tickets reclaimed from defaulting seasons ticket holders. Some of the Redskins fanned interviewed for the Washington...
And Now. . . A Feel Bad Story: Washington Redskins v. Their Fans
Posted on September 03, 2009Although I am a fan of the Chicago Bears (Walter Payton edition), I?ve always had a bit of a soft spot for the Washington Redskins and especially for their Hogettes. Well, I?ll always love those beefy cross-dressing pig-snouted guys, but...
Hoddeson v. Koos Bros. Revisited
Posted on September 01, 2009Is Koos Bros. estopped from denying liability for a contract entered into by a "silver-haired mountebank" on its sales floor? See Prof. Telman's Limerick for more details about this Business Associations staple on agency and estoppel. After discussing the case,...
Behavioral Economics and Peevyhouse
Posted on September 01, 2009The Second in a Series of Posts by: Guest Blogger, Alan White The Peevyhouse case offers all sorts of possibilities for law and economics discussions of the traditional and behavioral varieties, a few of which we were able to touch...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Lefkowitz
Posted on August 31, 2009I am teaching Lefkowitz v. Great Minneapolis Surplus Store for the first time this year. I don't know why this case has fallen out of the casebooks; I really like it. I also teach Izadi v. Machado Ford, Inc. (about...
Is Breach of Contract a Good Use of Taxpayer Dollars?
Posted on August 31, 2009LexCH.com, your source for Dawson and Gosper County News, brings this report from Hall County (which actually seems a bit out of their jurisdiction): the County Board of Supervisors has decided to cut funding to their local bookmobile, abruptly electing...
Another Blood Contract
Posted on August 28, 2009We reported earlier this year about a contract written in blood. In that case, Plaintiff Kim opened his appellate brief with the statement, "Blood may be thicker than water, but here it's far weightier than a peppercorn." Both at the...
The First Week: A Hypothetical
Posted on August 26, 2009As I indicated in my last post, on the first day of class, I discuss with my students a case, Ray v. William G. Eurice Bros., in which a party is held to the terms of a contract signed by...
"Roxanne's Revenge": A PhD on Warner Music [File This In: Awesome Contracts Stories]
Posted on August 25, 2009As Gawker tells it: Heartwarming story of the day: Back in the 80s, Warner Music tossed a clause in then-teenage rapper Roxanne Shante's contract saying they'd pay for her education for life. So she got a psychology Ph.D from Cornell....
Now in Print
Posted on August 24, 2009Kristen David Adams, Promise Enforcement in Mortgage Lending: How U.S. Borrowers and Lenders Can See Themselves as Part of a Shared Goal, 28 Rev. Banking & Fin. L. 507 (2009). Henry Deeb Gabriel, The Advantages of Soft Law in International...
Timeless Topics: Insects and Real Estate Contracts
Posted on August 24, 2009Bed bugs! From the New York Times: According to the law, sellers and their brokers must acknowledge a problem if asked. But conflicts of interest aside, neither can be expected to know whether an infestation exists elsewhere in the building....
Crocs Settles Breach of Contract Suit with NothinZ-Producer Australia Unlimited, inc.
Posted on August 21, 2009Here we have a number of variations on everyone's favorite form of ethylene vinyl acetate footware, Crocs. However, despite the fact that you can decorate your Crocs with flowers and peace signs, in the litigation context, it is apparently not...
On Paris, Zsa Zsa, 1988 and Alternative Measures of Damages
Posted on August 21, 2009As summer wanes and 1L orientation draws to a close, it is part of the sweet rhythm of academia that a colleague inevitably says something like: "every year, they get younger." I'll admit, this year, I was the one who...
Judge Denies $8.3+ million sought from Paris Hilton for Movie Flop
Posted on August 19, 2009Not too surprisingly, the film ?Pledge This!,? a sorority comedy starring Paris Hilton, bombed. The film?s investors sued Hilton for over $8.3 million, alleging that Hilton breached her contract by failing to promote the movie, and thereby causing it to...
Starting with Intent to Enter Legal Relations [or Why I Don't Start with Remedies]
Posted on August 18, 2009In his first post as guest blogger, Alan White explained his reasons for starting with Peevyhouse. Alan's arguments were enough to persuade me to move Peevyhouse into the number 2 spot, but I try to ease the students into the...
Alan White: Teaching Peevyhouse First
Posted on August 17, 2009The first in a series of posts by guest blogger, Alan White I was fortunate during my transition from practice to teaching to have had the wise counsel of several experienced contracts teachers, and as it happened they were all...
Welcome, Alan White!!
Posted on August 17, 2009I am pleased to welcome to the blog my friend and colleague, Alan White. Avid fans of the blog might think that name sounds familiar. And sure enough, we have had reason to mention Professor White's scholarship previously on this...
Another Take on the Van Halen "No Brown M&M's Rider"
Posted on August 17, 2009Perhaps the most famous contract in rock history is Van Halen?s 1982 World Tour rider. It contains the legendary requirement that the band be provided with a bowl of M&M?s in the dressing room, with all brown M&M?s removed from...
At Best Buy, Too Good To Be True
Posted on August 17, 2009Courtesy of Best Buy (via CNN), here's a nice lesson on the objective theory and the doctrine of mistake: Early Wednesday morning, BestBuy.com listed a 52-inch Samsung HDTV for $9.99 -- a savings of more than $1600. As customers jumped...
Save the Dates: February 27-28, 2010
Posted on July 30, 2009Having skipped 2009 because of scheduling conflicts at the intended host school, UNLV's William S. Boyd School of Law is planning to host the Fifth International Contracts Conference (or its likeness) on February 27 and 28, 2010. More details and...
Now in Print
Posted on July 30, 2009Shmuel I. Becher, A "Fair Contracts" Approval Mechanism: Reconciling Consumer Contracts and Conventional Contract Law, 42 U. Mich. J.L. Reform 747 (2009). Amelia H. Boss, The Evolution of Commercial Law Norms: Lessons to be Learned from Electronic Commerce, 34 Brook...
Now in Print
Posted on July 17, 2009Sarah Abramowicz, Childhood and the Limits of Contract, 21 Yale J.L. & Human. 37 (2009). Catherine Ascani, Casenote, Deal or No Deal: It's a Deal in Morgan Stanley Capital Group, Inc. v. Public Utility District No. 1 of Snohomish County,...
Call for Proposals
Posted on July 03, 2009Call for Proposals AALS Section on Contracts New Approaches to Teaching Contracts: A ?Teach-In? 2010 AALS Annual Meeting, New Orleans, Louisiana The Section on Contracts solicits proposals for its Annual Meeting program, New Approaches to Teaching Contracts: A ?Teach-In,? scheduled...
Now in Print
Posted on July 02, 2009J. Edward Allen, Comment, Insurance Carriers v. Construction Industry: A Texas-sized Showdown to Come? A Closer Look at the Implications of Lamar Homes, 50 S. Tex. L. Rev. 505 (2009). Oren Bar-Gill & Omri Ben-Shahar, An Information Theory of Willful....
Mid-Year Legislative Update
Posted on July 01, 2009With most state legislatures having concluded their business for the year, here is the 2009 mid-year legislative update. Revised Article 1 As of January 1, 2009, Revised Article 1 was in effect in thirty-four states: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado,...
The Coen Brothers on Studio Contracts
Posted on June 23, 2009I recently watched Barton Fink for the first time in more than a decade and the following scene reminded me of casebook staple Locke v. Warner Brothers, Inc., 66 Cal. Rptr. 2d 921 (Cal. Ct. App. 1997), in which the...
Now in Print
Posted on June 19, 2009Rachel S. Arnow-Richman, Employment as Transaction, 39 Seton Hall L. Rev. 447(2009). Allen Blair, A Matter of Trust: Should No-Reliance Clauses Bar Claims for Fraudulent Inducement of Contract?, 92 Marq. L. Rev. 423 (2009). Ian Brereton, Note, The Beginning of...
ALI Principles of the Law of Software Contracts
Posted on June 19, 2009Speaking of the recently-approved Principles of the Law of Software Contracts (the subject of our sister section's call for proposals below), here's an overview and remarks from Reporter Bob Hillman for the benefit of those who have not already read....
Call for Proposals
Posted on May 29, 2009Call for Proposals AALS Section on Commercial and Related Consumer Law ?The Principles of the Law of Software Contracts: A Phoenix Rising from the Ashes of Article 2B and UCITA?? 2010 AALS Annual Meeting, New Orleans, Louisiana The Executive Committee...
Now in Print
Posted on May 29, 2009M. Neil Browne & Jennifer Coon, The Impact of Market Ideology on Transnational Contract Law, 30 Loy. L.A. Int?l & Comp. L. Rev. 91 (2008). KennethM. Casebeer, Of Service Workers, Contracting Out, Joint Employment, Legal Consciousness, and the University of...
Plaudits for (Mostly Dead) Contracts Scholars
Posted on May 20, 2009Also appearing recently on Brian Leiter's Law School Reports: the results of a poll of the blog's readers to name The Most Important Legal Thinkers in American Law of the Past Century. The poll and the results were both skewed...
Plaudits for (Living) Contracts Professors
Posted on May 15, 2009Brian Leiter's Law School Reports, a reliable source of information about moving and shaking in legal academia, reported yesterday that Contracts professor and current dean of the Seattle University School of Law Kellye Testy will become the new dean at...
A Lesson in Contract Drafting to Trump All Others
Posted on May 14, 2009What is the drafting lesson to trump all others? The usual: one size does not fit all. AmLaw Daily reports that Trump Corporation leases space in one of the co-op buildings it had built in New York in the 1980's....
Is Miss California in Breach of Contract?
Posted on May 12, 2009Miss California - Carrie Prejean - has been getting a lot of press play lately. Just recently, at the Miss USA pageant, she got into a little bit of a jam when responding to Perez Hilton's question about same-sex marriage....
After a Home Short Sale, Lender May Still Seek the Difference
Posted on May 08, 2009For underwater homeowners who opt for the short sale, this WSJ article suggests that they still might have to tread water. In a short sale, a seller facing foreclosure can work out a deal with the lender to sell the...
Now in Print
Posted on May 02, 2009Paula D. Baron, Confused in Words: Unconscionability and the Doctrine of Penalties, 34 Monash U.L. Rev. 285 (2008). Omri Ben-Shahar, A Bargaining Power Theory of Default Rules, 109 Colum. L. Rev. 396 (2009). Curtis Bridgeman, Contracts as Plans, 2009 U...
Another Benefit of Contract-Based Warranties: Class Certification?
Posted on April 28, 2009This blog's illustrious editor, Prof. Snyder, recently pointed out that tort law provides much better remedies than contracts-based breach of warranty claims, but students nevertheless need to know about contracts-based remedies because of the longer statute of limitations...
Man claims campground had contract duty to protect him from water balloon
Posted on April 28, 2009A New Hampshire man who suffered injuries when he was hit by a water balloon fired by a slingshot is suing his campground, claiming that the facility owed a duty to protect him from being attacked. Things apparently get rowdly...
Your Public Interest Auction Donations
Posted on April 28, 2009Over at PrawfsBlawg, Rose Cuison Villazor asks: what do you donate to your law school's public interest auction? Here's my answer. Each original print is signed by the undersigned, and they are pictured in the home of the 2008 auction...
When promisors' intent to perform is conditional
Posted on April 26, 2009When a contracting party makes a promise, does it intend to keep that promise, "no matter what"? Gregory Klass of Georgetown says no. Every promise, he says, is conditional -- that is, the promisor intends to perform under what it...
Today in history: April 25
Posted on April 26, 2009On this date in 1938, the United States Supreme Court shocked just about everyone with the release of Erie Railroad v. Tompkins, a decision that wiped nearly 100 years of federal common law off the books and became a permanent...
Contract law: the last resort of the tardy
Posted on April 26, 2009Teaching contract remedies for breach of warranty, whether common law or UCC, often seems like a waste of time, since in many cirucmstances tort law provides superior remedies for defective products or services that cause injuries. But, as we often...
The case of the wry-faced llama
Posted on April 26, 2009Karl Llewellyn liked to make fun of 19th century contract law as being based on the arms' length horse trade between two strangers. But two centuries later animal cases still come up with some frequency. Like this Georgia case, in...
Today in history: April 26
Posted on April 26, 2009On this date in 1607, English employees of the privately held Virginia Company of London (left: the company seal) land at Cape Henry, Virginia, with the intent of founding a gold-mining operation. A month later they will found the first...
"Payday lender" squeezing defenseless . . . banks?
Posted on April 24, 2009Guess who's feeling what it's like being in the clutches of a predatory lender? Yep, Americas's banks, who are suddenly discovering what a lot of consumers have discovered over the years: the peril of fine print in loan agreements. Here...
US News First: No law school sees ranking decline
Posted on April 24, 2009The recent U.S. News rankings are out, and apparently every law school either rose in rankings or stayed the same, according to a survey of news releases by the schools. Announcing their highers rankings were, among others, William & Mary,...
Today in history: April 24
Posted on April 24, 2009On this date in 1957, the Suez Canal reopens for business after its extended closure during the Suez Crisis. Egyptian President Gamal Nasser had responded to an Anglo-French seizure of the canal by sinking all 40 ships in it. The...
Speaking of TARP
Posted on April 23, 2009The Government's Troubled Assets Relief Program has now grown to about $3 trillion--about the size of last year's entire federal budget, according to the quarterly report to Congress made by its Special Inspector General (SIGTARP). Other highlights of the report:...
Government endorses pre-dispute employee waivers . . . at least sometimes
Posted on April 23, 2009Contract law types are aware that employers are more and more using the idea of contractual waivers as a way of getting employees to surrender rights, often in advance of any accrual of the actual right. Well, what's good for...
Today in history: April 23
Posted on April 23, 2009On this date in 1791, lawyer and politician James Buchanan was born in a log cabin in Mercersburg, Pennsylvania. Buchanan went on to become one of the most experienced men ever to hold the office of President of the United...
Consumer exploitation, nonprofit division
Posted on April 22, 2009You may have missed a New York Times story a couple of days ago about one of the most oppressed classes of debtors in the country: students who borrowed for their educations. While TV and radio commercials offering to help...
Today in history: April 22
Posted on April 22, 2009On this date in 1864, the United States Congress passes the Coinage Act. It authorizes the creation of a new 2-cent coin (left), on which Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase decides to put the words "In God We...
Signs of the [New York] Times
Posted on April 22, 2009The latest group of money-grubbing executives clinging to their perks while laying off employees and asking union workers for concessions turns out to be the top dogs at the New York Times. CEO Janet Robinson earned $5,578,451, a nice 35...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Paramount Communications v. QVC Network, Inc.
Posted on April 21, 2009Paramount v. QVC is a lot like Paramount v. Time, and the decisions are entirely consistent: Paramount always loses. Beyond that, it is hard to say what principles are operative here. In this case, Paramount was trying to protect a...
Father offers to sell child star of Slumlord Millionaire?
Posted on April 21, 2009The father of Rubina Ali, child star of Slumdog Millionaire, allegedly put his daughter up for sale, offering to allow her to be adopted for about £200,000. Dad Rafiq Qureshi, who lives in one of Mumbai's worst slums and says...
How a CDS has more than one role in a bankruptcy . . .
Posted on April 21, 2009We're all learning a good deal about credit derivative swaps (CDSs) these days. The point of the CDS, of course, is to protect parties from defaults on bonds. Turns out that this protection can have a significant effect on the...
Today in history: April 21
Posted on April 21, 2009On this date in 753 B.C., twin brothers Romulus and Remus found a new town on Italy's Tiber which, after a fight in which Romulus kills his brother, is called "Rome." Remus had apparently preferred "Reme" as the town's name....
Today in history: April 20
Posted on April 20, 2009On this date in 1871, Congress passes the Civil Rights Act of 1871 at the urging of President U.S. Grant. The measure, originally aimed at suppressing the Ku Klux Klan in the South, will eventually come to be codified as...
Weekly Top Ten
Posted on April 20, 2009Most of the top papers stay the same this week, with only one new paper cracking our Top 10. Following are the ten most-downloaded new papers from the SSRN Journal of Contract and Commercial Law for the 60 days ending...
Auction house reneges on sale guarantee after market drops
Posted on April 20, 2009Christie?s is being sued by the consignor of a painting (left) by Francis Bacon (the other Francis Bacon, not the English lawyer who was Sir Edward Coke's rival in love and politics) after the international auction house allegedly reneged on...
Rescinding offers of at-will employment
Posted on April 20, 2009Over at the Volokh Conspiracy, David Post wonders whether law firms who renege on their at-will employment agreements with new associates are nevertheless liable for damages: X offers (in September, 2008) to hire me beginning in September 2009, and I...
Banks struggle to get away from "TARP-baby"
Posted on April 20, 2009Banks who want to pay back their TARP loans won?t be allowed to do so unless it?s in the "national interest," reports the Financial Times. Solvent banks want to repay the TARP funds pressed on them during the Bush Administration...
Today in history: April 19
Posted on April 19, 2009On this date in 1782, the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands becomes the first nation to recognize the independence of the United States. This is historically important because it marked the United States' first entry onto the world stage,...
Today in history: April 18
Posted on April 18, 2009On this date in 1923, Babe Ruth hits a home run and the New York Yankees beat Boston 4-1 in the first game ever played at the new Yankee Stadium. The team''s owners built the stadium with their own money...
Treasury recalls toxic cash
Posted on April 18, 2009The U.S. Treasury department announced today that it is recalling some $776 billion in U.S. currency which has been contaminated by toxic ink. [Frank Snyder]
Today in history: April 17
Posted on April 17, 2009On this date in 1492, one of the most important contracts in history is signed, as Queen Isabella I of Castile and León inks a deal with a Genoese sailor, Christopher Columbus, to sail westward to the Orient in search...
Signs of the times, continued
Posted on April 17, 2009Over at Legal Profession Blog they're linking to a story about a man denied admission to the New York BAr because he had too many outstanding student loans. As an aside, bankruptcy law has always puzzled me. If you buy...
Michigan jury gives Chrysler win in breach of K suit
Posted on April 17, 2009It's not all doom and gloom for Chrysler. Sure, its banks are balking at its reorganization plan. Its loyal longtime customers are fleeing to foreign models. Ottawa is saying it might let the company's Canadian operations die. Fiat is suggesting...
A brief detour into international civil procedure
Posted on April 17, 2009In a case that could have major implications for U.S. civil actions against Mexican parties, a U.S. district court has held that the only way of lawfully serving a Mexican defendant is through the country's central authority in the Ministry...
PA Law Profs Sue West over "Sham" Treatise Supplement
Posted on April 16, 2009Boozy Prof. William Clark isn't the only one to sue West over a treatise. According to Law.com, Profs. David Rudovsky (U Penn) and Leonard Sosnov (Widener) have sued West, claiming that authorship of the December 2008 pocket part to their...
Today in history: April 16
Posted on April 16, 2009On this date in 1905, steel tycoon Andrew Carnegie (left) donated $10 million to create the eponymous Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. It's not really clear whether it helped. A hundred and four years later, American law schools...
Employee contract rights overridden by bankruptcy
Posted on April 16, 2009A Canadian employee who was fired after his company sought bankruptcy protection found himself out of luck in his claim for wrongful termination. In West Bay SonShip Yachts Ltd. v. Esau, Gerald Esau had been an employee of West Bay...
Happy 5th anniversary to TaxProf
Posted on April 16, 2009Hard to believe that it's been half a decade since a dynamic and far-seeing tax law professor (okay, who would have thought that there was such a thing?) at the University of Cincinnati took a listserv dedicated to tax professors...
NY Appellate Court Holds that Dental Student's Claims Were Properly Fashioned as Breach of Contract
Posted on April 15, 2009We previously noted a NY trial court decision holding that a former NYU dental student improperly fashioned an administrative challenge (Art. 78 proceeding) as sounding in breach of contract. Well, an appellate court has unanimously reversed: Plaintiff properly brought this...
Today in history
Posted on April 15, 2009On this date, April 15, 1912, the luxury liner R.M.S. Titanic slips below the icy North Atlantic waves off the Newfoundland coast. Contracts types remember the event because Sir Cosmo Duff Gordon?s quick thinking in getting himself and his wife...
The ACORN bus brigade will be there soon
Posted on April 15, 2009The American Lawyer is reporting that lawyers working on the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy matter have already billed an amazing $84 million for the work done during the past four and a half months. On an annualized basis, that's a nice...
We're cool, oh yeah, we're cool
Posted on April 15, 2009ContractsProf, The World's Foremost Web Provider of Odd Nuggets of Stuff Primarily of Interest to People Who Teach Contract Law,tm has once again made the list of the top law-professor-edited legal blogs in this quadrant of the Milky Way. Kudos...
How are faculty members like AIG executives?
Posted on April 14, 2009Find out in this excerpt over at TaxProf Blog. There's another similarity. One of the problems with organizations is that they tend to be run for the benefit of those who run them. Witness AIG, where execs ran the place...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Paramount Communications v. Time, Inc.
Posted on April 14, 2009This case is again very complicated and involves a full panoply of defensive measures. You might think that just a few years after its Revlon decision, the Delaware Supreme Court would be eager to apply that decision to another case...
Today in history
Posted on April 14, 2009On this date, April 14, 1828, lexicographer Noah Webster publishes the first edition of his American Dictionary of the English Language, a major landmark in the question to get Americans to use straightforward, proper English. Lawyers immediately decide to ignore...
