Richard Epstein and the cold war in torts

Journal of Tort Law

Volumn 3, Issue 1, 2010, Pages

  Zipursky, Benjamin C ^a  

^a FORDHAM UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

Epstein; torts

Indexed keywords

EID: 78649542486     PISSN: None     EISSN: 19329148     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2202/1932-9148.1101     Document Type: Review

References (64)

1. See, generally, WILLIAM M. LANDES & RICHARD A. POSNER, THE ECONOMIC STRUCTURE OF TORT LAW (1987);
2. Richard A. Posner, A Theory of Negligence, 1 J. LEGAL STUD. 29 (1972).
3. GUIDO CALABRESI, THE COSTS OF ACCIDENTS (1970).
4. RICHARD A. EPSTEIN, CASES AND MATERIALS ON TORTS (9th ed. 2009).
5. Richard Epstein was editor of the Journal of Legal Studies from 1981 to 1991 and of the Journal of Law and Economics from 1991 to 2001.
6. For a recent example, see, Richard A. Epstein, The Many Faces of Fault in Contract Law: Or, How to Do Economics without Really Trying, 107 MICH. L. REV. 1461 (2009).
7. For example, Epstein represented Intel in Intel Corp. v. Hamidi, 30 Cal. 4th 1342 (2003), and represented tobacco companies in the 1990s.
8. RICHARD A. EPSTEIN, OVERDOSE: HOW EXCESSIVE GOVERNMENT REGULATION STIFLES PHARMACEUTICAL INNOVATION (2008).
9. See, e.g., Jeffrey Rosen, The Roberts Court and Federalism, 4 NYU J.L. & LIBERTY 330 (2009) (describing Epstein as "intellectual hero" of states' rights conservatives). Epstein is the Peter and Kirstin Bedford Senior Fellow, Hoover institution, and an Adjunct Scholar at the Cato Institute.
10. Richard A. Epstein, A Theory of Strict Liability, 2 J. LEGAL STUD. 151 (1973) ["ATSL"].
11. See RICHARD A. EPSTEIN, SIMPLE RULES FOR A COMPLEX WORLD (1995).
12. See, e.g., Richard A. Epstein, Defenses and Subsequent Pleas in a System of Strict Liability, 3 J. LEGAL STUD. 165 (1974);
13. Richard A. Epstein, Pleading and Presumptions, 40 U. CHI. L. REV. 556 (1973).
14. Richard A. Epstein, Life Boats, Desert Islands, and the Poverty of Modern Jurisprudence, 68 MISS. L. J. 861 (1999).
15. See, e.g., Stephen R. Perry, The Moral Foundations of Tort Law, 77 IOWA L. REV. 449 (1992) (grouping Epstein with Coleman and Weinrib as corrective justice theorist). One of the respects in which the Cold War story is misleading is that it omits the strong intellectual movement, deriving from rights-based and justice-based philosophical thinkers, which is usually referred to as "corrective justice theory."
16. See, e.g., JULES L. COLEMAN, RISKS AND WRONGS (1992);
17. ARTHUR RIPSTEIN, EQUALITY, RESPONSIBILITY AND THE LAW (1998);
18. ERNEST J. WEINRIB, THE IDEA OF PRIVATE LAW (1995);
19. Richard A. Epstein, A Theory of Strict Liability, 2 J. LEGAL STUD. 151 (1973);
20. George P. Fletcher, Fairness and Utility in Tort Theory, 85 HARV. L. REV. 537 (1972);
21. Stephen R. Perry, supra. As one who is usually grouped with these thinkers, I certainly do not mean to undermine the significance of what travels under the rubric "corrective justice theory." On the contrary, a central theme of this article is that Epstein's special place in the triumvirate of Calabresi-Epstein-Posner, lies in his having anticipated and motivated some central ideas in the approach to Torts that rights-based theorists have continued to develop.
