Treating the Untreatable - A Critique of the Proposed Pennsylvania Right to Treatment Law

Dr. Birnbaum has presented in a most eloquent fashion his case for the right to treatment. His position is simple and is easily understood. No person should be involuntarily confined to a mental institution if he will not receive meaningful treatment. To do otherwise would be to deprive one of liberty without due process of law. Dr. Birnbaum\u27s position that substantive due process requires substantive treatment it seems to me is irrefutable. If we assume that the patient who is confined against his will is not dangerous to society in the strictest sense of that word, then the only defensible reason for depriving him of his liberty is to treat him so that he can rejoin society as a useful and productive person. To confine him in the hospital; throw away the key and pay no attention to whether the substantive grounds for his confinement are being met is indeed a cruel hoax. To date the United States Supreme Court has yet to act to recognize this right; but, surely after the decision of In re Gault, in which the Court recognized that a jail is a jail regardless that the juvenile has been placed there under a civil rather than criminal procedure, the day when this right shall be given legal recognition is not in the distant future

Enlightened Territorialism and Professor Cavers - The Pennsylvania Method

A nice thing happened to territorialism one day. It had the good luck to run into Professor David Cavers. Prior to this encounter it had suffered a cruel fate. From relative obscurity it was touted by Professor Beale and the vested righters as the only solution to choice-of-law problems worthy of intellectual respect. It was quickly encased and enshrined in Restatement I for all to adore and admire. Having been placed on an undeserved pedestal it was not long before this child prodigy began throwing its weight around. The inevitable happened. Under the onslaught of truly brilliant legal thinking and writing territorialism was destroyed. Like all child prodigies, it was not equal to its press releases. From there it was but a short step to obscurity and ignominy. It was the most striking rags to riches to rags story that the law had to offer in this century. And then the meeting with Professor Cavers. The Choice-of-Law Process brought to territorialism a newfound respect. It was neither to be deified nor ignored. It has a place in choice-of-law

From Codling, to Bolm, to Velez: Triptych to Confusion

It is a rare event for a leading Court of Appeals to hand down three major opinions in a quickly developing field of law within a one-year time span. One would have expected that, having been granted the opportunity to speak thrice on the subject of products liability a full decade after the formal adoption of strict liability by leading courts throughout the country, the New York Court of Appeals would have seized the moment to crystallize the law and rid itself of shopworn concepts. Such expectations were only partially realized. The court did in fact break new ground in apparently establishing strict tort liability as an independent cause of action, expanding tort liability to second collision damages, and limiting the scope of disclaimers against nonbargaining third parties. However, despite three separate opportunities the court neglected to clarify the nature and scope of its commitment to the strict tort liability concept. By failing to confront the policy considerations underlying contributory fault, disclaimers, and antiquated duty rules, the New York court has placed itself in the position of being at the same time among the most progressive and retrogressive courts in the nation in the product liability field. Such an uneven performance deserves serious academic analysis

A Moderate and Restrained Federal Product Liability Bill: Targeting the Crisis Areas for Resolution

In this article I have tried to offer a rational, feasible, and politically acceptable solution to the present product liability crisis. To do this, I have first set out the problem. I explain in Part I how courts have created the crisis by formulating incomprehensible legal standards. In Part II, I examine the difficulties with assessing punitive damages against a defendant. In Part III, I discuss the conflict between the torts and workers\u27 compensation systems. In Part IV, I reflect on the need to protect wholesalers and retailers from needless litigation. Part V suggests that a federal study on the role of damages in product liability litigation be undertaken. I then explain in Part VI why Congress need only address these five problem areas to resolve the crisis, and in Part VII, I present my proposed statute

A Return to Jurisdictional Due Process - The Case for the Vanishing Defendant

To author an article concerning the constitutional aspects of longarm jurisdiction over non-resident defendants at this point in time requires an apology. The subject has been on the whole well treated by scholars and courts alike and the student can find excellent analytical and comprehensive works to inform him even as to the most subtle nuances of the field. No new decisions of startling import have been thrust upon us in the past year and those of more ancient vintage have been either fawned over or dissected with such fervor that nary a comma or quotation mark in International Shoe, McGee and Hanson v. Denckla remain uncommented upon. My concern is frankly not with the analytical framework which has developed to date but rather with the more startling proposals which have been suggested by noted scholars in the past several years for the further extension of state-court jurisdiction. The first is the thesis expressed by Professors yon Mehren and Trautman in their pervasive article, Jurisdiction to Adjudicate: A Suggested Analysis. The second, the approach of Professor David Seidelson in his view of the world that lay Beyond Minimum Contacts and the Long-Arm Statutes. It shall be the purpose of this article to critically examine these proposals and then suggest a rationale for continuing constitutional control of the jurisdictional question