Baxendale co-star dies in Hollywood
Posted on April 14, 2009Longtime pornographic actress Marilyn Chamers died yesterday at age 56. Chambers helped launch the modern "adult" film industry in 1972 when she was paid $25,000 and a slice of the gross to star in Behind the Green Door. The Los...
Man sells daughter, asks police to help collect payment
Posted on April 13, 2009A man who sold his 14-year-old daughter to a neighbor and then went to police to complain that the other party had breached the agreement by nonpayment has pleaded guilty to felony child endangerment. The man allegedly sold his daughter...
From Russia, with love
Posted on April 13, 2009Russian authorities apparently are bringing charges against Swedish retailer IKEA for terminating a Moscow lease it had with an Italian clothing store that was its tenant. The government is proceeding under legislation that ?prohibits forcing counterparties into unfavorable contracts...
Big banks as Petri dishes for lower compensation?
Posted on April 13, 2009A lot people have wondered whether the high-paid employees at the top investment bank are really worth the money they're paid. After all, they were at the wheel when the car went into the ditch. Could you do just as...
Weekly Top Ten
Posted on April 13, 2009For the third week in a row, Daniel Solove's and Neil Richards's paper exploring what the first amendment has to say about contract and tort law (where civil liability frequently attaches to purely verbal expressions) keeps the number one position...
Perils of becoming a "national law school"
Posted on April 12, 2009The University of Wisconsin School of Law has over the years earned a justified resputation as a major national law school. Its in-state rival, Marquette, also has a national focus. But it's the national focus that might give the school...
Pawn business holding up in recession
Posted on April 11, 2009The big U.S. banks may be on federal life support due to subprime loans, but the consumer "nonrecourse secured loan" business (a/k/a the pawn shop) appears to be holding up pretty well. Cash America International, Inc., the nation's largest chain...
Relive your 1L Contracts class at home! With better looking people!
Posted on April 11, 2009After what has seemed to most Contracts professors an unconscionably long time, the TV series The Paper Chase has finally come out on video. Technically, it's called "season one" although there was only one season on the original CBS program...
Bailouts may lead to fiduciary troubles
Posted on April 10, 2009The federal bailouts of General Motors, Chrysler, and various banks may raise some interesting questions of fiduciary duties. The Wall Street Journal is reporting today that the federal government is pressuring the automakers to reach deals with bondholders before the...
More on Webb v. McGowin
Posted on April 10, 2009When lumberman James Greeley McGowin died in 1934, his heirs stopped payments that the old man had been making to Joe Webb. The resulting case, as everyone who reads this blog knows, is Webb. v. McGowin. Two of the heirs...
Consequential damages for breach of insurance contracts
Posted on April 10, 2009Some interesting things have been going on in the Empire State with respect to consequential damages for breach of an insurance contract. A new client alert from lawyers Laurie A. Kamaiko and Steven P. Nassi of New York's Edwards Angell...
Courtney Love to sue over alleged looting of Cobain estate
Posted on April 09, 2009Singer Courtney Love is apparently getting ready to sue a group of people over money she says was looted from the estate of her dead husband, Kurt Cobain. (Left: The couple and their daughter in 1993). Love says some $550...
State says it won't pay on interest rate swap
Posted on April 09, 2009The state of Alabama says it isn?t going to pay J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. any money it allegedly owes under an interest rate swap deal between its school authority and the bank. The swap was apparently part of a...
Breaching conditions of an open-source license
Posted on April 09, 2009Last December the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled in Jacobsen v. Katzer, 535 F.3d 1373 (Fed Cir. 2008), that a user who violated the conditions of a web-linked open-source software license was liable not only for...
911 call for breach of Chinese food warranty
Posted on April 08, 2009A nice little exam question was on the news in the DFW area this morning. Seems a woman ordered some fried rice from an A&D Buffalo's restaurant (left) in Fort Worth. She ordered extra shrimp with the rice. After picking...
When relational contracts go bad
Posted on April 08, 2009T wo major players in the technology field are going toe-to-toe in Delaware chancery court over reciprocal licensing agreements for each other?s technology. NVIDIA Corp., which says it has a license to use Intel Corp. processors in its ?MCP chipsets,?...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Revlon v. MacAndrews & Forbes
Posted on April 07, 2009Ron Perelman, cigar-chomping CEO of Pantry Pride, wanted to acquire Revlon. Revlon's CEO, Michel Bergerac, did everything in his power to prevent the acquisition. The case is a great vehicle for teaching defensive measures, because Revlon's efforts to escape Perelmans'...
Employee bonuses as "unjust enrichment"
Posted on April 07, 2009Some contract law types have floated the idea of "unjust enrichment" law as a means of clawing back compensation paid to employees at failing firms. A union-affiliated investment advising company is now raising just that theory in a call to...
Closed or open?
Posted on April 07, 2009Over at PrawfsBlawg, Colin Miller is mulling over the value of the "open everything" exam, and getting some interesting comments. [Frank Snyder]
Ah, that's probably why he became an American citizen
Posted on April 07, 2009Rock drummer Mick Fleetwood and four others are suing a Portland (Me.) lawyer after they lost a contract dispute with the British Broadcasting Co. Lawyer Paul McDonald represented Fleetwood (left -- yes, sadly, he really is that old) and his...
Good faith effort, no guarantees
Posted on April 07, 2009This is almost certainly April Fool's joke, but it's a good story that raises a number of issues and will certainly get students' attention. It beings like this: In Stuttgart, Germany, a court judge must decide on a case of...
. . . and still more bonus news
Posted on April 06, 2009Law.com has a story today on the boom in litigation relating to executive bonuses, which is going both ways. Shareholders, public officials are going after companies that pay bonuses they promised, while employees are going after those that aren't paying...
Add "rising prosperity," delete "free markets" and "rule of law"
Posted on April 06, 2009At last November?s G-20 summit in Washington -- where the leaders unanimously pledged themselves to continue free trade in spite of the looming recession -- the group included the following passage in its closing communique: We recognize that these reforms...
Another Take on Bonuses
Posted on April 06, 2009This was sent to me by Valpo Law alumnus, Jeffrey Gordon, whose blog can be found here. Lots of ink is now being spilled over the sanctity of contracts, which seems to cover executive compensation but not the compensation of...
Maybe the foxes are now in charge of the henhouse
Posted on April 06, 2009At failed insurer AIG, the top individual bonus recipients got $3 million each, which was enough to get death threats and their own special piece of legislation from the United States House of Representatives. Turns out, though, lots of other...
Weekly Top Ten
Posted on April 06, 2009Two new papers hit our top ten list this week, Ethan Leib's Contracts and Friendships, which debuts at number 3, and a timely piece from Steve Schooner and Christoper Yukins on one of the lurking problems in the recent stimulus...
"There ain't no good guys, there ain't no bad guys . . . ."
Posted on April 05, 2009Okay, it's not really about contracts. But with the various economic initiatives coming out of Washington these days, contract law and corporate law are getting jumbled together. So you might be interested in a free conference being put on by...
You can't make this stuff up
Posted on April 05, 2009Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the two bailed-out federal corporations that lost a combined $110 billion last year and are getting another $200 billion from the government this year (on top of $200 billion last year), will shortly be paying...
Peevyhouse and John Wunder Down Under
Posted on April 03, 2009This week I'm teaching those two student rabble-rousers, Peevyhouse v. Garland Coal Co. and Groves v. John Wunder Co. The issue in both cases, of course, is whether the owner of property can get the cost of rectifying the defective...
Speaking of McQuade v. Stoneham . . .
Posted on April 02, 2009Some of us who teach Contracts also teach Business Associations, so we like to run occasional things of interest to B.A. teachers beyond, of course, Jeremy?s regular limericks. One of the great casebook staples is McQuade v. Stoneham (1934), a...
Congress Expands Attack on Bonuses
Posted on April 01, 2009In yet another ContractsProf Blog exclusive (this must be our lucky day!), we break news of bonuses paid to members of the executive branch during the Bush administration. It turns out, our first MBA President decided to follow the familiar...
New Issue of Constitutional Commentary
Posted on April 01, 2009The ContractsProf Blog is pleased to provide this news exclusive. Using our powerful connections and are heightened sleuthing powers, we have discovered that Constitutional Commentary has a special issue coming out today on dissenting opinions in Contracts Clause cases...
"Pay for Performance" sponsor explains legal reasoning . . . sort of
Posted on April 01, 2009The sponsor of the "Pay for Performance Act of 2009" gives his reasoning in a Huffington Post piece today. Freshman Rep. Alan Grayson (left), who introduced the bill, is a Harvard Law grad who was a staff clerk at the...
Not everyone likes "Pay for Performance"
Posted on April 01, 2009While the House of Representatives debates whether financial institutions that received TARP money ought to be compelled to adopt "pay for performance" criteria for compensation, the American Federation of Government Employees is urging Congress to jettison the concept when it...
US Supreme Court Decides 14 Penn Plaza
Posted on April 01, 2009Today, in an opinion written by Justice Thomas, a 5-judge majority of the United States Supreme Court held that "a collective-bargaining agreement that clearly and unmistakably requires union members to arbitrate ADEA claims is enforceable as a matter of federal...
Contracts Can Be Rewritten, Says NY Times
Posted on March 31, 2009Today's New York Times has a headline that would not have been news to Karl Llewellyn, "Contracts Now Seen as Being Rewritable." But this is probably news and definitely fit to print because it provides space on page 1 of...
On Twitter and Links to Two Recent Cases Holding Class Action Waiver = Unconscionable
Posted on March 31, 2009First, a recent SDNY (Griesa) decision holding that an arbitration clause in a student loan agreement was unconscionable. The arbitration clause included a class action waiver. Fensterstock v. Education Finance Partners. Second, a recent 9th Circuit decision holding unconscionable the...
AIG Bonuses: Enter Force Majeure -- Stage Left
Posted on March 31, 2009While lots of folks are scrambling around looking for contract-law defenses to retention payments such as those given employees at failed AIG, Congress is looking at resolving the issue by introducing a new player: force majeure. The Pay for Performance...
Over at our sister ship . . . .
Posted on March 31, 2009Over at Legal Profession Blog, Jeff Lipshaw (Suffolk) uses the AIG implosion to meditate on contract theory. As usual, he's got his own unique take on things. Check out My Iconoclastic Approach to Contract Theory (or Its Ultimate Failure) -...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Cheff v. Mathes
Posted on March 30, 2009Cheff has great facts, although the facts do not really affect the opinion. Holland Furnace, it turns out, was a thoroughly corrupt business that was also losing money. Its means of selling furnaces was to send a crew over to...
Weekly Top 10
Posted on March 30, 2009After a long hiatus, we?re back with the Weekly Top 10. It's a little heavy on commercial law this week, but there are some very nice contracts pieces that have hit the web in the last couple of months. Following...
Behind the scenes at AIG
Posted on March 30, 2009One of the interesting thing about the AIG explosion is how little most of us who are chattering in the media about the bailout and the bonuses (including me) actually know about why the whole thing blew up. If you...
AIG Talk
Posted on March 28, 2009Deborah Post (Touro) and I were guests on a Legal Talk Network segment discussing (what else?) the AIG bonuses. For those who can't get enough of hearing law professors talk to each other, you can access the podcast here. One...
For Those Who Did Not See Today's NY Times: More on AIG
Posted on March 25, 2009The Times today posted this letter of resignation from an AIG executive. He makes the case in defense of at least some of those executives. I have yet to see how this letter is received in the blogosphere. I do...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Stuparich v. Harbor Furniture
Posted on March 24, 2009This is a case about a family-owned close corporation. The father, Malcolm, Sr. gave a controlling share to his son, Malcolm, Jr., leaving two sisters, Candi and Ann, as minority shareholders. The siblings disagreed about the direction of the business...
Is the iPhone Actionably Slow?
Posted on March 23, 2009A New Jersey man is suing Apple, claiming that its network speed is not all it was advertised to be, according to this article in PC World. Plaintiff alleges breach of contract, among other things, because he claims that the...
Now in Print
Posted on March 23, 2009Paula D. Baron, The Doctrine of Penalties and the Test of Commercial Justification, 34 U.W. Austl. L. Rev. 42 (2008). Ashleigh L. Boggs, Note, Interpretation of Oil and Gas Lease Habendum Clauses in Texas and Why Oklahoma Should Maintain its...
New From the UN: Convention on Contracts for the International Carriage of Goods
Posted on March 20, 2009After nearly six years of negotiation, on December 12, 2008, the U.N. General Assembly adopted the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Carriage of Goods Wholly or Partly by Sea. It will be open for signature on September...
More on AIG: The Employee Contracts
Posted on March 19, 2009The House of Representatives' Legal Services Committee has made the agreements about which everyone is talking available on its website. The documents can be accessed here. [Jeremy Telman]
Now in Print (Hither and Yon Combined)
Posted on March 18, 2009A number of interesting-looking pieces have made their way over the transom in recent weeks; and, now that spring break is upon me (yeah!), and several outside promotion and tenure reviews are behind me (yeah!!), I have time to pass...
More on the AIG Bonus Contracts
Posted on March 18, 2009A forum on the NYT site "Room for Debate" includes short reactions from Tom Baker, Charles Fried, Frank Snyder, Glenn Greenwald, James P. Tuthill and Deborah W. Post: check it out here. The NY Times also has an op-ed by...
Thanks to AIG, Contract Drafting is Topic of Late Night Talk
Posted on March 18, 2009Finally, contract drafting becomes a topic of late night television: Enjoy! [Meredith R. Miller]
More on Madoff Mistake Case
Posted on March 17, 2009We previously mentioned a NYT article about a lawsuit to unravel a divorce settlement that included a payout from husband to wife for the right to keep the $5.4 million (or so they thought) Madoff account. As part of the...
ContractsProf Represent!
Posted on March 17, 2009On the AIG bonus contracts, from the SF Chronicle: Some attorneys are asking why the government, which owns 80 percent of AIG, didn't pressure the company to withhold payments while it investigated ways to stop them. "There wasn't any hurry...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Pedro v. Pedro
Posted on March 17, 2009Pedros was a family business run by three brothers. Alfred discovered that his brothers, Carl and Eugene were embezzling from the business, and he wouldn't shut up about it. After two investigations, some funds could not be accounted for. Carl...
From the Populist Outrage File: Blame it on the Contracts
Posted on March 16, 2009Considerable populist outrage is being directed towards AIG, which is planning to pay around $120 million in bonuses to employees. Some of these employees were "executives in the same business unit that brought the company to the brink of collapse...
Contract Written in Blood is Not Enforced
Posted on March 14, 2009This from James Levy at Legal Writing Prof Blog: Get this - the AP reports that two friends went to a combination karaoke bar/sushi restaurant when one of them decides he wants to write an agreement promising the other that...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Wilkes v. Springside Nursing Home, Inc.
Posted on March 10, 2009I am heading off for a conference this week and am behind in preparations, so this will be a short post and probably the last for the week from me. Wilkes sets out the standard for fiduciaries in the context...
Terminator IV: Attack of the Litigious Producer
Posted on March 09, 2009Yeah, that's right, Arnold. While you're off governing California, your franchise is in the courts! According to this article in The Daily Express (which, according to its website, is "the World's Greatest Newspaper"), Moritz Bowman, one of the producers of...
Breaking: NYT Declares Death of Contract
Posted on March 07, 2009In What Contract? in the NYT Real Estate section, reporter Michael M. Grynbaum begins: COULD the days of the iron-clad contract be numbered? It used to be that once a buyer went to contract on an apartment, the terms of...
Would You Attempt to Hurdle Contract, Propery and Health Law to Become a Grandparent?
Posted on March 04, 2009Arbitration Agreements Must Specify Kentucky to Be Enforceable in Kentucky Courts
Posted on March 04, 2009How Many Credits For Contracts?
Posted on February 25, 2009Most contracts profs would probably prefer to teach the course over two semesters as a six-credit course. When I was a law student, my contracts course was 3/2, but the law school I attended has since eliminated one credit and...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Ringling Bros.
Posted on February 25, 2009The Ringling Brothers are pictured at right. Together, they created a successful business enterprise. But when they passed the circus on their heirs, things got a bit messy. So messy, in fact, that I no longer teach this case, as...
Tenure and Contract
Posted on February 24, 2009The American Association of University Professors, which is like a lioness defending her cubs when it comes to tenure is roaring about its recent success (as an amicus) in the First Circuit case, Otero-Burgos v. Inter-American University. That case did...
Cancelled Firm Retreat Leads to Breach of Contract Suit
Posted on February 21, 2009This story from Carolyn Elefant at Legal Blog Watch: Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld wasn't able to give its partners a fancy retreat this year, so it's giving them something else instead: a lesson in first year contract law....
AALS Boycott Did Not Require Breach of Contract
Posted on February 19, 2009You may recall last semester's quasi-controversy over whether the AALS Mother Ship should hold any of the annual meeting events at the San Diego Grand Hyatt because it was owned (ostensibly?) by Doug Manchester, who had contributed quite generously to...
The New Face of Facebook?
Posted on February 19, 2009Exposed by Meredith Miller of the ContractsProfs Blog here, Facebook has rescinded its new standard terms of use and is temporarily reverting to its earlier terms of use. You can read more here or if you prefer, in The New...
New and Improved: Facebook Revises Standard Terms of Use
Posted on February 17, 2009Facebook has revised its standard terms of use. Here's a nice discussion of the major changes, and a follow up discussion concerning the enforceability of the revisions. [Meredith R. Miller]
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Pilsbury v. Honeywell, Inc.
Posted on February 17, 2009With last week's Limerick, we covered a case that teaches us that a shareholder has a right to inspect a corporation's books and records, including shareholder lists, in the context of a tender offer. State laws, including Section 220 of...
Love Contracts, Volume III
Posted on February 16, 2009Every year on February 14th -ish, we like to update our readers on the latest news regarding love contracts. If you don't know what a love contract is, you are a total loser, but you can remedy that status by...
Now in Print
Posted on February 14, 2009Michael J. Borden, Mistake and Disclosure in a Model of Two-Sided Informational Inputs, 73 Mo. L. Rev. 667 (2008). Zev J. Eigen, The Devil in the Details: The Interrelationship Among Citizenship, Rule of Law and Form-Adhesive Contracts, 41 Conn. L....
Contract News Round Up
Posted on February 13, 2009Some President's weekend reading related to current events and contract law: On the invalidated AMEX class action waiver: Nathan Koppel, The United States of Consumer Arbitration? Not So Fast, Says 2d Cir. (1/30/09). Steven Semeraro, Commercial Law Blog, Class Action...
Unenforceable Contracts in the Context of Advanced Assisted Reproduction Technologies?
Posted on February 12, 2009More in our continuing series of posts on the topic of contracts issues relating to advanced reproductive technologies (earlier posts can be found here and here). Today's New York Times has a report that includes more information on Nadya Suleman,...
Seattle U. Seeks Podium Visitor
Posted on February 11, 2009Seattle University School of Law invites applications for a year-long ?podium? visit in Contracts/Commercial Law for 2009-10. Contracts is a 1L required course: 3 credits in the fall, 3 credits in the spring, with a final exam at the end...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Crane v. Anaconda
Posted on February 10, 2009At left, we have an anaconda. At right, we have a crane. Alright. I can imagine an anaconda swallowing a crane. But here we have a case about a crane trying to swallow an anaconda. And that, I find, well...
50 Cent Not Gonna Give a Dime
Posted on February 10, 2009As reported in today's New York Law Journal, a New York trial court recently granted summary judgment to rapper "50 Cent" in a breach of contract action brought by his ex-girlfriend (and mother of his child). The ex claimed that...
International Law Blogger Declares Contracts Law Boring
Posted on February 09, 2009Over at Opinio Juris, everyone's favorite international law blog, Roger Alford (pictured) has a post about United States v. Eurodif, S.A., a recent Supreme Court decision that actually addresses some contracts issues. The question in the case is familiar to...
Now in Print: Dispatches from Abroad
Posted on February 06, 2009In an effort to help raise awareness among this blog's readers, most of whom are (as am I and my fellow bloggers) based in the U.S., this is the second of an irregular series of posts designed to call attention...
Now in Print
Posted on February 05, 2009Wayne Barnes, French Subjective Theory of Contract: Separating Rhetoric from Reality, 83 Tul. L. Rev. 359 (2008). Robert Boyle, The Enforceable Prepayment Penalty, 6 DePaul Bus. & Com. L.J. 585 (2008). James W. Fox, Jr., The Law of Many Faces:...
Madoff Mistake Case?
Posted on February 05, 2009This story from the NY Times: In June 2006, Steven Simkin and Laura Blank, who were in the process of a divorce, agreed to evenly split the $5.4 million in an account they had with Madoff Securities, according to a...
Apple Sued (Again!) for Breach of Warranty over 3G Speed
Posted on February 04, 2009Two things near and dear to my heart have converged in one place: contract law and the iphone. Apple was already facing lawsuits over 3G reception, and now PCWorld reports: Apple and AT&T Mobility are facing two new lawsuits claiming...
Snow!
Posted on February 04, 2009I really just wanted to post to say that Valparaiso got hit with about two feet of snow, and it is awesome. Our street is outside of the city (yes, we live in the greater metropolitan Valparaiso area!) and so...