22. See Epstein, supra note 9.
23. See, generally, Epstein, supra note 9;
24. Epstein, supra note 11;
25. Richard A. Epstein, Causation and Corrective Justice: A Reply to Two Critics, 8 J. LEGAL STUD. 477 (1979);
26. Richard A. Epstein, Intentional Harms, 4 J. LEGAL STUD. 391 (1975);
27. Richard A. Epstein, Nuisance Law: Corrective Justice and its Ultimate Constraints 8 J. LEGAL STUD. 49 (1979).
28. See, e.g., RICHARD A. EPSTEIN, MORTAL PERIL: OUR INALIENABLE RIGHT TO HEALTH CARE (1997);
29. RICHARD A. EPSTEIN, TORTS 64 (1999).
30. See Epstein, supra note 9.
31. See Epstein, supra note 5.
32. See, e.g., EPSTEIN, supra note 10.
33. Epstein, supra note 3
34. Richard A. Epstein, The Uneasy Marriage of Utilitarian and Libertarian Thought, 19 QUINNIPIAC L. REV. 783 (2000).
35. Richard A. Epstein, A Farewell to Pragmatism, 71 U. CHI. L. REV. 239, 244-49 (2004).
36. EPSTEIN, supra note 10 at 96-97.
37. See Epstein, supra note 11;
38. Epstein, supra note 15.
39. EPSTEIN, supra note 10, at 95.
40. Id. at 97. Characterizing Epstein's arguments here as based on liberty and rule-of-law requires some extension of the text in this particular section; it is the relative straightforwardness of strict liability that Epstein is expressly noting with approval.
41. Id. at 101-02.
42. RICHARD A. EPSTEIN, MODERN PRODUCTS LIABILITY LAW (1980);
43. RICHARD A. EPSTEIN, OVERDOSE: HOW EXCESSIVE GOVERNMENT REGULATION STIFLES PHARMACEUTICAL INNOVATION (2008).
44. See Epstein, supra note 16.
45. RICHARD A. EPSTEIN, TAKINGS: PRIVATE PROPERTY AND THE POWER OF EMINENT DOMAIN (1985).
46. See id.
47. Loretto v. Teleprompter Manhattan CATV Corp., 458 U.S. 419 (1982).
48. Richard A. Epstein, Why the FDA Must Preempt Tort Litigation: A Critique of Chevron Deference and a Response to Richard Nagareda, 1 J. TORT L. 5 (2006).
49. RICHARD A. EPSTEIN, FORBIDDEN GROUNDS: THE CASE AGAINST EMPLOYMENT DISCRIMINATION LAWS (1992).
50. EPSTEIN (TAKINGS), supra note 28, at 35-41 (relaxing all four conditions in the early common law for takings of property, in order to fashion a constitutional conception of takings).
51. Epstein, supra note 21.
52. See Epstein, supra note 9.
53. See Richard A. Epstein, Intel v. Hamidi: The Role of Self-Help in Cyberspace, 1 J. L. ECON. & POL'Y 147 (2005);
54. Richard A. Epstein, "Was New York Times v. Sullivan Wrong?" 53 U CHI. L. REV. (1986).
55. Stephen R. Perry, The Impossibility of General Strict Liability, 1 CAN. J.L. & JURIS. 147 (1988).
56. Id. at 161-62.
57. Id. at 164-65.
58. Id. at 168-69.
59. Id. at 171.
60. H.L.A. HART & A.M. HONORÉ, CAUSATION IN THE LAW (1959). It should also be mentioned that Epstein was a student at Oxford just five years after their book, Causation in the Law. See Epstein, supra note 9, at 162-64 (discussing Causation in the Law).
61. See, e.g., A.M. HONORÉ, RESPONSIBILITY AND FAULT (1999) (collecting prior papers).
62. See, generally, John C.P. Goldberg & Benjamin Zipursky, Torts as Wrongs, 88 TEXAS L. REV. 917 (2010).
63. See Epstein articles cited in note 11, supra.
64. See Epstein articles cited in notes 9, 11, and 15.