Enough Already With the Chickens: Let's Talk about "Visitors"
Posted on February 03, 2009The cosmos aligned perfectly: on the very day I taught ambiguity, the New York Law Journal reported a New York County Supreme Court case about ambiguity. And now I can demonstrate the doctrine is not just for the birds. In...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Austin v. Consolidated Edison
Posted on February 03, 2009Like Lovenheim, Austin is a case in which a corporation refused to distribute a shareholder proposal in advance of an annual shareholder meeting. Consolidated Edison's labor union proposed new rules that would provide employees with more generous pension benefits...
New Way to Occupy Your Time While Unemployed: Sue Your Former Employer
Posted on February 02, 2009The New York Times reports a recent uptick in the number of lawsuits by laid-off workers against their former employers. The report highlights suits by former Lehman Brothers, Eos Airlines and Heller Ehrman employees, who claim they were not given...
This Just In: More on Chickens
Posted on February 02, 2009We're on something of a chicken roll. I just learned that we, the United States" are "the Saudi Arabia of chicken." Stephen Colbert recommends that we form an O-Peck on this clip: I'm not sure how this relates to Frigaliment...
Did Somebody Mention Chicken?
Posted on January 30, 2009Meredith Miller posted a little clip to accompany the teaching of Frigaliment, Judge Friendly's great chicken coup. I suppose we all have our favorite visual tools to aid in conveying the import of that case. For the last couple years,...
I am Chicken (Hear Me Squawk...)
Posted on January 29, 2009I am teaching Frigaliment tomorrow. While I am not going to class in costume, I did "happen upon" this priceless clip, which I intend to share. Perfect at the end of a Friday class: Best lyric: "No, I am no...
Of Miles and Hair Styles
Posted on January 29, 2009First it was the battling dog walkers. Now the hair stylists. Non-competes turn up in the most interesting of places. This in Michigan news via the AP: The Michigan appeals court says Annie Keegan broke a no-compete clause by cutting...
Brandeis University Art Collection on the Blocks?
Posted on January 29, 2009Last year, we reported on legal battles swirling around Fisk University's (thus far unsuccessful) attempt to sell its collection of Georgia O'Keeffe paintings. It seems Fisk was a bit of a trend setter. As The New York Times reports, now...
Welcome, 600,000th Visitor!
Posted on January 29, 2009Yes, it seems only yesterday that we were marking the 500,000th visitor milestone (actually it was May 14th). But today, if form holds, our blog will host its 600,000th visitor. And, as you can see, our many German readers are...
Pay for Performance: Would It Work in Professional Sports?
Posted on January 27, 2009Harvard's Lucien Bebchuk has done great work to advocate that corporate executives' pay be linked to their actual performance. His 2004 book, co-authored with Jesse Fried, Pay Without Performance has had a huge impact in the academy, in the halls...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Lovenheim v. Iroquois Brands
Posted on January 26, 2009This case always generates a lively discussion. It addresses the limitations on a corporation's obligations to distribute proposals of ordinary shareholders along with proxy materials in advance of a shareholder meeting. In this case, Lovenheim, the shareholder, proposed that the...
PETA and Michael Vick Won't Be Working Together After All
Posted on January 22, 2009I know it sounds improbable, but the Associated Press reports that the People For the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and Michael Vick, former professional football player currently serving a 23-month sentence for criminal animal cruelty in connection with his...
New Scholarship: Alan White on Rewriting Contracts
Posted on January 20, 2009My colleague, Alan White, has a new greatest SSRN hit. Yes, for those of you who thought he couldn't top Behavior and Contract, Literacy and Contract, The Case for Banning Subprime Mortgages, or Risk-Based Mortgage Pricing, think again! His new...
Flight Delays Could Lead to Suit for Breach of Contract
Posted on January 19, 2009This from the WSJ: Passengers may be able to sue airlines for breach of contract if flights are delayed too long on the tarmac, according to rules proposed by the Department of Transportation. The agency published details last month on...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Rosenfeld v. Fairchild Engine
Posted on January 19, 2009The issue in Rosenfeld is whether a corporation must pay for expenses incurred in connection with a proxy fight when the insurgent group wins the proxy fight and gains control of the leadership positions in the corporation. The general rule...
Environmentalism Through Breach of Contact
Posted on January 13, 2009Over at Concurring Opinions, fellow contracts prof and fellow Sidley & Austin alum, Nate Oman (pictured) [at this point we exchange the secret S&A signal of recognition across cyberspace], has an interesting commentary on a Washington Post news story about...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Waltuch
Posted on January 13, 2009This case arose in the aftermath of a set of lawsuits against Waltuch which related to his speculative trades in silver while a vice president at Conticommodity Services,Inc. The silver market collapsed in 1980, and Conticommodity's clients sued Waltuch and...
Is Law Her Strong Suit or Is She Bluffing?
Posted on January 12, 2009In what appears to be an exclusive, FlopTurnRiver.com reports that Full Tilt Poker has filed a motion to dismiss a law suit brought in November by former Full Tilt employee and professional poker player, Clonie Gowan (pictured, sporting Full Tilt...
Dow Chemical v. Kuwait's Petrochemical Industries Company
Posted on January 12, 2009As reported in the Times of London, Dow Chemical is seeking up to $2.5 billion in a suit filed against the government of Kuwait for breach of contract. Dow claims entitlement to the damages after Kuwait pulled out of a...
Stephen Colbert's Misconceptions about Contracts
Posted on January 09, 2009Stephen Colbert (pictured before he discovered that he is a Winter) has done the world of contracts a tremendous favor by mentioning contracts on his television show, The Colbert Report, which is fast becoming America's favorite source for fake news....
Minnesota Bridge Collapse Victims Sue Consultant and Contractor for Breach of Contract
Posted on January 08, 2009A bridge collapse sounds like an foray into tort law. And the attorneys for victims of the Interstate 35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis are suing two private companies (a consultant who anlyzed the bridge and the contractor) for negligence. But...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Deutschman v. Beneficial Corp.
Posted on January 06, 2009There's not really much reason to teach this case, except that it helps students learn the difference between a put and a call and that options are securities for 10b-5 purposes. If you have troubles remembering the difference between put...
Reminder: Annual Meeting Panel
Posted on January 05, 2009For those of you attending this week's AALS annual meeting, please remember the Contracts Section's program Friday, January 9, 2009, at 8:30 am in Marina Salon G, South Tower/Level 3, San Diego Marriott Hotel & Marina. The program features a...
Interesting At-Will Employment Case from West Virginia
Posted on January 05, 2009As reported in the West Virginia Record, Williamson Memorial Hospital hired Crystal Hatfield in 2005 as a benefits and special projects coordinator. Her wage -- $14/hour -- angered other employees who had not applied for the position because they were...
GM Seeks In-Kind Damages in Suit v. Cadence Innovation LLC
Posted on January 02, 2009Last year, Cadence Innovation LLC and General Motors entered into a contract under which Cadence would provide parts necessary for certain GM cars. AsThe Detroit Free Press reported last week, Cadence filed for bankruptcy in August 2008 and is now...
Time-Warner Caves in Negotiations with Spongebob, Dora
Posted on January 01, 2009At left, we have SpongeBob, a Nickelodeon character shown in the process of eating Manhattan. Those of you with children may have noticed an annoying scroll covering up SpongeBob's stick legs during yesterday's broadcast. Those of you who get your...
Contracts Issues in the Canadian Television Series "Slings and Arrows"
Posted on December 31, 2008Here is a wholly inadequate trailer for the brilliant Canadian series, "Slings and Arrows." I cannot begin to tell you how tremendous this series is. Let me put it this way. Today is December 31st. If you are sitting there...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Santa Fe Industries
Posted on December 30, 2008Santa Fe Industries owned 95% of the stock of the Kirby Lumber Corp. This put Santa Fe over the relevant threshold under Delaware law and thus permitted Santa Fe to avail itself of Delaware's short-form merger statute. Santa Fe offered...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Transatlantic Financing
Posted on December 29, 2008You may think that the one-week drought in Limericks was a product of the winter holidays, and you might be right. Or it might be an attempt to build up the tension before the following: my last Contracts Limerick!!! Well,...
Two Takes on High-Risk Borrowing ...
Posted on December 23, 2008... one whimsical and seasonal; the other thoughtful and timely. This, from Sunday's Las Vegas Review-Journal: And, from NYU's Oren Bar-Gill, The Law, Economics and Psychology of Subprime Mortgage Contracts: Over 4 million subprime loans were originated in 2006, bringing...
Ho-Ho-Huh?
Posted on December 23, 2008One of my former research assistants sent me this card two or three years ago.
Your Chance to Pre-Screen Two Coming Features
Posted on December 19, 2008The forthcoming December 2008 issue of the New York University Law Review features not one, but two scintillating-looking articles of interest to contracts scholars and teachers. In Efficient Breach Theory Through the Looking Glass, 83 NYU L. Rev. 1679 (2008),...
Now in Print
Posted on December 19, 2008Caleb J. Bartel, Professional Compensation in Bankruptcy: Using Contract Law Principles to Interpret Ambiguous Retention Orders, 9 Transactions 149 (2007). M. H. Sam Jacobson, A Checklist for Drafting Good Contracts, 5 J. Ass'n Legal Writing Directors 79 (2008)...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Basic Inc.
Posted on December 16, 2008It is grading period, which leaves me with little time for posting. Basic, Inc. v. Levinson does not have Limerickworthy facts, but it is too important a case to ignore, as it gives Supreme Court approval to the fraud-on-the-market theory,...
Dick Speidel Tribute at AALS Annual Meeting
Posted on December 15, 2008From our friend Mike Kelly at the University of San Diego: Northwestern University School of Law and the University of San Diego School of Law are hosting a reception honoring the career of Richard Speidel, who passed away this past...
Terri Hatcher Is a Woman of the Highest Integrity
Posted on December 15, 2008All Headline News reports that last year, cosmetics maker Hydroderm accused Terri Hatcher (pictured) of endorsing other products while under contract to endorse its anti-aging products exclusively. One would have to wonder about a person who would have to endorse,...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Clark v. West
Posted on December 15, 2008William Clark had a great reputation as a prolific legal scholar. In 1899, he was hired to teach law at Washington & Lee University. According to Washington & Lee's website, he was fired within weeks and demanded to know the...
Contracts Panel at AALS Annual Meeting
Posted on December 13, 2008Please plan to attend the Contracts Section's program and business meeting at the AALS Annual Meeting in sunny San Diego. The topic for this year's panel is "Immutable Rules and Contract Law." Chosen from among those who the planning committee...
AALS Workshop on Transactional Law
Posted on December 13, 2008You may want to mark your calendars for next June's AALS Workshop on Transactional Law, June 10-12, in scenic Long Beach, California. If you go, keep your eyes open for flying buses and '67 Shelby GTs. (Both scenes are set...
Now in Print
Posted on December 12, 2008Shmuel I. Becher, Assymetric Information in Consumer Contracts: The Challenge That Is Yet To Be Met, 45 Am. Bus. L.J. 723 (2008). Aaron-Andrew P. Bruhl, The Unconscionability Game: Strategic Judging and the Evolution of Federal Arbitration Law, 83 N.Y...
Six Degrees of Judith Regan
Posted on December 11, 2008Kevin Bacon (pictured), step aside. There is a new parlor game in town, thanks to the continuing adventures of Judith Regan, formerly a HarperCollins publisher with her own imprint, the eponymous ReganBooks. Here's how you play the game: one player...
Alex Kuczynski Is Not the Poster-Mom for Surrogacy
Posted on December 11, 2008My heart sank when I saw Alex Kuczynski's article, Her Body, My Baby, in the New York Times Magazine on her experience as the beneficiary of the services of a surrogate mother. I have a child because of the wonders...
Bratz v. Barbie: The Sequel
Posted on December 10, 2008We reported earlier that Mattel won the first round of its legal battle with Bratz doll-maker MGA. Last week, Bloomberg news reported that Barbie was not satisfied to get the Bratz dolls in a headlock. She went for the kill....
4 Sale: 1 Br Condo nr 7 trn w EIC, River Vues & 5-yr $$$back guarantee
Posted on December 09, 2008Does the real estate bust have you beat? Want to buy a new condo, but don't want to worry about waiting for the next boom before you can sell without a loss? Well, Rockrose Development Corporation has a brand new...
Now in Print
Posted on December 09, 2008Oren Bar-Gill & Elizabeth Warren, Making Credit Safer, 157 U. Pa. L. Rev. 1 (2008). Nancy S. Kim, The Software Licensing Dilemma, 2008 BYU L. Rev. 1103. Timothy J. Maun, Comment, iHack, Therefore iBrick: Cellular Contract Law, the Apple iPhone,...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Escott v. BarChris
Posted on December 09, 2008Ordinarily, I would not include a case like Escott v. BarChris in my Business Associations course. First off, it's long. Second, there's not much law in it, or at least not much law for which I like to hold my...
Ebenezer Scrooge on Contract Formation
Posted on December 09, 2008I consulted several print and on-line versions of Dickens's A Christmas Carol and did not find the following dialogue, nor does it appear in all of the film versions of the tale. So, I'll attribute it to the Roger O....
Arianna Huffington + Jon Stewart = Eggplant Parmesan
Posted on December 08, 2008Arianna Huffington (pictured) was on The Daily Show last week promoting her new how-to book on how to be a successful blogger. The key, Huffington says, is to write about your passion, which in her case is cheese. An incredulous...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Nanakuli Paving v. Shell Oil
Posted on December 08, 2008I've taught this case for years, and I've always considered it Limerickworthy, but only recently did the proper rhyme scheme occur to me. Giving credit where credit is due, I must acknowledge that my wife, the celebrated poet Catherine Tufariello,...
Now in Print: Dispatches from Abroad
Posted on December 07, 2008As our world shrinks and becomes increasingly interconnected, U.S. scholars visit or take posts abroad and foreign scholars reciprocate, and private law systems tend to converge, it seems odd that U.S. contracts scholarship is not chock full of citations to...
Wilkinson-Ryan on the Behavioral Economics of Efficient Breach and Liquidated Damages
Posted on December 07, 2008Tess Wilkinson-Ryan, Sharswood Fellow in Law and Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania School of Law, recently posted Do Liquidated Damages Clauses Encourage Efficient Breach?, in which she (1) reports the methodology and results of a series of experiments designed...
Australia: A Movie About Contract Law
Posted on December 07, 2008A few days ago, in a fit of holiday and pre-exam frivolity, I went to see Australia, the latest Baz Luhrmann ? Nicole Kidman collaboration. It?s quite different from Moulin Rouge (no singing to speak of), yet it?s still a...
New CISG Scholarship
Posted on December 03, 2008Antonin I. Pribetic, friend of the blog and the practitioner who has best positioned himself of the traffic circle at which scholarship, Canadian law and the CISG intersect, has a new article out. You can download it from SSRN here....
Buyer?s Remorse, Now With Bite
Posted on December 03, 2008Recently, the New York Court of Appeals unanimously held that the buyers of a house could back out of the deal by disapproving of the contract pursuant to an ?attorney approval contingency.? In Moran v. Erk, the Erks signed a...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: New Horizons v. Haack
Posted on December 02, 2008This is a sad case about a woman, Allison Haack, who formed an LLC with her brother and was left on the hook when the LLC was dissolved because Ms. Haack did not abide by all necessary formalities in dissolving...
Links to Related Blog Posts
Posted on December 01, 2008Just in case there are readers of this blog who are interested in further discussion of the two recent international contracts (i.e. treaties) posted on this blog recently here and here, you can find it over at Opinio Juris. Kenneth...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Selmer v. Blakeslee Midwest
Posted on December 01, 2008Blakeslee-Midwest owed Selmer $120,000, but it offered to pay only $67,000. As Selmer was on the brink of collapse and desperately needed the cash, it accepted the partial payment. Two years later, Selmer sued claiming that the settlement was the...
Now in Print
Posted on November 30, 2008- Michael G. Pratt, Contract: Not Promise, 35 Fla. St. U. L. Rev. 801 (2008). [Meredith R. Miller]
"Black Friday" Scholarship Roundup
Posted on November 28, 2008Although last Friday did not, as once advertised, bring us the cinematic release of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, and today's receipts may not provide retailers the boost they are used to seeing the day after Thanksgiving, the last...
Dr. Pepper, At Long Last, Have You Left No Sense of Decency?
Posted on November 27, 2008Earlier we praised Dr. Pepper on this blog for living up to its agreement to provide a free soda to everyone in America if the new Guns N' Roses album were to appear this year. But now the New York...
More from the Wall Street Journal on How International Law Sucks
Posted on November 26, 2008I have already provided a brief comment on the Wall Street Journal's campaign to blame international human rights law for the sudden rise in piracy off the coast of Somalia. But the Journal's interest in international law goes beyond piracy....
The Law of Turkey Leftovers
Posted on November 26, 2008I have posited here before that all of contract law could be taught with turkey cases. I?ve recycled two turkey posts year after year, perhaps leading some to believe that I fulfill my blogging commitments with leftovers. But, I am...
Is International Law to Blame for Piracy?
Posted on November 26, 2008Well, it's a bit of a stretch, but treaties are just contracts between states, so it's close enough for a day-before-Thanksgiving post. The Wall Street Journal is on a campaign to convince the world that international law is to blame...
I Can?t Believe I Sent it to the Whole Listserve
Posted on November 25, 2008A recurring theme on the ever-fabulous AALS contracts list-serve involves pressing ?reply to all? accidentally. The list is a fabulous resource, but over the years it has seen its share of embarrassments (because it automatically replies to all when you...
The King of Pop Settles with Bahraini Prince
Posted on November 25, 2008Alas, Michael Jackson's fans will have to wait for his next law suit if they want to hear him testify. As reported earlier on this blog, Sheikh Abdulla bin Hamad Al Khalifa, second son of the King of Bahrain, alleged...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: McConnell v. Hunt Sports Enterprises
Posted on November 25, 2008McConnell v. Hunt Sports Enterprises, though a Business Associations case, has a strong contractual element to it. The question at hand is, to what extent can the members of an LLC contract around their fiduciary duties in the LLC agreement....
New Scholarship: Schooner on Contractor Fatalities
Posted on November 24, 2008Steven Schooner (pictured) of the George Washington Law School, has posted to the Social Science Research Network his new article, Why Contractor Fatalities Matter. As a Law Prof whose scholarship focuses on national security and U.S. foreign relations law but...
Now in Print
Posted on November 24, 2008- Marco J. Jimenez, The Value of a Promise: A Utilitarian Approach to Contract Law Remedies, 56 UCLA L. Rev. 59 (2008). [Meredith R. Miller]
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Baby M
Posted on November 24, 2008I taught Baby M for the first time this year. The image at left shows Baby M, at eight cells. Well, it might be Baby M. I'm not really sure. There's not a lot of contracts doctrine in the case,...
Foreclosure Prevention and Modifying Mortgages
Posted on November 21, 2008In light of the subprime mortgage crisis, which lead to the credit freeze, which has dominoed into a full-out global market meltdown, I thought it would be interesting to talk to someone actually "working on the ground" to prevent foreclosures...
Gentlemen's Agreement or Implicit Understanding
Posted on November 20, 2008Today's New York Times has a fascinating account of a dispute regarding a 22-year-old Japanese pitcher named Junichi Tazawa. Mr. Tazawa sports a gaudy 1.02 E.R.A. and can throw a 97 mile per hour fastball. Not surprisingly, Major League Baseball...
World's Worst Director Ordered to Pay $2.1 Million for Breach of Contract
Posted on November 19, 2008Many have called Uwe Boll (pictured) among the world's worst directors. For example, here, here, here, here, and here. Boll has not taken the criticism standing down. Rather, he has challenged his critics to boxing matches and easily bested them...
Two Princes and One King Involved in Breach of Contract Suits
Posted on November 18, 2008First, as reported in eflux Media here, Revelations Perfume and Cosmetics is suing the artist formerly known as the artist formerly known as "Prince" (now, just Prince again -- pictured), as well as his music publisher, Universal. The perfume company...
business Associations Limerick of the Week: Auerbach v. Bennnett
Posted on November 18, 2008Our last Business Associations Limerick introduced the concept of demand in shareholder litigation. We now move on to the next option for boards seeking to stave off shareholder derivative litigation. If demand might well be excused as futile (which, interestingly...
DC Law Firm Sues the D.C. Government
Posted on November 17, 2008BLT reports that Crowell and Moring LLP has filed a suit agaisnt the District of Columbia seeking unpaid legal fees in excess of $300,000. According to the complaint, C&M represented the DC Public Schools from 2001 through March 2006. Despite...
contracts Limerick of the Week: Hoffman v. Red Owl Stores
Posted on November 17, 2008Hoffman v. Red Owl Stores is the classic case for illustrating the grounds for liability in cases of pre-contractual reliance. Generations of students have been drawn to the drama of Mr. Hoffman's heroic efforts. He started a grocery store in...
Now in Print
Posted on November 14, 2008- Albert Choi and George Triantis, Completing Contracts in the Shadow of Costly Verification, 37 J. Legal Stud. 503 (2008). - Jonathan Riley, Embracing the Principle of Growth: A Call for an Expansion of the Doctrine of Fortuitous Event in...
David Defeats Goliath in the Fourth Circuit
Posted on November 13, 2008As WSAZ.com reports, Sam Juniper, a West Virginia man, sued his former employer to enforce the employer's promise that his medical benefits would not change after he retired in 2000. In 2002, he received a $40 invoice relating to some...
Keith Olbermann Contract
Posted on November 12, 2008Remember the Simpsons episode in which Homer invests in pumpkin futures and blithely predicts that the sky's the limit as the calendar moves into November? Well, no matter. Fresh from a huge spike in ratings for Keith Olbermann's show "Countdown...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Grimes v. Donald
Posted on November 11, 2008Grimes v. Donald always makes me think of Nietzsche's Unzeitgemaesse Betrachtungen, cleverly translated as "Thoughts out of Season." Grimes brought a shareholder derivative suit challenging an executive compensation scheme that permitted the CEO (Donald) to declare himself "constructively terminated" if...
Posner on the "Mercury-Like Slipperiness of Indiana Law"
Posted on November 10, 2008It is good see Judge Posner in such good form. His recent opinion in Classic Cheesecake Co., Inc. v. JP Morgan Chase Bank made me laugh out loud. [Note to self: avoid reading Posner during the sermon!] The facts of...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Carroll v. Beardon
Posted on November 10, 2008Carroll is a great public policy case. It involves the sale of a brothel in Montana. The purchase price was in the neighborhood of $50,000, even though the property itself was worth only $6000. Moreover the mortgage was to be...
Now in Print
Posted on November 06, 2008- Michael J. Kelly, Recognizing the Breadth of Non-assignable Contracts in Bankruptcy: Enforcement of Nonbankruptcy Law as Bankruptcy Policy, 16 Am. Bankr. Inst. L. Rev. 321 (2008). - Florencia Marotta-Wurgler, Competition and the Quality of Standard Form Contract: The Case...
We're Number 30!!!
Posted on November 06, 2008According to this post on TaxProf Blog, the ContractsProf Blog is ranked 30th among blogs edited by law professors. For some reason, while we are ranked 30th on visitors, we are unranked on page views despite the fact that we...
Prop 8 Passes in California, Raises Contract Issues
Posted on November 05, 2008Proposition 8, which bans same-sex marriage, was passed by voters in California. Assume the following facts, which probably are not too far fetched: After the California Supreme Court decision allowing same-sex marriage, a same-sex couple in California books a banquet...
On Presidents, Puppies & Promises
Posted on November 05, 2008This blog is, at least nominally, about contracts. The Restatement (Second) of Contracts § 1 defines a contract as "a promise or set of promises for the breach of which the law gives a remedy, or the performance of which...
Prank Call Costs English Broadcaster His Contract
Posted on November 05, 2008Andrew Sachs (pictured) is a 78-year-old English actor and comedian. I'm not familiar with his complete body of work, but I would be surprised if he ever surpassed his performances as Manuel, the Spanish waiter, bellboy and foil to John...
Election Day 2008
Posted on November 04, 2008Just in case your daily routine involves reading this blog but does not involve noticing what day it is, we provide this public service reminder. Today is election day in the United States. Don't forget to vote!! [Jeremy Telman]
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: In re Wheelabrator Technologies, Inc.
Posted on November 04, 2008This case is a bit a dud, but it presents a lot of law in very little space, at least in the edited version provided in the Klein, Ramseyer & Bainbridge casebook that I use, so I continue to like...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Battle of the Forms
Posted on November 03, 2008At some point, the various battle of the forms cases all run together. Merchants exchange form price quotations, purchase orders, confirmations or invoices and then the courts perform the requisite 2-207 dance. It's fun to run the cases through the...
Brown on Halloween, Promises & Signed Documents
Posted on October 31, 2008Halloween time always reminds me of the Peanuts Special, It's The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown. Of course, my thoughts turn to two wise philosophers, admirable contract scholars and lovable losers: Charlie Brown and Linus. For example, in light of the...
An Update on the Google Book Scanning Project
Posted on October 29, 2008Back in 2005 (time does fly when you're blogging), we mentioned Google's plans to scan basically all the books in the world and make them available on the Internet. Publishers and authors were outraged by the project. The Chronicle of...
New Recruiting Tool: Sue Students Who Don't Attend Classes
Posted on October 29, 2008Cincinnatti.com reports that the University of Cincinnati is seeking to recover $6300 from Angela Caliguri. Ms. Caliguri claims that she went onto UC's website to look at its course offerings in 2004. She then compared those course offerings to those...
At Last, A Soft-Drink Company that Keeps Its Word
Posted on October 28, 2008Okay, first a little background. There is a group of musicians that calls itself Guns N' Roses. The band is quite popular, but it has not released a studio recording since 1991. Recently, Guns N' Roses announced that it would...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: In re eBay
Posted on October 28, 2008This is a pretty simple case about usurpation of a corporate opportunity. Investment bankers approached eBay's principals with offers of shares in companies to be distributed in public offerings that the banks were underwriting. In return, the investment banks hoped...
Now in Print
Posted on October 27, 2008- Wayne Barnes, The Objective Theory of Contracts, 76 U. Cin. L. Rev. 1119 (2008). - Daniel B. Bogart, Good Faith and Fair Dealing in Commercial Leasing: The Right Doctrine in the Wrong Transaction, 41 J. Marshall L. Rev. 275...
Marvin v. Marvin Updated: The Tim Burton Case
Posted on October 27, 2008Since we have just posted a Limerick commemorating the most celebrated of palimony cases, Marvin v. Marvin, it is worthy of note that, as MSNBC reports, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Teresa Sanchez-Gordon issued an order on September 16th of...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Marvin v. Marvin
Posted on October 27, 2008Marvin v. Marvin provides for wonderful opportunities to discuss social issues relating to promises made in the context of marriages and other forms of cohabitation. Lee Marvin and Michelle Triola Marvin lived together for six years. At the start of....
Creep Bliss in Seattle
Posted on October 23, 2008Emeritus Professor David Slawson (pictured) of USC's Gould School of Law, provides this link from the Seattle Times, as well as the following summary: A firm based in New York State sells credit-card machine leases to merchants, using supposedly independent...
Chapman, Alabama, 1925
Posted on October 22, 2008Some time ago we noted here that when Joe Webb of Webb. v. McGowin fame was working at the W.T. Smith Lumber Company back in the 1920s, one of his co-workers was Alonzo Huble "Lon" Williams, driver of the train...
Can two people "cohabit" without. . . "doing it"?
Posted on October 22, 2008A majority of the New York Court of Appeals held yesterday that the word "cohabitation" was ambiguous as used in a separation agreement -- namely, because it is unclear whether two people must engage in sexual relations to be cohabiting...
Robin Williams v. Frank & Beans: A Couple of Dicks
Posted on October 22, 2008E! Online reports that Robin Williams is suing a production company by the name of Frank & Beans for $6 million. E! also provides the complaint, which alleges causes of action for breach of contract and promissory estoppel here. According...
Gift Card Class Action Survives in NY Appellate Court
Posted on October 21, 2008We previously mentioned a federal class action against Amex over gift card fees. Well, in a separate state case against Simon Property Group over gift card fees, an appellate court in New York (Second Department) recently held that, in the...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Broz v. Cellular Information Systems
Posted on October 21, 2008Robert Broz wore two corporate hats. He was the President and sole shareholder of RFB Cellular (RFB), and he was also a member of the board of Cellular Information Systems (CIS). A broker of telephone service licenses approached Broz in...
L'il Kim and a L'suit
Posted on October 20, 2008According to the New York Times, rap star L'il Kim has been enjoined temporarily from recording new music. A New York Supreme Court Justice set November 5th as the date for a hearing on the injunction. Independent label Brookland Media...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Balfour v. Balfour
Posted on October 18, 2008Mr. and Mrs. Balfour lived together in Ceylon for 15 years. While Mr. Balfour was on leave from his position in Ceylon and the two were living in England, Mrs. Balfour developed rheumatic arthritis. Her doctors suggested that the cool,...
Now In Print
Posted on October 17, 2008- Michael D. Cicchini, Broken Government Promises: A Contract-based Approach to Enforcing Plea Bargains, 38 N.M. L. Rev. 159 (2008). - Mahmoud A. El-Gamal, Incoherence of Contract-based Islamic Financial Jurisprudence in the Age of Financial Engineering, 25 Wis...
A Take on Clickwrap?
Posted on October 17, 2008Well, not really, but this piece from the Onion does speak volumes about the Internets: CHINO, CA?In an unprecedented and historic event Monday, the "I Am Under 18" button, an Internet security device which if selected restricts access to websites...
Rapid Expansion Leads to Venti Triple Lease Breach
Posted on October 17, 2008Having outgrown itself, Starbucks is in a slump. Back in July, it announced its first list of store closings - taking with it the life of our short-lived outfit in Central Islip, NY. And with the store closings, the WSJ...
Non-Competes in Russia
Posted on October 16, 2008Have you ever wondered whether non-compete clauses are enforceable in Russia? Yury Ivanov writes in the Moscow Times: The main problem with a non-compete clause in Russia is that it may, in certain circumstances and in certain wordings, contradict with...
Statutory Poetry
Posted on October 15, 2008Those who are subscribers to the AALS listserve, or who have had other occasion to interact with Sid Delong (Seattle) will not be surprised to see an example of his razor-sharp wit, but it was still a surprising amount of...
ContractsProf Blogger Concurs
Posted on October 15, 2008As the previous post indicates, our own blogger, University of the Pacific McGeorge School of Law's Miriam Cherry, is now doing double duty as a guest blogger on Concurring Opinions where she is blogging not only about contracts but about...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Bayer v. Beran
Posted on October 14, 2008Alas, I found no public domain images of Jean Tennyson, wife of Camille Dreyfus, who was president of the Celanese Corporation at the time it decided to promote its product (which is not, I repeat, not rayon) by sponsoring a...
The Suit that Could Have Been: Citibank v. Wachovia
Posted on October 14, 2008The Wall Street Journal Law Blog is in mourning. "Oh what fun it could have been," laments the blog. We haven't had a knock-down, drag-out tortious interference with contractual relations claim like this since the glory days of the Texaco-Pennzoil...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Sullivan v. O'Connor
Posted on October 13, 2008Sullivan v. O'Connor involves a promise by a doctor to provide the plaintiff with a nose that "would enhance her beauty and improve her appearance." However, after three surgeries, the plaintiff emerged with a nose that was disfigured and deformed...
Fashion Faux-Pas Could Cost Actress $20 Million
Posted on October 10, 2008The Wall Street Journal's Law Blog reports that Charlize Theron has been "cheating on" Raymond Weil, cuckolding the Swiss watchmaker through a dangerous liaison with Dior. Raymond Weil claims that Theron was caught in flagrante delicto when she wore a...
A Minor Dispute Regarding the Peaceable Kingdom
Posted on October 08, 2008According to the Wall Street Journal, tech entrepreneur and multimillionaire Halsey Minor bought the painting shown at left, Edward Hicks' "The Peaceable Kingdom With the Leopard of Serenity," from Sotheby's for $9.6 million. At the same time, Mr. Hicks bought...
VP Debate as Exam Skills Teaching Moment
Posted on October 07, 2008Sure, the Biden/Palin VP debate in St. Louis seems like years ago, but it is worth noting that it provides a wonderful teaching moment. In exam taking, students struggle with answering the call of the question. If I tell the...
Now in Print
Posted on October 07, 2008- Mary Hunter Morris, Comment, Only "The Punctilio" if I say So: How Contractual Limitations on Fiduciary Duties Deny Protection to Victims of Oppressive Freeze-Outs within Private Business Entities, 10 Duq. Bus. L.J. 73 (2008). [Meredith R. Miller]
Hey! Ho! Let?s Sue!
Posted on October 07, 2008From 1983 to 1987, Richard Reinhardt was a drummer for the legendary New York City punk rock band, The Ramones. As was the band's custom, he took the last name ?Ramone? and, with that, the stage name ?Ritchie Ramone.? Reinhardt...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Caremark
Posted on October 07, 2008In In re Caremark International Inc. Derivative Litigation, Chancellor William T. Allen (pictured) set aside the existing Delaware standard governing a Board's duty of oversight, which had been established in the 1963 case, Graham v. Allis Chalmers. In Graham, the...
A Motivated Employee
Posted on October 06, 2008From The Shining (1980): Jack: Have you ever thought about my responsibilities? Wendy: Oh Jack, what are you talking about? Jack Torrance: Have you ever had a SINGLE MOMENT'S THOUGHT about my responsibilities? Have you ever thought, for a single...
Weekly Top Ten
Posted on October 06, 2008Another Monday and another new Weekly Top Ten, this one featuring a new article by Benjamin Alarie suggesting a new solution to the old Peerless problem. Following are the top ten most-downloaded new papers from the SSRN Journal of Contract...
Glass Ceiling on Government Contracts?
Posted on October 06, 2008Last Thursday, the New York Times reported that although women own almost half of all small businesses in the country, generating $2 trillion in revenue, they are awarded only 3.4% of annual federal contracts. In 2000, Congress voted to put...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Peevyhouse
Posted on October 06, 2008It is a pleasure to be able to post about a case that needs no introduction. Peevyhouse v. Garland Coal is an old stand-by. It's a great teaching case. Not only does it illustrate important issues regarding the proper measure...
Maybe It's Actually a Conditional Gift
Posted on October 01, 2008I don't know why I keep getting annoyed by companies that claim that you can deal with them without having "a contract." This report of a release from Verizon Wireless, for example, reprinted in a reasonably reputable newspaper: Verizon Wireless...
Court Addresses Modification of Clickwrap Agreement
Posted on October 01, 2008The U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland (Titus, J.) recently had occasion to address the modification of a clickwrap agreement. Plaintiffs, real estate appraisers, used defendant FNC?s internet-based service, ?Appraisal Port.? Plaintiffs brought a class action against FNC,...
Poetic Meter and Fault in Contracts Law
Posted on October 01, 2008Our own Keith Rowley was on the program for the conference on Fault in Contract Law held this past weekend at the University of Chicago Law School, with the papers to be published in the Michigan Law Review. I will...
Fruehwald on Reciprocal Altruism as the Basis For Contract
Posted on September 30, 2008Edwin S. Fruehwald (Hofstra) has posted to SSRN a piece titled Reciprocal Altruism as the Basis for Contract. Here's the abstract: Behavioral Biology illuminates the basis of contract. Behavioral biologists believe that genes are selfish; they are only interested in...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Francis v. United Jersey Bank
Posted on September 30, 2008Poor Lillian Pritchard gave in to depression after her husband's death. Her husband, loving father that he was, tried to warn Lillian of the vipers she had raised. "He'll steal the shirt off your back," Mr. Pritchard warned Lillian, speaking...
Selling Your Patrimony?
Posted on September 29, 2008Ordinarily we don?t pay much attention here to the kind of cosmic questions that show up frequently in moot court competitions, like whether there?s some sort of constitutional right not to become a "genetic parent." But when the question becomes...
Weekly Top 10
Posted on September 29, 2008Two new papers make our top ten list this week, Alan White's study of voluntary mortgage modifications and Stephen A. Smith's review of an important recent book by James Gordley. As always, there's a good deal of interesting stuff here....
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Oliver v. Campbell
Posted on September 29, 2008Attorney Oliver agreed to represent Dr. Roy Campbell for a stated fee of $750. Okay, it was the 1950s, but even then $750 was a bit low for divorce proceedings that led to a 29-day trial. Things went pretty well...
International Cycling Union and The Grand Tours Reach Accord
Posted on September 29, 2008You may have noticed that this year's Tour de France was missing something. Like, for example, all of the top riders. However, ESPN reports that the International Cycling Union (UCI) and the organizers of the most famous cycling races, the...
Now in Print
Posted on September 26, 2008- Stephen D. Dunn, The Next Reform: The State of Contractual Freedom in China, 9 Austl. J. Asian L. 289-306 (2007). - Norman Otto Stockmeyer, To Err is Human, To Moo Bovine: The Rose of Aberlone Story, 24 T.M. Cooley...
NY Appellate Court: End User Has No Case Against Manufacturer
Posted on September 26, 2008Here's the summary of a recent case out of New York's Second Department involving claims by an end user (grocery store operator) against the manufacturer of cash register software: On this appeal, we are asked to consider whether a dissatisfied...
Bix on Consent
Posted on September 26, 2008Contracts are usually said to be different from things like crimes and torts in that they impose duties based on the consent of the party. We're all bound by duties of tort law whether we choose to be or not,...
If You Can Put a Man on the Moon . . .
Posted on September 26, 2008. . . settling a dispute over a government contract ought to be easy, right? Maybe, maybe not. The two contractors fighting over NASA's proposed Constellation moon-rocket project have apparently called a "weeklong truce" in their battle. United Space Alliance,...
Letterman Resorts to Self Help
Posted on September 26, 2008On Wednesday, John McCain announced that he was suspending his Presidential campaign so that he can help fix the current financial crisis. As a result, he had to back out of his promised appearance on the "Late Show with David...
Lehman Multi-Lender Contracts Under Scrutiny
Posted on September 25, 2008The bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers has caused shockwaves around the world, and those who participated in multi-lender deals the venerable investment banking house are looking anxiously at their contracts to find out just what they?re facing. Lawyers Merritt Pardini, Timothy...
Help Wanted
Posted on September 25, 2008Penn State?s Dickinson School of Law is looking for "distinguished scholars" or "entry-level candidates of exceptional promise" in various areas, including contracts and commercial law. The school is on a $120 million kick to build up it?s law school facilities...
Better Resolution for Insurance Disputes?
Posted on September 25, 2008When an insurance company wrongly denies your claim, or gives you less than you ought to get, you have an arsenal of legal weapons available to you. Fact is, though, that most of these weapons are unrealistic for ordinary people,...
After Ten Years, They're Apparently Fed Up
Posted on September 24, 2008Some contract disputes are simple. Some aren't. The $100 million breach-of-contract dispute between American Skiing Co. and Wolf Mountain Resorts over Park City's The Canyons resort is apparently one of the latter. Asked what the litigation is about, a lawyer...
You Can Lead a Kid to Farnsworth, But You Can't Make Him Think
Posted on September 24, 2008There seems to be a gulf, says Suffolk?s Jeff Lipshaw, between practicing lawyers and the professors who taught them. There is another gulf between the practicing lawyers and their clients. In a new "thought piece," Law's Illusion: Scientific Jurisprudence and...
Update: Dan Rather's Breach of Contract Action
Posted on September 24, 2008We've mentioned before that Dan Rather has sued CBS for breach of contract. Here's an update from the Austin Business Journal: A New York judge ruled Monday that former CBS anchor and longtime newsman Dan Rather can proceed with a...
The Blog Post to Nowhere: Political Economy and the Convenience of Contract
Posted on September 24, 2008You may have heard, Governor Sarah Palin said "thanks but no thanks" to the "bridge to nowhere" in Ketchikan, Alaska. Well, our fourth branch of government, CNN, has uncovered that Gov. Palin did, however, say "yes" to a "road to...
Stop Eating My Intellectual Property!
Posted on September 24, 2008Talk about sour grapes! According to this report on Serious Eats, and this one on The Presurfer, some fruit now comes with an end-user license agreement, which reads as follows: The recipient of the produce contained in this package agrees...
Law v. Social Pressure in Medieval Business
Posted on September 23, 2008How do societies develop methods of enforcing commercial dealings? That?s a subject that both economists and historians have investigated over the years. They've paid particular attention to the "Maghribi," Jewish traders in the Islamic Mediterranean of the Middle Ages...
No, Really, It Has Nothing to Do With the Market Downturn
Posted on September 23, 2008A Russian hedge fund manager is suing the redeveloper of New York's Plaza Hotel, claiming that the $53.5 million penthouses he bought in reliance on computer modeling are unsatisfactory and "attic-like." Andrei Vavilov plunked down $10 million as a down...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Brehm v. Eisner
Posted on September 23, 2008Michael Eisner, Disney's CEO for 20 years, hired his friend, the celebrated Hollywood agent, Michael Ovitz, to be Disney's President. The hire was a disaster from the start. I don't think it was really Ovitz's fault. I blame Eisner. Eisner's...
Joy at Frank's Return
Posted on September 22, 2008Regulars to this blog will notice the return of a number of familiar by-lines. You will be seeing a lot more of Keith and Miriam. And I am especially delighted to have Frank back posting regularly on this blog. Frank...
There's NO Crying in Blogging!
Posted on September 22, 2008As you'll see from today's posts, its good to have our faithful blog editor Frank Snyder "back in the saddle." (His words, and not my own cheap reference to his ill-fated altercation with a quarter horse named Moses). Among other...
Weekly Top 10
Posted on September 22, 2008After a lengthy hiatus and with a semester still fairly new, here are the top ten most-downloaded new papers from the SSRN Journal of Contract and Commercial Law for the 60 days ending September 21, 2008. 1 Freedom of Contract,...
WNE Law Expands
Posted on September 22, 2008Congrats to Western New England College's School of Law, which last week unveiled a new $5.5 million addition to the school's S. Prestley Blake Law Center. It marks a major expansion to the Springfield, Mass. campus. From the release: The...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Colonial Dodge
Posted on September 19, 2008The Millers bought a Dodge station wagon from Colonial Dodge and then realized that it was missing a spare tire. Apparently a strike at the tire manufacturer made it impossible to provide a spare, but the dealer promised to supply...
New Scholarship: Bullshit Promises
Posted on September 18, 2008I promised Curtis Bridgeman (pictured) and Karen Sandrik that I would discuss their new essay "Bullshit Promises" on this blog, so long as I had the time and it wasn't too inconvenient. But now, I don't really feel like going...
Dispute Between New York Public Library and Photographer over Theater Archive
Posted on September 17, 2008Here's a challenging fact pattern, but it is not from an exam. It's from Saturday's New York Times : Leo Friedman and Joseph Abeles formed a partnership, the Friedman-Abeles studio, that specialized in pictures of broadway musicals. Abeles was a...
SDNY Dismisses Action against Iraq based on Impossibility under Article 79 of CISG
Posted on September 17, 2008Prior to the commencement of United States-led war in Iraq, Hilaturas Miel S.L. (?Hilaturas?) entered into a contract to supply the Republic of Iraq with yarn under the U.N. Oil For Food Program. The Southern District of New York (Sweet,...
The NFL Player Formerly Known as Chad Johnson
Posted on September 16, 2008Name changes are hard. I know from personal experience. True, the actual legal process of changing one's name, e.g. from David Aaron Telman to David Aaron Jeremy Telman, is actually quite easy. I paid an attorney a couple hundred bucks...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Kamin
Posted on September 16, 2008As business judgment rule officianados already know, I am a proponent of Stephen Bainbridge's abstention theory of the business judgment rule (BJR). Well, sort of. Actually, I think the BJR is no longer necessary to protect directors, because they are...
Lone Star Supremes Enforce Waiver-of-Reliance Provision
Posted on September 15, 2008The Lone Star Supremes held that a waiver-of-reliance provision precluded a party from claiming fraud in the inducement with respect to an arbitration clause. Two commercial parties settled a protracted dispute over oil and gas royalties. The settlement agreement specifically...
$40 Billion Contract with &%*$! Europeans Canceled
Posted on September 15, 2008I used to think "Why would anybody want to fly on an air bus?" But then I learned then when you pronounce it the proper, French-inflected way, it's really not so bad. That must have been what the Pentagon was...
Now in Print
Posted on September 15, 2008- Victor C. Romero, United States Immigration Policy: Contract or Human Rights Law?, 32 Nova L. Rev. 309-325 (2008). [Meredith R. Miller]
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Evergreen
Posted on September 15, 2008I am fortunate to live in a town that still has a drive-in movie theater, and I am pleased to be using a casebook that includes a case about a drive-in theater. Evergreen Amusement Corp. v. Milstead illustrates the difficulties...
Tagged... We're It...
Posted on September 14, 2008Torts Prof Blog tags us with this meme: (1) identify five non-law blogs that you find interesting, and (2) tag five law-bloggers to do the same thing. I've never been a big fan of chain letters, and this internet meme...
Caveat Employer: Recruiters Beware!
Posted on September 12, 2008If a prospective employee intentionally lies on his resume and gets hired, are the misrepresentations grounds for the employer to rescind the employment contract? According to a recent New York trial court decision, the prospective employee?s misrepresentations are only grounds...
NY Times Reports Tragedy: 21-Year-Old May Have to Work for Only $6 Million
Posted on September 11, 2008The New York Times wants to be able to tell a feel-good story about a local kid, Pedro Alvarez, who grew up in poverty, worked hard and is going to get to live out his dream. Alas, contract law is...
Pictures
Posted on September 11, 2008If you normally view this blog using Internet Explorer, you may have noticed that our pictures are sometimes inexplicably cropped. If you view our blog using a different web browser, such as Mozilla Firefox, which you can download for free...
Battle of the Titans over Huntsman Corp. Deal
Posted on September 11, 2008Jon Huntsman, Sr. the Chairman of Huntsman Corp., a Texas-based chemical company (not to be confused with his son, Jon Huntsman, Jr., the Governor of Utah), is fighting mad. In July 2007, Leon Black's private-equity firm, Apollo Management L.P. agreed...
Florida Condo Buyers Seeking Escape from Contracts
Posted on September 11, 2008The Wall Street Journal reports that Florida is "awash" in empty or unfinished condominiums and that investors, trying to escape their contracts, are going to court seeking to recover their deposits. Thus far, the courts have been unsympathetic. The WSJ...
In Memoriam: Richard E. Speidel (1933-2008)
Posted on September 10, 2008The fields of contracts and commercial law (as well as ADR) lost an important scholar and a wonderful gentleman Saturday. At the time of his death, Dick Speidel was the Beatrice Kuhn Professor Emeritus at Northwestern University School of Law...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Shlensky v. Wrigley
Posted on September 09, 2008Last week's Limerick addressed the famous dictum of Dodge v. Ford Motor Corp., in which the court reminded Henry Ford that his primary goal ought to be shareholder wealth maximization. In discussing that case, we cautioned that there is more...
California Court Puts the Brakes on Warranty Claim
Posted on September 08, 2008The Plaintiff in Shtofman v. Mercedes-Benz of North America, Inc., No. B195677, 2008 WL 3984219 (Cal. Ct. App, Aug. 29, 2008) bought a new 1997 Mercedes S420 in 1997. It came with a 4-year, 50,000 mile warranty. During the warranty...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Neri
Posted on September 08, 2008If the Americas Cup, were a competition among boats to see which could be the subject of the most celebrated lost volume seller case, the 1970 31-foot Broadwater "Bay Breeze" at issue in Neri v. Retail Marine Corp. would surely...
New Contracts Law Scholarship on SSRN
Posted on September 08, 2008Government contracting fans can find something new to read here. It is Steven L Schooner (pictured) and Daniel S. Greenspahn's article, "Too Dependent on Contractors? Minimum Standards for Responsible Governance." Here's the abstract: While acknowledging that there are many benefits,...
UCC Legislative Update
Posted on September 07, 2008Nearly three months after both houses of the Illinois legislature passed SB 2080, Governor Rod Blagojevich signed it into law on August 22, making Illinois the 34th state to enact Revised UCC Article 1 and the 31st state to enact...
Fault in Contract Law
Posted on September 06, 2008Here's the updated programmatic schedule for the symposium on "Fault in Contract Law" later this month at the University of Chicago School of Law: Friday, September 26 9:00 Opening Remarks 9:15?10:45 Panel I Chair: Douglas Baird (Chicago) Eric Posner (Chicago),...
Call for Papers: AALS Annual Meeting
Posted on September 06, 2008The AALS Section on Contracts solicits papers and proposals for our 2009 Annual Meeting program on ?Immutable Rules and Contract Law,? scheduled for Friday, January 9, from 8:30-10:00 a.m. In the last three decades, legal scholars have paid considerable attention...
Now in Print
Posted on September 05, 2008In no particular order: - Katherine A. Burkhart, Note, Layering Administrative Law and Basic Contract Principles: Analyzing the Waiver of FMLA Claims in Severance Agreements, 33 J. Corp. L. 983-1006 (2008). - Nancy Kim, Mistakes, Changed Circumstances and Intent, 56...
The Not So Peaceable Art Kingdom With The Lawsuit of Sotheby's
Posted on September 05, 2008The NY Times reports that Sotheby?s has filed a $16.8 million lawsuit against Hasley Minor, an art collector and Internet entrepreneur. (By the way, The Newsday headline: "Sotheby's Art Attack on Tycoon"). The lawsuit alleges that Minor has refused to...
AZ Supreme Court Permits Breach of Implied Warranties Claim to Proceed Despite Lack of Privity
Posted on September 04, 2008The Supreme Court of the home state of Republican Presidential candidate, John McCain, decided last week that a homebuilder who is not also the vendor of a residence can be sued for breaches of implied warranties of workmanship and habitability...
Complaint in Class Action against Amex over Gift Cards
Posted on September 04, 2008We previously mentioned that a class action was recently filed against American Express here in the Eastern District of New York. The complaint alleges that Amex's gift card practices constitute a breach of contract, unjust enrichment and conversion. Namely, Amex...
In re Seinfeld (Clancy v. King)
Posted on September 04, 2008Oh, how I have waited for this day!! For years, I have been relying on a scene from Seinfeld in which the Seinfeld character tries to return a jacket to a store because he dislikes the clerk who sold it...
Government Owes $1.1 Billion for Breach of Contract
Posted on September 03, 2008The Blog of the Legal Times, BLT for short (cute, non?) reports that the U.S. Court of Appeals has affirmed a judgment of the Court of Claims that the U.S. government breached its lease agreement relating to oil exploration off...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Dodge v. Ford Motor Co.
Posted on September 03, 2008UCLA Law School's Lynn Stout (pictured) says I shouldn't teach Dodge v. Ford Motor Co. anymore. Really! I'm not making this up. Here's her article, and this is the abstract: Among non-experts, conventional wisdom holds that corporate law requires boards...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Sherwood v. Walker
Posted on September 02, 2008My discovery of Otto Stockmeyer's little essay on Sherwood v. Walker inspired me to try my hand at a Sherwood Limerick. Alas, the anxiety of influence is strong here. I tread on paths well worn by other poets. Sherwood v....
Cell Phone Dispute in England
Posted on September 02, 2008According to The Independent, Vodaphone, England's second largest provider of cell phone services, has announced plans to increase its charges for telephone services by as much as 40% per call. But no need for the Brits to keep a stiff...
The Only Sure Winners in the America's Cup: Lawyers
Posted on September 01, 2008Like most lubbers, I've never really cared much about the America's Cup and the millionaires -- oh, sorry, billionaires -- who compete in it. Indeed, I have often said that most of my knowledge of the sea comes from SpongeBob....
Washington Supremes Hold that AT&T's Class Action Waiver is Unconscionable
Posted on August 30, 2008Two days ago, the Supreme Court of Washington upheld a decision that AT&T's class action waiver in the arbitration clause of its Consumer Services Agreement is unconscionable. Despite a clause choosing New York law, the court applied Washington law based...
Lipshaw on Objectivity and Subjectivity in Contract Law
Posted on August 30, 2008Our compatriot Legal Profession blogger Jeffrey Lipshaw (Suffolk University Law School) has a new piece in the Canadian Journal of Law and Jurisprudence titled Objectivity and Subjectivity in Contract Law: A Copernican Response to Professor Shiffrin. It is available on...
Contracts Profs Blog Infecting Serious Scholarship
Posted on August 29, 2008The Thomas M. Cooley Law School's emeritus professor Norman Otto Stockmeyer (pictured) has recently published a charming short article about Sherwood v. Walker. The article, To Err is Human, To Moo Bovine: The Rose of Aberlone Story, can be downloaded...
N.Y. Trial Court Holds that Dental Students' Claims against NYU Not Properly Fashioned as Breach of Contract Action
Posted on August 28, 2008We all know the type of personality that chooses a career in dentistry (which happens to claim both my father and brother in its ranks): Well, today's New York Law Journal reports (subscription required) that a New York County Trial...
More on Judge Pirro
Posted on August 28, 2008Earlier this week, we reported on Eileen Klapak, who was to appear on the "Judge Pirro" show but was unhappy with the way the taping went and is trying to prevent the episode from being aired. In that post, we...
Is the Word "Paid" Ambiguous?
Posted on August 27, 2008The 8th Circuit recently addressed this question in Henning v. Mainstreet Bank. Here are the facts, as told by the 8th Circuit: Henning was a principal and officer in several businesses that borrowed money from Mainstreet. In July 2003, Henning,...
Verizon/Google Deal
Posted on August 27, 2008What do you get when you cross the number 2 wireless communications provider with the number 1 internet search engine? According to the Wall Street Journal, Verizon is hoping to get "a wide-ranging partnership" and "a much-needed jolt for the...
Class Action Against Amex for Gift Card Charges
Posted on August 26, 2008Newsday reports that a class action has been filed against American Express, alleging breach of contract and unjust enrichment based on its gift card policy. Namely, Amex apparently charges $10 for a cardholder to obtain anything below a $5 balance...
What's In a Name? $5 Million, for Instance
Posted on August 25, 2008Jim Morrison is dead. That's his grave at left. So, you would think that if a band plays a tour in the 21st Century under the banner "The Doors of the 21st Century," nobody would be fooled and think they...
Business Associations Limerick of the Week: Barlow
Posted on August 25, 2008If you are wondering why you are reading a Business Associations Limerick on the Contracts Profs Blog, there are a few answers: 1. I ran out of Contracts Limericks 2. I couldn't find any other place to post my Business...
Contracts Limerick of the Week: Borat
Posted on August 25, 2008We here at the Contracts Blog object to accusations that we are obsessed with "Borat." True, we did report on controversies relating to the release signed by participants in the film here, here, here and here. But hey, we were...
Formation Issue before "Judge" Pirro
Posted on August 25, 2008Today is the first day of a new academic year here in Valparaiso, and the local newspaper, the Post-Tribune, is on board with an article about contract formation. That's not how they put it, of course, but a contracts issue...
Court Addresses Class Action Waiver in Commercial Contract
Posted on August 22, 2008Plaintiff advertisers commenced a class action suit against Yahoo!, alleging that Yahoo! breached its advertising agreement in numerous ways. For example, plaintiffs alleged that Yahoo! promised to place plaintiffs' advertisements in a way that targeted plaintiffs' likely customers but, instead,...
Innovative Teachers' Contracts in Danger in Denver
Posted on August 19, 2008The Wall Street Journal reports that school teachers in Denver do not like the pay for performance concept. They are staging sick-out and there is talk of a strike. According to the Journal, the Denver School District district is willing...
NY Codifies "Professor Review Copy Not for Resale"
Posted on August 18, 2008I vaguely recall a discussion on the Contracts Listserv about the legal weight (if any) of the publisher's stamp on textbooks proclaiming: "Professor Review Copy Not for Resale." Well, New York has passed the Textbook Access Act, the central purpose....
Back To School...
Posted on August 18, 2008Here at ContractsProf Blog, we tend to shy away from sartorial advice. That is, unless it is back to school time. In the past, we have recommended this t-shirt for the first day of school: Here's yet another fine possibility...
Now in Print
Posted on August 18, 2008- Dara K. Newman, Note, If You Can't Build It, They Won't Come: Condominium Construction Moratoria and Gentrification, 35 B.C. Envtl. Aff. L. Rev. 593-623 (2008). - Jennifer Young, Case Note, Contracts: The Price of Dignity is $3.19: Should Mutual...
Limerick of the Week: Sea-Land
Posted on August 18, 2008Sea-Land Services v. Pepper Source is another delightful case, a real joy to read. I knew it would be a good one when Chief Judge Bauer began his opinion by calling it "spicy." The case involves one Mr. Marchese (also...
Contract Issue in "A Series of Unfortunate Events"
Posted on August 14, 2008If you are the sort of blog reader who prefers posts about happy resolutions to unsolved mysteries or about dutiful litigants winning large judgments or about smart people doing smart things smartly, you might want to continue your web surfing....
Open Source Software: Why the Difference between Conditions and Covenants Matters
Posted on August 14, 2008Yesterday, on the Electronic Frontier Foundation?s Deeplinks Blog, Michael Kwun keenly asked and addressed the following questions: Imagine that you write some code, and offer it to the public under an open source license that requires that if someone distributes...
Ohio Sues E-Voting Machine Company for Breach of Contract
Posted on August 13, 2008Ohio has waged a countersuit against e-voting machine maker Diebold (now known as Premier Election Solutions), seeking damages caused by malfunctioning machines in the swing state's 2004 and 2006 elections. The Diebold machines are infamous for losing hundreds of votes...
The Favre Contract
Posted on August 12, 2008It is surprising that the New York Jets have gone to so much trouble to sign the washed-up actor, Brett Favre, who didn't even get the girl (Cameron Diaz, pictured left) in his most successful film There's Something about Mary....
California Supremes' Sweeping Ruling Invalidates Non-competes
Posted on August 11, 2008Robert J. Ambrogi of Legal Blog Watch beat us to it, and did it perfectly, so here's his summary: In a ruling sure to send shudders through corporate legal departments up and down the west coast, the California Supreme Court...
Limericks of the Week: Walkovsky v. Carlton
Posted on August 11, 2008Walkovsky v. Carlton is a great case. It always generates a good discussion of the public policy issues surrounding the limited liability protections attendant to the corporate form. The facts are simple; the law is complex. Guy gets hit by...
Moral Damages Awarded in International Arbitration
Posted on August 11, 2008In a recent NYLJ article, Emmanuel Gaillard provides a nice overview of the arbitration award in Desert Line Projects LLC, which granted an Omani company US $1 million in moral damages in a breach of contract dispute against the Yemen...
Shameless Self-Promotion: Medellin & Originalism
Posted on August 11, 2008Months ago, I posted and posted and posted and posted about the Medellin v. Texas case and my concerns that if the U.N. Charter is non-self-executing and therefore without force as a matter of domestic law, the same might be...
Now in Print
Posted on August 09, 2008Now available in print: - Nicholas C. Dranias, Consideration as Contract: A Secular Natural Law of Contracts, 12 Tex. Rev. L. & Pol. 267-327 (2008). From Symposium: Intellectual Property, Trade and Development: Accommodating and Reconciling Different National Levels of Protection,...
Court Allows Associate's Claim to Proceed for Nominal Damages Only Because Damages (for Not Making Partner) are Too Speculative
Posted on August 07, 2008In 1999, plaintiff Patrick Hoeffner ("Hoeffner") began working in Orrick's New York office as an associate in the IP group. In 2002, two of Orrick's New York IP partners left for Chadbourne & Park. Hoeffner was solicited by the departing...
Second Circuit Certifies Contract Modification Question to New York Court of Appeals
Posted on August 07, 2008The Second Circuit has certified a contract question to the New York Court of Appeals in Israel v. Chabra. In that case, Michael and Steven Israel sued to recover a bonus for services rendered to AMC Computer Corp. The Israels...
Grain Contracts: Floods and Price Fluctuations
Posted on August 06, 2008What is a grain farmer obligated to do when a flood causes loss of a crop? Is the farmer still obligated to deliver grain under forward contracts? If the flood causes the market price of grain to increase, can the...
Limerick of the Week: Owen v. Cohen
Posted on August 05, 2008Owen v. Cohen is a highly Limerick-worthy case. First off, since it is about a failed partnership to operate a bowling alley, it, along with Escott v. BarChris, is part of my business associations course's running bowling theme. Second, the...
Blame it on the Lawyers: NDA for iPhone Application Developers
Posted on August 04, 2008iPhone enthusiasts may have noticed that many of the applications available in Apple's much-hyped "app store" fall short. Many of the applications are buggy and have stability and crashing issues. Blame it on the lawyers! Many application developers would tell...
Limerick of the Week: Lawlis
Posted on August 02, 2008I didn't get to post a Limerick last week as we were driving cross country. visiting, inter alia, Devil's Tower. Cross-country trips, I have learned, leave little time for anything but sight-seeing, eating and recovering. So, I will post a...
Now in Print
Posted on August 01, 2008Now available in print: - George S. Geis, Automating Contract Law, 83 N.Y.U. L. Rev. 450 (2008). - Mariana Pargendler, Modes of Gap Filling: Good Faith and Fiduciary Duties Reconsidered, 82 Tul. L. Rev. 1315 (2008). - Lawrence Solan, Terri...
California Court First To Declare Cell Phone Early Termination Fee Illegal
Posted on August 01, 2008This just in from SiliconValley.com: Californians fed up with being charged for ending their cell phone service prematurely won a major victory in a Bay Area court decision that concluded such fees violate state law. In a preliminary ruling Monday,...
Estate Fails to Establish Mistake of Fact as Ground to Rescind Decedent?s Annuity
Posted on July 30, 2008Jean M. Simes (Simes) died of cancer less than four months after purchasing an annuity that provided for monthly benefit payments as long as she lived. The administrators of her estate (the Estate), sought to rescind the annuity based on...
The Boss on the Hold Up Game (and Gas Prices)
Posted on July 29, 2008Back in June, after Adam Liptak's NYT article about the use of Dylan's lyrics in judicial opnions, Prof. Katrina Kuh lamented that: Bruce Springsteen ranks as the third most-cited rocker in judicial opinions. However, I can?t help but think that,...
We Plead the Fifth
Posted on July 28, 2008It is undeniable that, here at ContractsProf Blog, we love all things Rose the 2d of Aberlone. And, we took great interest in this story, via Jeffrey Lipshaw at Legal Profession Blog: As I'm still a member in good standing...
Law Firm Partnership Exits, Partnership Contracts and Fiduciary Limbo
Posted on July 26, 2008With my Business Organizations students, after reading the "grabbing and leaving" agency cases, I always raise the question of what an exiting law firm partner can do without breaching her fiduciary duty to the partnership - in preparation to leave...
Another Plug for The Slippery Slope
Posted on July 24, 2008This time, I think I need not ask forgiveness for a shameless plug for my new podcast project, The Slippery Slope. While the project features general interest, law-related conversations on a wide variety of topics, the most recent episode actually...
"A Kiss is not a Contract"
Posted on July 23, 2008A little July humor from Flight of the Conchords. Caveat: contains language and themes that may not be appropriate for work or the company of children. The summary: a kiss does not constitute a binding promise of anything more (maybe...
Catfight: Barbie v. the Bratz
Posted on July 22, 2008She may look all, "Oooh, let's have a tea party," but Barbie (left) can be a monster in the courtroom. According to news reports, including this one in Tradingmarkets.com, Barbie's Mattel has prevailed over rival MGA, distributor of the Bratz...
Fault in Contract Law at the University of Chicago
Posted on July 22, 2008Ariel Porat and Omri Ben-Shahar provide the following information about an upcoming conference: The University of Chicago Law School and the Michigan Law Review are hosting a conference on FAULT IN CONTRACT LAW. Fault is often considered a tort doctrine,...
Limerick of the Week: The Punctilio
Posted on July 22, 2008I make a big deal out of Cardozo's opinion in Meinhard v. Salmon. The paragraph in which he defines the fiduciary duty among co-venturers in a business is as close to poetry as any legal opinion has ever come. Here...
Missouri Appeals Court Holds that Employee ADR Program is Not an Enforceable Contract
Posted on July 21, 2008In late June, the Missouri Court of Appeals addressed the legal enforceability of a program adopted by Hallmark requiring employees to arbitrate employment disputes. The court held that Hallmark's ADR program did not constitute a contract and that there was...
Tangential Rant on a Pet Peeve
Posted on July 17, 2008This rant is probably more aptly blogged by our friends over at this blog or even this blog, but it will really make me feel better to get this off my chest. When I read this sentence from an inane...
Arbitration Fairness Act Moves to Full Committee
Posted on July 16, 2008Prof. Paul Secunda / Workplace Prof Blog reports that, yesterday, the House Commercial and Administrative Law Subcommittee decided by a voice vote to report the Arbitration Fairness Act bill (H.R. 3010) favorably to the full House Judiciary Committee...
Why Borat Release Agreement is Niiice!
Posted on July 16, 2008We've mentioned the "Borat" release on these pages before. Kent Raygor and Bardia Bakhtari have a fairly detailed discussion of the terms of the release in today's NYLJ in an article titled "Great Success! 'Borat's' Release Agreement Averts Liability...
Bull Semen Mix-Up Leads to £67,000 Damage Award
Posted on July 15, 2008Here's a story for good old Rose the Second of Aberlone. After wrongly labeling the semen of a "valuable Aberdeen Angus bull," a UK artificial insemination center has been ordered to pay £67,000 in damages. The story from the BBC:...
Government Contracts: Are They Sui Generis?
Posted on July 14, 2008Over at the Commercial Law Blog, Jennifer Martin reports and comments on a recent discussion of the nature of government contracts. We have recommended Professor Martin's writings on the subject of wartime contracts before here. For those interested in the...
Limerick of the Week: Fenwick
Posted on July 14, 2008Nothing like a trip to the beauty shop to address a bad hair day (left). But when is a beauty shop receptionist a partner and when is she an employee? In Fenwick v. Unemployment Compensation Committee, we learn that the...
Iowa Supremes Rule in Favor of Ice Cream
Posted on July 14, 2008This Iowa case is a good one for the summer, at least to the extent it involves the production of ice cream. Pursuant to a contract between Wells Diary and Pillsbury, Wells promised to produce Haagen-Dazs ice cream for Pillsbury....
The Slippery Slope
Posted on July 14, 2008I hope I will be forgiven for using this space for a non-contracts item. I wanted readers to know that I have launched a side-side-project of general interest law-related podcasts. Please check it out. You can learn more about the...
Now in Print
Posted on July 12, 2008- Shmuel I. Becher and Tal Z. Zarsky, E-contract Doctrine 2.0: Standard Form Contracting in the Age of Online User Participation, 14 Mich. Telecomm. & Tech. L. Rev. 303-366 (2008). - Margaret F. Brinig, Are All Contracts Alike? 43 Wake...
Subscriber Sues Newspaper for Staff Cuts
Posted on July 11, 2008Raleigh, North Carolina's 's News & Observer reports that Raleigh's News & Observer is being sued by a subscriber angered by new staff cuts. Durham attorney Keith Hempstead alleges that he renewed his subscription just before the newspaper announced that...
Special Commemorative Poem
Posted on July 10, 2008This past week, I have been occupied with sewage problems at home. The sewer line coming out of my house pulled away from the house and was also damaged in other ways that were discovered only after a man who...
Telman is Shifting Paradigms!
Posted on July 08, 2008I would ordinarily leave the honors to my able co-blogger; however, it is hard to see him over that tall pile of moving boxes. Plus, he's a little too humble about the paradigm shifting he has accomplished in legal writing...
Wisconsin Supreme Court Applies Economic Loss Doctrine to Bar Fraud Claims Related to Residential Home Sales
Posted on July 08, 2008In a recent decision, the Supreme Court of Wisconsin held that the economic loss doctrine barred a buyer's claims for intentional misrepresentation in connection with a residential real estate purchase. Plaintiff buyer, Shannon Below, purchased a house in Milwaukee from...
Limerick of the Week: General Automotive v. Singer
Posted on July 07, 2008What a week! I am moving offices while teaching, and we have a sewage leak in our house which prevents us from using the water. I am thus doubly homeless. Thank goodness for my colleague and local hero, Ivan Bodensteiner,...
Speaking of Unconscionability: New Mexico Supremes Refuse to Enforce Class Action Waiver
Posted on July 04, 2008According to the ABA Journal Online, last week, the New Mexico Supreme Court refused to enforce a class action waiver in consumer contracts with Dell Inc. (The consumers sued Dell alleging misrepresentation about the amount of memory contained in the...
Now in Print
Posted on July 04, 2008- Christina Bohannan, Copyright Preemption of Contracts, 67 Md. L. Rev. 616-671 (2008). - Edith M. Brown and Charlene L. Smith, Match Point: All in the Timing, Luck, and Mutual Mistake, 32 Okla. City U. L. Rev. 263-277 (2007). -...
Sonics to Move to Oklahoma; Seattle Grieves
Posted on July 03, 2008We reported earlier on a breach of contract action brought by the Seattle Sonics' former owner Howard Schultz against the new owners of the NBA basketball team, alleging that the new owners had planned all along to move the team...
Rush, You're No Howard Stern
Posted on July 03, 2008The Wall Street Journal reports that Rush Limbaugh (pictured) and Clear Channel have agreed to an eight-year $400 million contract, entailing a salary of $38 million/year plus a $100 million signing bonus. Not bad, but still $100 million shy of...
An Interesting New Unconscionability Decision
Posted on July 02, 2008Thanks to the Ohio State University Moritz College of Law's Larry Garvin for sharing with us details and commentary on Knudsen v. Lax, 842 N.Y.S.2d 341 (Co. Ct. 2007), a recent case in which tenants sued their landlord seeking to...
Nine-Year-Old in Football Contract Dispute
Posted on July 01, 2008One of the images at left is a human brain. The other is a football. Tony Mathis carries something like at least one of these objects in his skull at all times. You be the judge as to which. As...
Phil Spector's Continuing Legal Problems
Posted on July 01, 2008When we last left Phil Spector, he was looking exceedingly creepy while being found not guilty (due to a hung jury) of murder charges in the 2003 death of actress Lana Clarkson in Spector's home. Now, Half Life Source reports...
Limerick of the Week: Majestic Realty
Posted on June 30, 2008This may not be the best Limerick I've ever composed, but I think it among my most useful. It pretty much sums up the case and states the relevant exception to the rule that parties are generally not liable for...
It Depends What You Mean By ?Occupying? The Vehicle
Posted on June 30, 2008Insurance disputes often provide the most interesting interpretation issues. Take for example this recent appellate case out of New York?s Third Department. Plaintiff truck driver was struck by a hit-and-run driver while standing on the street in the City of...
Contracts Prof Snubbed in New Collection of Limericks
Posted on June 27, 2008Limericks seem to be in the news a lot lately. As reported in the Washington Times, Ernest W. LeFever has just published Liberating the Limerick, which includes 230 representative examples of the undersigned's preferred poetic form, contributed by over fifty...
The Newest Investment Vehicle: "Personal Seat Licenses"?
Posted on June 26, 2008How are football franchises managing to raise money for their new stadiums? Well, if the local city and state legislators won't pony up tax dollars, one option is to sell "personal seat licenses" ("PSLs") to well-healed and die-hard fans. The...
Duke Football Wins!!!
Posted on June 26, 2008At left is the Wallace Wade Stadium, home to the Duke Blue Devil football team and site of the 1942 Rose Bowl. These days, Duke isn't really thinking Rose Bowl. Or any bowl really. According to the Louisville Courrier-Journal, Duke...
Judge Demeans Himself: Composes Legal Limerick
Posted on June 25, 2008For some reason, my co-blogger Meredith Miller thinks I ought to be the one to blog about an opinion recently issued by Judge Berle M. Schiller of the U.S. District Court in Philadelphia. The full report on the case is...
Would You Really Want Credit for this Idea?
Posted on June 24, 2008Corey Feldman and Corey Haim are out of the spotlight, but that's nothing a little car-wreck-reality-tv can't temporarily fix (see, e.g., VH1's Surreal Life). The two former childhood stars have been sued for $1 million in L.A. Superior Court based...
Change in Reporting Relationship Entitles Ex-President/CEO to Severance Payments
Posted on June 24, 2008A trial judge in New York recently granted plaintiff C. Richard Stafford summary judgment, holding that his former employer breached his employment contract by failing to make severance payments. Scientia Health Group, Inc., is a venture capital firm that invested...
Further, on Consideration
Posted on June 24, 2008When it comes to the doctrine of consideration, Tulane University School of Law's Mark Wessman (pictured) is a one-man wrecking crew. His latest assault on the doctrine, Recent Defenses of Consideration: Commodification and Collaboration, can be found in the Indiana...
Now in Print: When Tomorrow Has Arrived
Posted on June 23, 2008Lately, SSRN is all the rage. The popularity of SSRN makes sense given that, as it promises, it brings us "tomorrow's research today." And, given that it can sometimes take over a year from manuscript submission to law review publication,...
Limerick of the Week: Manning v. Grimsley
Posted on June 23, 2008Above is a picture of Fenway Park (actual size!), site of Ross Grimsley's immortality as an icon of scope of employment doctrine. On September 16, 1975, some Red Sox fans were doing their best to encourage Grimsley, who was warming...
When Worlds Collide
Posted on June 23, 2008Lately, I've been feeling a bit guilty about posting my business associations Limericks on a contracts blog. But now Emory Law School's Professor Frederick Tung (pictured below the supernova) has solved my problems with an article posted on SSRN and....
A Mind-Bending Ruling on the Status of eBay Sales
Posted on June 20, 2008Uri Geller (pictured) was once famous for bending spoons and other objects with his mind. Does the fact that I have to tell you what he was famous for mean that he is no longer famous? In any case, Geller...
A Fault-Line Drawn in Contracts Theory
Posted on June 20, 2008The University of Virginia Law School of Law's George M. Cohen has a new article out challenging conventional wisdom regarding contract law as a system of strict liability. The piece, The Fault that Lies within Our Contract Law, was written...
And Speaking of FOX Television . . .
Posted on June 18, 2008Fox's megahit American Idol has a problem, and for once, it's not Paula's fault. No, this time the Associated Press is reporting that the problem is with management. The American Federation of Musicians, a musicians' union, is suing the producers...
Writers Walk at Fox
Posted on June 18, 2008Back when The Simpsons was fresh and funny, they had an episode in which Bart and Lisa write an episode of Itchy and Scratchy for the Krusty the Clown show. Realizing that nobody at the networks will take them seriously...
Held: No Contractual Right to Single-Sex Education
Posted on June 17, 2008Back in April, my able co-blogger noted the AP's reporting on the oral argument in Dodge v. Trustees of Randolph-Macon Woman's College. In Dodge, a group of female students sued the college for breach of contract after its trustees decided...
Oregon Politician Liable For Breach of Contract, Inter Alia
Posted on June 17, 2008According to The Oregonian, Craig Berkman "cut quite a figure" for years in Oregon politics. Jeff Mapes reports that Berkman was a big donor in national Republican circles, the chair of the Oregon Republican party, and the great hope for...
Secret Contracts for 50 U.S. Military Bases in Iraq?
Posted on June 17, 2008As reported in the Asian Times Online, various representatives of the Bush administration have been saying for some time that the United States has no interest in "permanent" military bases in Iraq. Whew. That's a relief. However, according to an...
Relationship Negotiation: Why Wait for the Pre-Nup?
Posted on June 16, 2008WSJ Law Blog reports that Valleywag (self-described as "Silicon Valley's Tech Gossip Rag") reports on a supposed agreement between Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his girlfriend. Apparently, when Zuckerberg's girlfriend moved to Silicon Valley, the couple penned a contract to...
Limerick of the Week: Ira S. Bushey & Sons v. U.S.
Posted on June 16, 2008We already know what to do with a drunken sailor. That question has been answered in the famous sea shanty and illustrated in this video (with thanks to Meredith Miller for her technical assistance!): But Judge Friendly had to address...
ATA Sues FedEx for Breach of Contract
Posted on June 16, 2008Ahh, ATA. I have such pleasant memories of flying on your planes out of Midway to LaGuardia. Where are you now, old friend? Alas, like most air carriers, you are in the throes of bankruptcy. Supporters of deregulation, be careful...
Limerick of the Week: The Franchise Cases
Posted on June 10, 2008If you were looking for this weekly installment yestereday, when it usually appears, and were outraged that you could not find it, please sue American Airlines for all damages reflecting your disppointment, including pain and suffering of course. Today's Limerick...
Mandatory Arbitration of Credit Card Disputes Gets Mainstream Press Attention
Posted on June 10, 2008Finally, Business Week's cover story, Banks v. Consumers (Guess Who Wins), brings a mainstream press indictment of the big business of The National Arbitration Forum (NAF), and the not-so-mysterious fact that consumers lose these cases more than 90% of the...
T-Mo Sues Starbucks Over Free Wi-Fi Plan
Posted on June 09, 2008In light of slumping profits, it is no secret that Starbucks is looking to restore its image to the humble coffeehouse of Seattle in 1971. That is, it has undertaken "initiatives intended to restore an authentic coffeehouse experience to the...
I'll make her an offer she can't refuse...
Posted on June 06, 2008For those of you that yearn for the guilty pleasure of celebrity related contract news, book publisher HarperCollins has sued mob daughter Victoria Gotti for the return of a $70,000 advance on a memoir. Reuters reports: Gotti and HarperCollins signed...
SWEEEEEET!!
Posted on June 05, 2008I'm interrupting my vacation to bring this breaking news. I have already posted numerous times (e.g., here, here, and here) on the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision in Medellin v. Texas, in which the Court found that the State of...
Away for the Weekend
Posted on June 05, 2008I will be away this weekend, attending the West Chester University Poetry Conference. Hopefully, I will be able to brush up on my prosody a bit and thus improve the Limericks. If you are in the Philadelphia area and would...
Weiskopf on Lady Duff
Posted on June 05, 2008St Johns University's Nicholas Weiskopf has a new article forthcoming in the Pace Law Review about Cardozo's famous decision involving Lucy, Lady Duff-Gordon (pictured). It's always nice to have occassion to ponder Lady Duff-Gordon and Cardozo's opinion in the Wood...
Supersonic Contract Dispute
Posted on June 05, 2008This is Seattle. A nice place for a basketball team. Or so thought former Seattle Supersonics owner, Howard Schultz. This is Oklahoma City, home of the new owners of the team, including the group's chairman, Clay Bennett. A bit retro,...
Limerick of the Week: Hoddeson v. Koos Bros.
Posted on June 02, 2008Shakespeare? Overrated! I mean, I've looked through the guy's works -- ahem, excuse me, oeuvre -- and I have many complaints. First, the guy can't spell. Second, his plays are full of cliches. "There's something rotten in the state of...
Ding, Dong, the Which* is Dead
Posted on May 29, 2008At its annual meeting last week, the American Law Institute approved an amendment, which NCCUSL (a.k.a. the Uniform Law Commission) had previously approved, replacing the oft-jilted text of Revised UCC § 1-301 with language consistent with pre-Revised UCC § 1-105:...
Pondering Unconscionability
Posted on May 29, 2008Diligently avoiding grading the last of my exams, I ran across a couple of interesting-looking papers recently distributed by the Social Science Research Network -- each of which grapples with the ever-slippery concept of unconscionability. Omri Ben-Shahar, immediate past president...
Speaking of International Law ...
Posted on May 27, 2008Moved by the spirit of Jeremy's recent shout out to the new International Law Prof Blog, I realized it has been more than a year since I last updated this blog's readers on the status of the U.N. Convention on...
Speaking of Fishin' and Baseball Players ...
Posted on May 27, 2008Here's one in honor of our fearless leader, Frank Snyder, who now spends his spare time as a minor league baseball mogul. The recent trade that sent pitcher John Odom (no, not that John Odom) from the Calgary Vipers to...
Idiosyncratic Terms a la Monty Python
Posted on May 27, 2008Groom: We want to buy a bed, please. Mr. Lambert: Oh, certainly. I'll get someone to attend to you. Mr. Verity! Mr. Verity: Can I help you, sir? Groom: Ah, yes. We'd like to buy a bed ... a double...
Limerick of the Week: Botticello v. Stafanovicz
Posted on May 27, 2008This is the case I use to teach the doctrine of ratification, even though in this case the court found no ratification. It's a fun case to teach, and students are usually relieved to learn that the case is easier...
The Antioch College Contract
Posted on May 26, 2008Antioch College held its last commencement ceremonies (for a while) this month. The school's Board of Trustees announced in 2007 that it would close this year, with plans to re-open in 2012. More than half of the Antioch College faculty...
Gone Fishin'
Posted on May 25, 2008Posts are likely to be relatively light around here at ContractsProf Blog over the next week or so, while your humble contributing editors are traveling around the globe. No worries, we'll be back with BIGGER, BETTER and BOLDER content when...
Regulating Early Termination Fees
Posted on May 25, 2008Terminating a cell phone service contract can be cost prohibitive because of the early termination fees charged by most carriers -- that is, the $175 or more the carriers charge if you cancel your service contract early. I have always...
Why Baseball Players Need Tenure
Posted on May 24, 2008One of the overlooked advantages of tenure is that deans cannot trade law professors for players to be named later and the like. More specifically, as the USA Today reports, no dean would think of trading a law professor for...
"Well, my hope is that someday it won't be called a contract; it will be called marriage."
Posted on May 23, 2008Ellen DeGeneres to Senator McCain earlier this week, in an exchange that made McCain visibly squirmy. Her remark is apropos of my previous post concerning the marriage as contract rhetoric. Here's a transcript of their exchange: DeGENERES: We're back with...
"Wow, rockstars ask for some stupid crap."
Posted on May 22, 2008If you need a break from grading exams, check out the Foo Fighter's catering and hospitality contract riders at The Smoking Gun. Quite amusing, and definitely written with an audience in mind, including a clause which acknowledges: "Wow, rockstars ask...
Motorola Judgment Reduced from $4 Billion to Zero
Posted on May 21, 2008Business Week, picking up a story from the Associated Press, reports that a bankruptcy judge has approved a settlement in the Iridium case, reducing Motorola's liability from $4 billion to zero. According to The Register, Iridium was and is a...
Oh, About Computation of Prejudgment Interest. . .
Posted on May 21, 2008The introductory contracts course glosses over topics like the calculation of prejudgment interest (at least, my course does). Here is an excerpt from a recent case from New York's intermediate appellate court (3d Department) that demonstrates the potential complexity of...
Welcome International Law Prof Blog!
Posted on May 20, 2008We at the Contract Profs Blog would like to welcome a new team to the Law Professor Blog Network family. Editors Mark Wojcik (left), Cindy Buys (center), and Michael Peil (right) have joined forces with Contributing Editor, Cyndee B. Todgham...
Limerick of the Week: Mill Street Church v. Hogan
Posted on May 20, 2008Thisis a useful teaching case because it covers both implied actual authority and apparent authority. The Church is bound by Bill Hogan's decision to hire his brother, Sam, to do some work in the church both because a past course...
Not-Quite-Mid-Year UCC Legislative Update
Posted on May 17, 2008Out of deference to friends and colleagues updating casebooks and statutory supplements for publication prior to the start of fall classes, as well as friends and colleagues teaching contracts or commercial law courses this summer or preparing or updating their...
Patriots Fan Ordered to Pay $65,500 in Liquidated Damages for Breach of 10-Year Agreement for "Luxury" Stadium Seats
Posted on May 16, 2008This breach of contract story from the Boston Globe: If you want to buy those luxury seats at Gillette Stadium to enjoy Patriots games, better read the fine print first. A man who decided he wanted out of his 10-year...
Jail Time for Breach of Contract?
Posted on May 16, 2008Today's New York Times reports that a 49-year-old Missouri woman has been indicted for driving a 13-year-old California girl to suicide through use of a MySpace account. According to the indictment, Lori Drew created a MySpace account under the name....
"It's contract law, marriage, that's all it is, contract law."
Posted on May 16, 2008Charles Karel Bouley's reaction (at Huffington Post) to the California Supreme Court's marriage decision. Here's an excerpt of his reaction: Mayor Newsom, I was wrong. I apologize. This morning, May 15, 2008 at 10am, when the California State Supreme Court...
A Right to Health Insurance for Same-Sex Partners? It Depends on What You Mean by ?Similar Union,? ?Recognized,? ?Only Agreement? and ?For Any Purpose?
Posted on May 15, 2008First Vermont allowed same-sex couples to enter into civil unions. Then Massachusetts allowed same-sex couples to marry. (And, JUST HOURS AGO, the Supreme Court of California lifted that state's ban on same-sex marriage). In response to the strides made by...
EarthLink and Wireless Philadelphia Disconnecting
Posted on May 14, 2008According to the Wall Street Journal, EarthLink announced on Tuesday that it would be discontinuing its wireless Internet service in municipal Philadelphia. Since 2006, Earthlink had been working with Wireless Philadelphia to provide low-cost wireless Internet service in the city...
Today is the Day!!
Posted on May 14, 2008Based on our history, I predict that today will be the day that this blog surpasses 500,000 visitors since its inception. If we only had a Uruguayan Peso for each of those visitors . . . . Thanks for visiting!...
The Importance of Appropriate Word Choice
Posted on May 13, 2008This isn't much of a contracts story, but luckily most things can be connected to contract law. Contractual obligation distills to what it appears the parties intended to promise to do. And, the first indicator of what the parties intended...
"No Damages for Delay" Clause Enforced in Colorado
Posted on May 12, 2008A Colorado appellate court recently held that a "no damages for delay" clause in a construction subcontract was enforceable. The general contractor had a highway construction contract with the Colorado Department of Transportation. The general contractor entered into a subcontract...
Limerick of the Week: Watteau v. Fenwick
Posted on May 12, 2008It is worth teaching Business Associations just for this case. It is the perfect illustration of the doctrine of inherent authority. It has all of the necessary ingredients: a general agent for an undisclosed principal who exceeds his authority by...
Kill Lancome!
Posted on May 11, 2008Uma Thurman is mad. In fact, I haven't seen her this mad since Michael Madsen shot her in the chest, took her samurai sword and buried her alive. She is no longer mad at Bill. No, no, that's all in...
Rumors from the Campaign Trail II
Posted on May 10, 2008Here's another rumor that is circulating: At the height of the Lewinsky scandal, Bill Clinton (pictured saying "I did not have sex with that woman . . . " -- well, no, not really) promised Hillary that if she stuck...
Rumors from the Campaign Trail
Posted on May 10, 2008I have heard many versions of a rumor of a contract between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. The deal is that she will get out of the race if he will get her campaign out of its debt . ....
Congress May Close Loophole for Defense Contractors
Posted on May 09, 2008According to the Associated Press, as reported in the Orlando Sentinel, Congress is moving to close a loophole that until now has permitted military contractors to avoid paying taxes and evade the strictures of U.S. employment law by setting up...
Drafting Conference at Emory Law School
Posted on May 09, 2008On May 30-31, 2008, Emory Law School will be hosting a conference entitled "Teaching Drafting and Transactional Skills: The Basics and Beyond." Given recent discussions on this blog (here) and recently scholarship on the subject (noted here) and scholarly interest...
More International Contracts Law Scholarship
Posted on May 06, 2008Florida Coastal School of Law's Charles Martin (pictured) recently published The Electronic Contracts Convention, the CISG, and New Sources of E-Commerce Law in 16 Tulane Journal of International and Comparative Law 1 (Fall 2007). Here's the abstract: Although no non-European...
Limerick of the Week: Gay Jensen Farms Co. v. Cargill, Inc.
Posted on May 05, 2008Gay Jensen Farms Co. v. Cargill Inc. is a great case for teaching the very important principle that contractual relations, including agency relations, can be implied through conduct. In this case, the Warren Grain & Seed company defaulted on contracts...
People Is Stoopid: $5 Million Baby Pictures
Posted on May 05, 2008Question: What kind of person would expose her children to ruthless paparazzi just in order to make a few bucks? Answer: The kind of person who doesn't need the money in the first place. Today's New York Times reports that...
The Army Lawyer: Special Contracts Issue
Posted on May 04, 2008The Army Lawyer's January 2008 issue is a special issue devoted to "Contracts and Fiscal Law Developments of 2007 -- The Year in Review. As the Table of Contents indicates, much of the issue is taken up with developments in...
Peter Alces in University of Illinois Law Review
Posted on May 04, 2008Peter Alces (pictured) of the William and May School of Law has just published Unintelligent Design in Contract, in the University of Illinois Law Review. Here is the abstract: Scholars have expended considerable energy in the effort to ?discover? a....
New Contracts Scholarship
Posted on May 04, 2008Jody Kraus's: From Langdell to Law and Economics: Two Conceptions of Stare Decisis in Contract Law and Theory, has just come out in the Virginia Law Review. Here's the abstract: In his classic monograph, The Death of Contract, Grant Gilmore...
The CISG: The Rodney Dangerfield of Treaties
Posted on May 02, 2008In their new case comment, All Quiet on the CISG Frong: Guiliani v. Invar Manufacturing, the Battle of the Forms, and the Edlusive Concept of Terminus Fixus, James M. Klotz, Peter Mazzacano and friend of the Blog, Antonin I. Pribetic...
The General Services Administration: A Victim of "Terrorism"
Posted on May 02, 2008According to the Wall Street Journal (see story "The Ousting of Lurita Doan"), Lurita Doan (pictured), as chief of the General Services Administration, oversaw "tens of billions of dollars in government contracts" with the help of inspectors general. In her...
New Topical Category: Limericks
Posted on May 01, 2008Thanks to Joe Hodnicki of the Law Professors Blog Network and to Frank Snyder, whose limitless indulgence permits me to post here, we now have a new topical category for the Limericks fans out there. It has not yet been...
WSJ: Meet the New Boss
Posted on April 30, 2008When The News Corporation bought Dow Jones & Company, publisher of the Wall Street Journal, the Bancroft family, which held a controlling interest in Dow Jones, put up a fight in an attempt to protect the Journal's independence. The News...
Limerick of the Week: Gorton v. Doty
Posted on April 29, 2008After a long hiatus from Limerick posting, I have decided to share with the blog's readership a selection from Volume II of my collection of Limericks for Lawyers. Volume II summarizes cases covered in my Business Associations course, but many...
Girls Gone Litigious?!?
Posted on April 29, 2008What do you get when you cross Ashley Alexandra Dupre, the woman with whom former New York Governor Elliot Spitzer allegedly had some very expensive private encounters, with the Girls Gone Wild franchise? a. A law suit. b. A perfect...
Alamo and National Sue Orbitz
Posted on April 28, 2008According to the St. Louis Business Journal, Alamo Rent-A-Car and National Car Rental are suing Orbitz Worldwide, Inc. for breach of contract, alleging that Orbitz has violated its online listing agreement with the two companies and has and improperly removed...
No Punitive Damages in Genentech Case
Posted on April 28, 2008Last week, the California Supreme Court upheld a $300 million verdict on a breach of contract claim against the biotechnology company Genentech (HQ pictured) but struck the $200 million award of punitive damages, according to the San Francisco Chronicle...
"Greed Is Good" Guy Sued
Posted on April 27, 2008As TMZ.com puts it, "A guy that once starred in a movie with Michael Douglas, then became his business partner, is suing the Oscar winner, claiming he got screwed out of millions." Now that's good reporting. Want to know the...
Senate to Employees: You're on Your Own
Posted on April 24, 2008In Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., the Supreme Court ruled, in a 5-4 decision, that Title VII required that a plaintiff allege that defendant acted with discriminatory intent in making adverse pay decisions during the 180 days prior...
"Family Guy" Writers Sue Fox
Posted on April 24, 2008According to the Hollywood Reporter, Seth MacFarlane and 15 other writers of the animated sitcom "Family Guy" are suing 20th Century Fox TV,alleging breach of contract and other claims. The writers allege that Fox has violated its contract with the...
Handwritten Letter of Intent Worth $10.5 Million
Posted on April 22, 2008According to Newsday.com, a jury has awarded $10.5 million to internet executive Alfred West in his suit to enforce a handwritten agrement with IDT Corp. According to the report, West met with IDT founder and chairman Howard S. Jonas on...
Breaking 19th-Century News
Posted on April 21, 2008National Public Radio reports that a 77-year-old Tampa woman is suing the city for its failure to repay a $300 loan made by her great-grandfather to the City of Tampa during the Civil War. Assuming 147 years of interest at...
There's No Crying in Baseball Contracting
Posted on April 21, 2008Portfolio.com reports here on the death of mega-contracts in baseball. Yes, we're thinking of you, Troy Tulowitzki (pictured), and also of Evan Longoria. These are two young baseball players who signed rich but not jaw-dropping contracts with their teams either...
Bear Market for Job Seekersh
Posted on April 20, 2008The New York Times reports that JP Morgan has notified new Bear Stearns hires that they will not be needed. But the unemployed recruits can still keep what the Times calls a consolation prize -- they can keep their signing...
Vermont and Pennsylvania Enact Revised Article 1; Tennessee and Illinois Progress Toward Enactment
Posted on April 18, 2008Governor Jim Douglas signed Vermont HB 563 into law on April 10. Governor Ed Rendell did likewise to Pennsylvania HB 1152 on April 16. Pennsylvania HB 1152, by its terms, takes effect on or about June 15, 2008. Vermont HB...
A Contractual Right to Single-Sex Education
Posted on April 15, 2008According to the Associated Press, the Virginia Supreme Court heard on Monday from Wyatt B. Durrette, Jr., attorney for women students admitted to the Randolph Macon Women's College (now known as Randolph College) who have alleged that the college's governing...
Class Action v. Southwest Airlines
Posted on April 15, 2008The International Herald Tribune reports that four Southwest Airlines passengers are bringing a federal action alleging breach of contract and other causes of action relating to missed inspections of airplanes over a six-year period. According to plaintiffs' lawyer Lew Garrison,...
Trouble on the Treasure Coast
Posted on April 13, 2008The Cyberknife Center of Florida's Treasure Coast is suing the St. Lucie Medical Center (SLMC) in a Marin County court for fraud and breach of contract. Cyberknife opened a multimillion dollar cancer center last summer but closed it in January...
Twilight of the Ringnuts
Posted on April 12, 2008His music has been praised in the most extravagant terms: "He has his half hours." "It's better than it sounds." For fans of Richard Wagner (left), there is no better way to spend 15-16 hours than listening to his singular...
The Future of CBS News: Lame Duck or Albatross?
Posted on April 11, 2008All glory is fleeting. When CBS News hired Katie Couric a year and a half ago, the move represented a clear break with its past. Couric was sure to bring CBS into the 21st century by completing the People Magazinfication...
CBS News Haunted by Its Past: The Dan Rather Suit
Posted on April 11, 2008Dan Rather (pictured) sued his former employer last September. Yesterday, most reports suggested that CBS won something of a victory, with headlines such as "Dan Rather's CBS Lawsuit Loses Some Steam," "Court Dismisses Majority Of Claims In Dan Rather's Lawsuit...
Legal Recruiters and Mutual Assent
Posted on April 09, 2008A legal recruiter sued Akin Gump for a placement fee, and a New York trial court recently granted the law firm summary judgment. The recruiter sent an unsolicited email to a partner of the law firm, attaching the resume of...
Trek Sues to End Contract with Greg LeMond
Posted on April 09, 2008At left is Greg LeMond (in the yellow jersey) poised to win his third Tour de France. In 1986, LeMond became the first American to win cycling's most celebrated race. In 1987, he was nearly killed in a hunting accident....
Medellin and Contracts Revisited II
Posted on April 08, 2008Justice Roberts' opinion in Medellin v. Texas has been praised as "modest and fairly careful." But on the crucial question of self-execution, I find the opinion both bold and confusing. Bold, because I think the petition for cert. was improvidently...
Medellin and Contracts Revisited I
Posted on April 07, 2008Having now carefully read the Medellin case, I have two more comments to make that relate to earlier posts on contracting with the U.S. government and the enforceability of international agreements as domestic law. Today, I will take up the...
Hazardous Duty Pay for Bloggers
Posted on April 06, 2008They work long hours, often around the clock. It's a job that estranges them from family and loved ones -- not only becasue of the demands of their work but also because the experience so alters them that they can...
Rhodes Says Air America is in F**n Breach of Contract
Posted on April 04, 2008This blog has seen its share of radio hosts with contract issues. Now, consider the predicament of liberal talk show host Randi Rhodes, who has a show on Air America. At a recent (off air) appearance on behalf of Air...
More from the Music Industry
Posted on April 04, 2008No doubt influenced by yesterday's post on this blog about the ailing music industry, the New York Times today reports on what it calls "the ailing music industry," which has now teamed up with MySpace to start a new music...
Jay-Z in $150 Million Contract with Live Nation
Posted on April 03, 2008As this blog has previously reported, the music industry is being forced to move away from its reliance on a revenue stream coming from the sale of records LPs CDs well, let's just say the music industry is moving away...
Potential Plot Line for "Six Feet Under"
Posted on April 01, 2008The Metropolitan News-Enterprise is fast becoming one of my favorite sources of contract law news. Last week, the News-Enterprise supplied the basis for a post about chutzpah. Today, the News- Enterprise reports on a fascinating case involving a missing cadaver...
Blogger Wins Book Contract with Regnery Press
Posted on April 01, 2008The New York Times recently reported that one benefit of blogging is the inevitable book deal that follows. So, it was just a matter of time before this blog's Jeremy Telman (pictured) exploited the publicity for his verse generated in...
Bloggers Sued for Breach of Contract
Posted on April 01, 2008The Law Professors Blog Network (LPBN) is suing bloggers Franklin G. Snyder (left, top) and Keith A. Rowley (left, bottom) for breach of contract in connection with their blogging activities on the Commercial Law blog, allegedly in breach of contractual...
Transactional Approaches to Teaching
Posted on March 28, 2008I have been very impressed since (re)joining the teaching profession by the amount of time and energy that law professors devote to pedagogical concerns. This devotion to teaching has been on display recently on the contracts profs listserv, based on...
Contract Law: Fighting Threats to Artistic Integrity
Posted on March 27, 2008While many contracts scholars were busy discussing Medellin and the CISG, the Smashing Pumpkins were busy suing their former record label Virgin Records for breach of contract. The band is apparently peeved that the label is using its name and...
International Agreements: Once More
Posted on March 26, 2008Apologies to those of you who are getting tired of the treaties-as-contracts theme,but once more unto the breach! We have had a couple of recent posts, here and here, about the danger that its international partners will be less willing...
Medellin and the CISG
Posted on March 26, 2008The University of Michigan's Bruce Frier has raised the following interesting question in the aftermath of the Supreme Court's decision in Medellin v. Texas (already mentioned on this blog here) yesterday: Does anyone know whether the CISG is among the...
Teaching Transactional Contracts Law
Posted on March 25, 2008Our faculty, like the faculty at many law schools, is engrossed in the Carnegie report on legal education. Meanwhile, the contracts law professors listserv is bubblin with interesting ideas about integrating practical drafting and transactional skills training into the first-year...
Consumer Law Conference at the University of Houston Law Center
Posted on March 25, 2008More than 30 experts from around the world will converge in Houston on May 23rd and 24th, 2008 to discuss issues of importance to any comsumer law professor at a conference entitled "Teaching Consumer Law -- The Who, What, Where,...
Medellin and Contracts
Posted on March 25, 2008The U.S. Supreme Court today decided Medellin v. Texas. Links to the opinion as well as extended scholarly discussion of the case can be found, for example, on Opinio Juris, here, and on SCOTUSblog, here, here and here. The crucial...
Mistakes Happen: JP Morgan / Bear Stearns Contract
Posted on March 24, 2008As the WSJ Law Blog recounts, today newspapers are reporting that the JP Morgan and Bear Stearns deal is being renegotiated and, in addition to shareholder disapproval, this may be due to contract "mistakes." "Mistakes" apparently include an inadvertently included...
A Bad Case of Chutzpah
Posted on March 23, 2008The Metropolitan News-Enterprise reports on a charming little case called Shalant v. Smith that was recently affirmed by the California Court of Appeals, 2nd District. In 1998, Stuart Smith retained Joseph L. Shalant for $5000 to represent him in a...
Two Reasons Not to Contract with the Government
Posted on March 22, 2008Although I teach contracts and contribute to this blog, I am not a contracts scholar. My main research interests lie at the intersection of U.S. constitutional law and international law. But in that context, I have been thinking a lot...
To Facebook or Not to Facebook
Posted on March 21, 2008Do professors have a life outside of class? Or, do they strut and fret their hour up at the lectern, then lie dormant until the next class starts? Well, if any student ever believed the professor disappeared into a void...
The Mortgage Contingency Clause: A Nice Example of a Condition
Posted on March 21, 2008When teaching the law of contract conditions, I find that the mortgage contingency clause contained in most residential real estate contracts is a palpable example. A simple and recent New York Supreme Court case provides a ready illustration. Plaintiffs/sellers contracted...
Duke Bows to Pressure: Dehydrates Students
Posted on March 21, 2008The Duke Chronicle reports that Duke University removed water dispensers from campus dormitories because their presence violated the terms of a 10-year contract between Duke Dining Services and the Coca-Cola Company. Under the terms of the agreement, only Coca-Cola products...
What We Talk About When We Talk About Supporting the Troops
Posted on March 20, 2008MTV films is releasing Stop-Loss at the end of the month. Here's a synopsis from the website: Decorated Iraq war hero Sgt. Brandon King makes a celebrated return to his small Texas hometown following his tour of duty. He tries...
Ted Nugent Update
Posted on March 17, 2008As we previously reported, a Michigan appellate court awarded Ted Nugent $60,000 in contract damages after the Muskegon Summer Celebration (MSC) retracted an invitation to Mr. Nugent to perform at the Celebration in 2003. Last week, MLive.com reported that, after...
Poverty Law Conference at Valparaiso University
Posted on March 17, 2008I am told that the Valparaiso Univesrity School of Law's Foreclosure Conference announced previously on this blog is already oversubscribed. Those of you who would still like to experience Spring in Indiana might want to attend our Conference on Law,...
More Drama at Regnery Press
Posted on March 16, 2008Last month we reported that a number of convservative authors were headed to arbitration with their claims against Regnery Publishing, a conservative press. This month, according to Human Events.com, in a separate proceeding, the arbitrator ordered author Richard Miniter to...
South Dakota Makes 30
Posted on March 14, 2008By affixing his signature to SB 93 on March 13, 2008, Governor Mike Rounds made South Dakota the thirtieth state to enact Revised Article 1. South Dakota's enactment, along with Kansas's (enacted last year), will take effect on July 1,...
Best Efforts in Base Ball (Circa 1919)
Posted on March 13, 2008Speaking of best efforts, consider the following standard-form language from the 1919 contract between "Shoeless" Joe Jackson and the Chicago White Sox (more precisely, Charles Comiskey, who owned the White Sox): The player agrees to render for the club owner,...
Mike Leigh on Best Efforts (Dedicated to Larry Garvin)
Posted on March 13, 2008Helen Lenoir: Now, gentlemen, we all know why we?re here. We seem to have come to something of a stand-still. Arthur Sullivan: Indeed, we have. Lenoir: Which, Arthur, is because? Sullivan: Because, Helen, I am unable to set the piece...
It's a Mystery: Author's Settlement Agreement is Ambiguous
Posted on March 12, 2008Walter Mosley and Joy Kellman were married for over 13 years. During that time, Mosley commenced his writing career and became famous for, among other works, a series of stories starring a detective named Easy Rawlins, and his sidekick, Mouse....
Government Contracts and the Revolving Door
Posted on March 12, 2008You may know John Ashcroft (left) as the author of "Let the Eagle Soar" or you may know him as a former U.S. Attorney General. In any case, he testified before Congress yesterday, defending a contract that could pay him...
Real Estate Developer's Detrimental Reliance Entitles Him to $6.5 million
Posted on March 11, 2008A trial judge in Suffolk County, New York has awarded a real estate developer roughly $6.5 million in damages based on the developer's "detrimental reliance." The plaintiff Ron Parr, a local real estate developer, had entered into business dealings with...
Contracts, Politics, and National Security
Posted on March 11, 2008On February 29th, the U.S. Air Force announced that it was awarding a $35-40 billion contract to build aerial refueling planes to a team formally led by Northrop Grumman. I challenge anyone to click on the image at left and...
Really Hot Cayanne: Porsche Up in Flames
Posted on March 10, 2008This story concerning allegations of breach of contract, breach of warranty and negligence, courtesy of The BLT: A D.C. law firm specializing in national security cases moved a little away from its niche this week by filing a civil action...
Foreclosure Conference at Valparaiso
Posted on March 10, 2008My colleague, Alan White, has organized a one-day conference, "Defending Foreclsosures, Saving Homes," to be held Friday, March 29, 2008 at the Valparaiso University School of Law. Conference participants will learn about the latest developments in foreclosure and bankruptcy, loss...
Syllabi as Contracts
Posted on March 10, 2008I have often considered beginning my Contracts course by insisting that students sign and return a copy of a mock syllabus containing unreasonable terms on the first day of class. My favorite unreasonable term: If a student's cell phone goes...
Spring Break
Posted on March 09, 2008My postings may be a little thin this week. As some of you know, my second job is as owner of the Texarkana Gunslingers, an independent minor league baseball team. Spring training starts May 1, and I'm off to the...
Vicous Unprovoked Assault on Brian Leiter Refuted!
Posted on March 09, 2008There are three things most everyone knows about our blogmate Brian Leiter (Texas), the author of Brian Leiter's Law School Reports (the People magazine of America's elite law schools), and more recently Brian Leiter's Legal Philosophy Blog. The first is...
How Much Should a CD Cost?
Posted on March 08, 2008Well, of course, a CD should cost whatever the market says it should cost. It's a matter of supply and demand, as anybody familiar with the most basic economic principles will tell you. Oh, wait. That was in the days...
Georgia O'Keefes to Stay at Fisk University
Posted on March 08, 2008In 1949, Georgia O'Keefe donated 101 of her paintings, including Radiator Building -- Night, New York (left) to Fisk University. As CBS reports, O'Keefe's donation required that the paintings not be sold and be kept on permanent display. Fisk University,...
Consequential Damages Welcome Here!
Posted on March 07, 2008In two cases decided on February 18, 2008, the New York Court of Appeals permitted the award of consequential damages despite contractual provisions in insurance policies excluding consequential loss, so long as the damages were the "foreseeable" and "natural and...
Showdown in Minnesota
Posted on March 06, 2008It's high noon in L?etoile du Nord, and the big guns are out and firing. In its "Exchange" forum, the Minnesota Law Review is featuring lively contributions by NYU's Oren Bar-Gill (left) and the University of Chicago's Richard Epstein (below...
To Deponents: More Contract Talk, Less Profanity
Posted on March 05, 2008A federal judge has sanctioned a lawyer and his client for the client's stubborn and sustained use of profanity during his deposition in a contract dispute. The story, from the WSJ Law Blog: First thing we did this morning, after...
Tom Stoppard on Formation Defenses (and Vic Goldberg's "Net Profits Puzzle")
Posted on March 04, 2008Fennyman: Henslowe, do you know what happens to a man who doesn't pay his debts? His boots catch fire! Cut to playhouse interior where the proprietor, Henslowe, is trussed up with his boots being held to a burning brazier Fennyman's...
Peevyhouse Redux?
Posted on March 04, 2008This story from Robert J. Ambrogi at law.com's Legal Blog Watch: It is debatable whether George Washington ever chopped down a cherry tree, but we can be certain he was never dragged into court over it. Not so the Martha's...
Legal Theory Blog Recommends . . .
Posted on March 02, 2008For the first time since December 1, 2007, Lawrence Solum, the inspirator of the Legal Theory Blog, recommends a piece of contracts scholarship as his Download of the Week. He recommends Curtis Bridgeman's Contracts as Plans. Here is the abstract:...
The Best is the Enemy of the Reasonable
Posted on March 01, 2008What?s the difference between a clause requiring "best endeavours" and one requiring "reasonable endeavours"? And, for that matter, one requiring "all reasonable endeavours"? In a decision last year, Rhodia International Holdings v. Huntsman International LLC, [2007] EWHC 292 (Comm), the...
Three Cheers for Merchants!
Posted on March 01, 2008I was just reading with great interest the spiffy new Commercial Law Blog when I came across a fascinating post on The Morality of Trade by Marie T. Reilly (pictured) that included this: If merchants "were [ever] considered" no better...
Why Is a Burrito Sandwich So Hard to Swallow?
Posted on February 29, 2008As Professor Marjorie Florestal (University of the Pacific McGeorge School of Law) notes in the abstract to her new article, Is a Burrito a Sandwich? Exploring Race, Class and Culture in Contracts, a recent case involving the question of whether...
Oman's Random Thoughts on Consideration
Posted on February 29, 2008Nate Oman (William & Mary) asks: why bother with consideration to determine which promises are enforceable? He argues: why not enforce all promises, no matter how trivial, and let litigation costs serve as the gatekeeper for which promises get enforced...
Commercial Law Blog
Posted on February 29, 2008Welcome to the world ... Commercial Law blog. Check it out; add it to your Google Reader subscriptions. [Meredith R. Miller]
Call for Papers: Security and Privacy Issues in IT
Posted on February 28, 2008Those whose work touches on electronic commerce and related issues may be interested in the upcoming Third International Conference on Legal, Security and Privacy Issues in IT, which will be held at the University of Economics, Prague, Czech Republic, on...
India, International Cricket Battle Over Contracts
Posted on February 28, 2008Backers of the new India Premier Cricket League are bracing for a battle with the International Cricket Council over the ICC's decision to schedule matches so as to prohibit players from competing in the upstart league. The Premier League has...
ContractsProf Isn't Chicken
Posted on February 28, 2008One of the seller's witnesses in Frigaliment Importing Co. v. BNS Int'l Sales Corp., 190 F. Supp 116 (1960), testified that "'Chicken is everything except a goose, a duck, and a turkey. Everything is a chicken. . .'" Professor Ethan...
Writers Ratify Strike Settlement
Posted on February 27, 2008The Associated Press reports that 93.6% of the members of the Writers Guild of America voted to ratify a three-year contract with Hollywood movie and television companies, thus ending the tragic writers' strike. Only 4.060 of the 10,500 Guild members...
White House Stands Up For Contracts
Posted on February 27, 2008According to CNN, the White House has issued a warning to Democrats that President Bush will veto a pending bill that would create a $4 billion fund to help state and local government buy homes abandoned in the mortgage crisis....
Courts Should Not Imply Employment Contracts in U.K.
Posted on February 27, 2008When is someone who works for an employer an "employee"? The question can be significant in the U.K., where "employees" have certain rights that "agency employees" do not. Agency employees are those who work for employment agencies, who in turn...
Gooooooooooal! Real Madrid!
Posted on February 27, 2008It's good that somebody keeps track of these things. Most soccer (football) fans are probably focused on such mundane things as how many games their teams win. But the accountants at Deloitte Touche are always focused on the most important...
Blogger in Contract with Warner Brothers
Posted on February 26, 2008Would you pay this man $100,000 to pick music for you? If you answered "Yes!" you must be corporate America. According to the New York Times, Warner Brothers is negotiating a deal with Mario Armando Lavandeira Jr., better known as...
Regulating Service Contracts in the EC
Posted on February 26, 2008The European Community has been working toward a system for encouraging and regulating an internal market in services. How it's going about that task is the subject of Regulatory Strategies on Services Contracts in EC Law, a new paper by...
Students Mull Breach of Contract Action
Posted on February 26, 2008Students at Cambrian College in Sudbury, Ontario, are considering breach of contract actions against the institution's Board of Governors, which voted this week to terminate a geology program for alleged lack of student interest. Critical students point out that Sudbury...
Weekly Top Ten
Posted on February 25, 2008It's been a pretty good week for Christopher Patterson (Florida), who sees two of his recent papers land in the top three this week. All in all, there are four new papers and six returnees. Following are the top ten...
Bluebook Enters 20th Century
Posted on February 25, 2008The second-best-selling law book in history (right behind Deuteronomy) is now on the web. Yep, the 18th edition of the Uniform System of Citation (better known as the Bluebook) is now available on line. You can thus now actually search...
The Predictive Power of This Blog
Posted on February 24, 2008Sports fans were probably surprised by the Chicago Bulls' 135-121 victory over the Denver Nuggets on Friday, since that was the most points the Bulls have scored in a game since 1991. But Contracts Profs Blogs readers knew it was...
CISG Conference at Touro Law Center
Posted on February 24, 2008While Frank is on the topic of conferences at Touro, I should mention the CISG conference which my colleague Jack Graves has organized. It will be held on Friday, April 11, 2008. All the relevant details: here. [Meredith R. Miller]
Call for Papers: Business Law and Technology
Posted on February 24, 2008If you're working in the areas of law and technology, you'll be interested in the upcoming 2nd Annual Conference on Business, Law, & Technology, scheduled for June 17-19, 2008, at the Jacob Fuchsberg Law Center at Touro College in New...
Poetic License
Posted on February 24, 2008Australian poet and critic Les Murray has offered a deal to any publisher who wants a "blurb" from him on a new poetry book. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, on February 13th, Murray wrote to the poetry editor of...
Higher Wages Can't Count as Reimbursement
Posted on February 23, 2008California employers and their employees cannot agree to a system under which the worker gets a higher wage and pays his or her own business expenses, according to a recent decision by the state supreme court. The California Labor Code...
Embattled Hoosier Coach Takes Contract Buyout
Posted on February 23, 2008We previously noted the contractual issues surrounding the termination of Indiana University basketball coach Kelvin Sampson, who was charged with violating NCAA rules and lying about it. Now come reports that Sampson, who denies any wrongdoing, will accept a $750,000...
UCC Article 1 Legislative Update (2/22)
Posted on February 22, 2008As of January 1, 2008, Revised UCC Article 1 was in effect in 28 states -- Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina,...
Help Wanted
Posted on February 22, 2008Upstate New York is beautiful in the fall, and beautiful in the winter, too, if you've got someone to shovel the snow for you. So think about spending the year where the Vale of Onondaga meets the Eastern Sky (left)...
Supreme Court: Arbitration Clause Trumps State Law
Posted on February 22, 2008Law professors keep writing about the problems with pre-dispute arbitration clauses and their possible interference with important public interests. Meanwhile, the U.S. Supreme Court keeps ignoring all that advice. Latest win for the pro-arbitration forces is Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's...
Dispute Resolution and Strategic Sellers
Posted on February 22, 2008Pre-dispute arbitration agreements carry with them the possibility that sellers who include such clauses in End User License Agreements may do so strategically -- that is, that they may use them to gain a systematic advantage over buyers. Do sellers....
Evangelicals and Payday Loans
Posted on February 21, 2008Traditional American usury law has always been heavily influenced by a Biblical tradition that has disfavored lending money at interest. The prohibition of lending money at interest has been condemned at least since Plato, and was completely banned to Christians...
Five Illustrated Tips for Negotiating Non-Competes
Posted on February 20, 2008Forbes.com has an article advising employees (and presumably independent contractors) in their negotiation of non-compete clauses. I much prefer the "in pictures" version of the advice. The 5 tips mirror my classroom teaching on the subject: (1) consult with an...
Trouble for Hoosier Hoops
Posted on February 20, 2008The NCAA has alleged that Indiana University men's basketball coach, Kelvin Sampson, lied to NCAA investigators and violated NCAA rules. What he allegedly lied about was impermissible phone contacts with potential recruits for his team. Samspon is quoted by ESPN...
Store Closing! Everything Must Go!
Posted on February 20, 2008Folks who think they're getting great deals at furniture store going-out-of-business sales may be in for a rude surprise. It seems buyers who think they're taking advantage of a distressed retailer are actually the ones getting stung. Furniture liquidators who...
That's Probably Why It's Considered "Timeless"
Posted on February 20, 2008One of the pleasures of having been educated in the California State Public School System from kindergarten through college is the large number of very famous books you never actually had to read. This means that it's now possible to...
Sub-Primary Loans
Posted on February 20, 2008In a story published on Saturday (arriving in Valparaiso by Pony Express today), The Washington Post reports that Senator John McCain took out a $1 million loan two weeks before the New Hampshire primary in order to keep his then-cash-starved...
Mysteries of the Universe Explained
Posted on February 19, 2008To the left is Jason Kidd. Until recently, Kidd was the point guard for the New Jersey Nets. He's good enough at his job that he was voted to the All Star Team this year, despite his team's disappointing first-half...
Contracting in Wartime
Posted on February 19, 2008At the Fourth International Conference on Contracts, Jennifer S. Martin (University of Pittsburgh) presented a very interesting paper, Contracting for Wartime Actors: The Limits of the Contract Paradigm. Here is the abstract from SSRN: Much can be (and has been)...
Frank Snyder Naked!!
Posted on February 19, 2008Okay, I admit it! This is really just about improving the rankings of the blog. But what a cutey!! Typical Snyder modesty. [Jeremy Telman]
This Blog Thing Might Just Catch On
Posted on February 19, 2008The indefatigable Paul Caron, boss of TaxProf Blog and capo di tutti capi of the Law Professor Blog Network, is at it again with a new ranking of blogs written by law professors. Caron first started doing this in his...
State Sues Over UConn Law Library
Posted on February 19, 2008The University of Connecticut School of Law thought it was getting a new landmark when it spent $24 million for a new library in 1996. It did, but it also wound up with a $15 million lawsuit to go along...
New Fad: Suing for $54 Million
Posted on February 19, 2008As she reports on her very revealing blog, sometime in 2006 Raelyn Campbell bought an extended warranty along with a laptop computer from Best Buy. To make a long story short, Ms. Campbell's computer malfunctioned in May 2007, and the...
Opting In and Out of European Contract Law
Posted on February 18, 2008The European Parliament has been mulling over the question whether to develop "optional instruments" for European contract law -- alternative contract law regimes that parties could elect to use, either on an opt-in or opt-out basis. Exactly how these regimes...
Miscellaneous IT Roundup
Posted on February 18, 2008The new issue of Vince Polley's excellent but really badly titled Miscellaneous IT Related Legal News (MIRLN) is out. Some highlights: * A study suggests that buyers on eBay saved about $19 billion in 2007 over what they would have...
Universal Sued Over Music Royalties
Posted on February 18, 2008A group of musical rights-holders, including those of Count Basie, Benny Goodman, Sarah Vaughan, Patti Page, and Les Brown are suing Universal Music Group, claiming that the company has failed to pay royalties it owes. The basic claim is for...
Weekly Top 10
Posted on February 17, 2008A brief by law and economic scholars in a major energy contract case and the continuing problems of the subprime credit market dominate this week's Top Ten list. Following are the top ten most-downloaded recent papers from the SSRN Journal...
Patriot Spygate and Breach of Contract
Posted on February 16, 2008Ever notice that, sooner of later, nearly everything involves a contract dispute? Take the controversy over whether the New England Patriots improperly took secret videotapes of the St. Louis Rams prior to their meeting in the 2002 Super Bowl. The...
Cycling Contracts?!?
Posted on February 15, 2008To the left is Levi Leipheimer, the cyclist I was hoping would win this year's Tour de France. Why? Because I have great sympathy for any world-class athlete named Levi. But the Tour organizers have dashed my hopes, announcing that...
Law School for Sale
Posted on February 15, 2008A potential buyer is in the wings for the American Justice School of Law in Paducah, Kentucky. The private school -- now almost always described as "troubled" -- saw five of its faculty resign two weeks ago, calling for the...
Carry Me Back to Ye Olde Virginnie
Posted on February 15, 2008It's amazing what you can find on the Internet these days. For those who teach the most famous contracts case in the history of the Old Dominion, Lucy v. Zehmer, here's a blast from the past: A postcard from Ye...
Love Contracts, Revisited
Posted on February 14, 2008Last year, on Valentine's Day, this Blog appropriately recognized the existence of "Love Contracts." Unfortunately, due to the author's preference to wait until commercial television shows appear on DVD so that he can watch them without commercial interruption, he was...
Intrade Calls the Democratic Race for Obama
Posted on February 13, 2008Why is this man smiling? Well, there is website called Intrade that, as described in David Leonhardt's "Economic Scene" column in today's New York Times, permits members to "buy and sell contracts whose price is tied to real-world events." Right...
William & Mary President's Contract Not Renewed
Posted on February 13, 2008Remember the old Dick van Dyke Show? Well, memories of that show stay with me. In one episode Rob (Dick van Dyke), in desparation, hires his wife Laura (Mary Tyler Moore) as a typist for the comedy show ("The Alan...
A Good Time Was Had By All
Posted on February 13, 2008Last weekend, dozens of Contracts professors and other cool cats gathered in sunny Sacramento for the Fourth International Conference on Contracts, hosted this year by the University of the Pacific's McGeorge College of Law. Well-organized once again by ContractsProf blogmeister...
UCC Revised Article 1 Update
Posted on February 13, 2008As of January 1, 2008, Revised UCC Article 1 was in effect in 28 states -- Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina,...
A Legal Obligation to be Witty?
Posted on February 12, 2008The Boston Globe's Miss Conduct, who answers such pressing etiquette questions as whether one should say "bless you" when an aetheist sneezes, reports that she has signed a book deal. Feeling the pinch of reality after having actually executed a...
Contracting Around Rent Stabilization: Void Ab Initio
Posted on February 11, 2008Riverside Syndicate, Inc. v. Munroe is a recent (2/7/08) New York Court of Appeals decision that provides a nice example of a contract that is against public policy. Tenants leased three rent-stabilized apartments that were apparently combined into one unit...
Contracting Around Free Speech
Posted on February 10, 2008According to the BBC, the British Olympic Association (BOA) has, for the first time, asked athletes to sign a contract pledging to abide by an Olympic rule prohibiting political demonstrations or propaganda. The rule in question is Section 51 of...
Holmes and Homes
Posted on February 08, 2008The blogosphere is aglow as opinionators wage battle over morality and contract in the context of the mortgage crisis. Early in contracts courses, students become acquainted with Oliver Wendell Holmes's position on contracts -- that is, a contract is a...
Conservative Authors Suit Headed to Arbitration
Posted on February 02, 2008As reported in The New York Times last year, a group of five authors sued Eagle Publishing, the parent company of Regnery Publishing, alleging that the publisher was depriving authors of royalties by selling the books at deep discounts through...
Dance 10, Negotiations Skills 10 Too, It Appears
Posted on February 02, 2008This blog clearly misunderestimated the dancers, many of whom were part of the original production of "A Chorus Line," who sued for a share in the current revival of the show when it characterized them as "being in a tough...
More Mandatory Arbitration Clauses
Posted on February 02, 2008We have already heard what Homer Simpson thinks of mandatory arbitration clauses here. Now the Consumer Law and Policy blog weighs in with a post that may be of interest here. [Jeremy Telman}
Another Private Equity Buyout Implodes
Posted on January 31, 2008Alliance Data Systems is suing The Blackstone Group, seeking to force the latter, a private equity firm, to go through with a $6.4 billion buyout deal. According to this story in the Dallas Morning News, The Blackstone Group has announced...
Material Omission?
Posted on January 27, 2008This story from today's NY Times: EDDIE CROWE, a 38-year-old former bar manager from Galway, Ireland, thought he had hit the jackpot. In June 2006, after more than a year of searching for a suitable place to open a bar...
Executive Pay at Delphi
Posted on January 27, 2008When it comes to executive compensation, scholars tend to fall into two camps. Some defend current levels of executive compensation as the product of a market. Simply put, highly skilled executives negotiate for very rich compensation packages because of the...
Bridezillas Revisited
Posted on January 23, 2008To the left is Profossor Rich Bodek of the College of Charleston's History Department. He took my wedding photos. He also served as best man, witness and host of the wedding reception. I was very pleased with his work --...
Allocating Contract Liability after the Bubble Bursts
Posted on January 23, 2008The New York Times had an article yesterday about a woman who is suing her real estate agent for persuading her and her husband to pay perhaps 10-15% too much for their $1.2 million house in San Diego. The case...
Evaluations, Contracts and Ethics
Posted on January 22, 2008I have written many an angry letter to Randy Cohen, author of a column called "The Ethicist" which appers in The New York Times' Sunday Magazine. My letters are always about how law and ethics are not the same thing...
Mistake, 33 Cent Gasoline
Posted on December 08, 2007From this story on Yahoo! News: Dozens of drivers made a mad rush for cheap gas after a station employee accidentally changed the price to 33 cents a gallon. An employee closing Trig's Minocqua Shell for the night mistakenly entered...
Corbin, Williston and . . . Homer?!?
Posted on November 28, 2007In his dissent in the recent contracts case, Seawright v Amer. Gen. Fin. Serv., Inc., Judge Boyce F. Martin relied on a rather unusual authority in the lone footnote to the dissenting opinion. Rather than citing to Williston or Corbin...
Wedding Photographer to Pay Damages for Lousy Photos
Posted on November 26, 2007This decision by Judge Sylvia Ash (NY Supreme, Kings County) in Andreani v. Romeo Photographers & Video: FACTS Defendant is a professional photography and video studio, owned and operated by Frances Romeo. On December 31, 2005, Plaintiff entered into a...
Is A-Rod's Contract Rational?
Posted on November 19, 2007Congratulations to Alex Rodriguez (left) on his third MVP award. It is well-deserved. According to press reports, Rodriguez has quipped that he and the New York Yankees are in the "bottom of the fifth inning" in their negotiations on his...
Restitution Conference Announcement
Posted on November 16, 2007On Friday, December 14, 2007, the University of Washington and Lee, Lexington, Virginia, will host a "Roundtable on Restitution and Unjust Enrichment in North America." This information from Professor Eoin O'Dell: The main point underpinning the Roundtable is to get...
Geniuses welcome!
Posted on November 15, 2007If you are reading this post and understanding it, you are likely a genius. So says this website. And if you're the same kind of genius that I am, you believe everything you read on the web. [Jeremy Telman]
Show Me the Euros!
Posted on November 14, 2007According to press reports, supermodel Gisele Bundchen, pictured near left, is demanding to be paid in Euros rather than in U.S. currency. According to Bloomberg, Bundchen is making this demand so that she can "remain the world's richest model" and...
Media Finally Recognize Prawfs' Rock Star Status
Posted on November 14, 2007Talk about burying the lead! National Public Radio's report, "Singing Law Professor Rocks the Classroom" begins by noting that Contracts "can be one of the most tedious, dry and dreaded classes that first-year law students have to take." Well, Contracts...
Dissatisfied with Fridge, Man Sues Sears
Posted on November 07, 2007This story from The Southeast Texas Record: Dissatisfied with a bum refrigerator, John Violette has filed suit against Sears Holding Corp. Violette claims the fridge he bought from a Port Arthur Sears last year has never worked properly. Violette's suit...
FCC Plans to Axe Exclusive Cable Service Contracts
Posted on October 30, 2007From yesterday's NY Times: Federal regulators plan to throw out exclusive cable television service contracts with apartment buildings and open up competition to phone companies, according to a published report. The new rule, which could significantly lower cable prices for...
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