Today in Supreme Court History: May 24, 1870

5/24/1870: Justice Benjamin Cardozo's birthday.

Justice Benjamin Cardozo

Comments

[DaivdBehar]

Palsgraf v LIRR. Predicting the rare accidents is the basis of duty. Hey, lawyer wanker, what is the number of the next Big Lotto? You are more likely to be correct than to predict the next crash at the most dangerous intersection in the country. He copied that from St. Thomas. St. Thomas attributed this supernatural power to God, in accordance with his faith. I do not criticize this faith. This dummy attributed it to people.

Why? To plunder the assets of productive people and to redistribute it mostly to the worthless lawyer profession in rent seeking. The orts go to tax sucking parasite client. All government payments to this parasite should be subrogated before distribution to the lawyer.

Torts is one of the biggest fraud heists in history.

Read the sequence of events in Palsgraf. The railroad did nothing wrong except start to move its train on time. This case is a joke.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palsgraf_v._Long_Island_Railroad_Co.

This doctrine destroyed manufacturing in our country. It is unauthorized industrial policy by the greedy, know nothing lawyer profession. Immunity grows an enterprise. Liability shrinks it and destroys it. Those decisions should not be made by greedy lawyers.

[DaivdBehar]

The birth of a lawyer is a national catastrophe. It will kill $5 million in economic value every year it breathes. If a genetic marker can be found to foresee such a national catastrophe, abortion becomes a patriotic duty. Foreseeability is the basis of duty.

[apedad]

You know, you might have a good point (or at least an arguable point), in here if you dropped the crazy-talk.

[DaivdBehar]

See the events of Palsgraf for crazy.

[Krychek_2]

I think apedad's point is that every now and then you actually manage to say something worth considering, but because it's buried so deeply in your over the top histrionics, it's hard to see. Also, if you dropped the over the top histrionics, you might find yourself being taken seriously.

[Dr. Ed 2]

It's more than histrionics. Notwithstanding below, I now remember what I'm seeing indications of, but it's not my place to say what it is.

And the question I have about Palsgraf is twofold -- first, who owned the scale, and second, the wisdom of pushing someone onto a moving train...

[DaivdBehar]

Did you ever try to take candy from a baby? Not so easy. Now try taking $trillion from the worthless lawyer profession. Nothing one can say matters until the arrests.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Apedad, you're right -- there are what I seem to remember as textbook indications of mental illness in his first posting.

I've been out of Student Affairs long enough not to remember exactly what, but there was stuff of a type that I've seen before as a big-time indication of *something*, i.e. legitimate "crazy talk."

I've said this before and I say it again -- Daivd would be wise to consult with a competent mental health professional -- I emphasize "competent" because, IMHO, a lot of them aren't....

[DaivdBehar]

Hi, Doctor. What signs of mental illness have you seen in my posts? Not only are you reading minds as the lawyer is, now you are reading them across the internet. You are also reading the mind of someone you have never met. Is that a bit grandiose on your part?

This is from the KGB Handbook you may have found in the trash. You are defending your failed occupation by calling a dissenter mentally ill. I had to report your Comment because of that personal remark.

[Dr. Ed 2]

You're right, it's the same mental disorder that the Soviets fabricated a new type of, but there are several legitimate versions of it.

Report me to your heart's content, I still strongly encourage you to seek help.

[CJColucci]

Read the sequence of events in Palsgraf. The railroad did nothing wrong except start to move its train on time. This case is a joke.

The railroad won.

[DaivdBehar]

What were its costs? The defense lawyers won. The railroad probably spent more than the value of the life of the plaintiff.

[Jimmy the Dane]

Does the left like this justice? If not, lets start today off by canceling them.

[DaivdBehar]

This case affirms another Medieval doctrine, the chain of causation, with its proximate cause. This is yet another lucrative, fraudulent lawyer superstition.

The modern view of mishaps is that multiple factors come together in one place/one time to cause damage. There may be 12. The bigger the damage, the bigger the number. The prevention of any one may prevent the entire mishap. The majority of these factors are not under the control of the defendant.

Try updating your Medieval doctrines, lawyers, for a change of pace.

The proximate cause doctrine induces a cover up, and suppresses a root cause analysis of these factors. Everything found will be used to plunder the assets of the defendant. Torts, far from being more safety, prevents prevention, and causes more destruction to our nation. This profession must be crushed to save our nation.

[ReaderY]

Even when he suggests things that sound plausible on their surface, they collapse at the slightest investigation.

In Palsgraf v LIRR, Chief Judge Cardozo’s opinion reversed the jury award to LIRR because the plaintiff’s accident wasn’t foreseeable. Far from expanding tort liability to anything conceivably forseeable, as insinuated, the opinion contracted the universe of tort liability by imposing foreseeability as a limitation, without removing any other requirement. The opinion says you can’t have liability without foreseeability. That does not in any way imply that whenever you have foreseeability, you have liability. Moreover, foressability has to be from the point of view of the average human.

In short, Cardozo did the exact opposite of what DavidBehar claimed he did.

Of course, I can hardly fault his consistency on this point. Just as causality is a mere medieval concept, so is logic. While the enlightened DavidBehar has undoubtedly advanced far beyond such limitations on his thinking, we poor schmucks, in our darkness, are stuck with them.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Another interesting thought on that case is what was the LIRR's stated policy on passengers carrying explosives aboard their trains? How common were "fireworks" in NYC at the time, and how legal were they?

I'm sorta thinking that the NYFD might have had something to say about fireworks so unstable that merely dropping them to the platform would set them off -- if that happened in a wooden tenement building, it likely would have ignited a major fire.

BUT if carrying boxes of fireworks was common and legal back then, and if the LIRR permitted them on their trains, then there ought to have been a presumption that a box might be fireworks. (It's why the railroads started labeling hazmats.)

[DaivdBehar]

Go get your money from the doofuses running with unstable fireworks. They got the wrong defendants.

The point is that is about money, and nothing else. The railroad has money. The doofuses do not. The lawyer is going after the innocent party with money. It is not about safety, not about deterrence, not about improving the practice. It is to plunder the productive people in our nation.

That deters well. It deters business startup and business maintenance. This toxic profession must be crushed. There is no other way to take $trillion away from people, than to crush them.

[DaivdBehar]

Cardozo plagiarized St Thomas, as the entire profession does. Problem: St. Thomas said, God can predict and prevent accidents, not people. Not even the Medieval church was as wrong as this toxic lawyer. In 1300, it even said, the proof of the existence of God was supernatural, his existence was in faith, not in the real world. The Church gave up on Scholasticism officially in the 19th Century. The lawyer profession continues to hold onto to it. Why are they that stupid? There are a $trillion reasons.

[Dan Schiavetta]

The Andrews dissent, which is in wonderful simple English, more accurately describes tort law in general, at least as it has developed since then.

[DaivdBehar]

Accepting the current view of the common law. Forget about updating it to the multi-factorial view.

Spill cooking oil in a supermarket. 100 people will walk around it. Walking around it is what is foreseeable. The fall cannot be foreseen. The plaintiff is too stupid or inattentive to walk around it as everyone else has done. It breaks a leg, because of thin bones. No one else taking a fall would have anything more than a sore butt. You are demanding the defendant pay for 2 pre-existing conditions, one is stupidity, the second is thin bones.

You lawyers have made it nearly impossible to start or to stay in business. You must be crushed to save our nation.

[Dr. Ed 2]

More interesting are the store videos that show purported victim *intentionally* stepping on it. Great for introduction at trial...

[DaivdBehar]

That depicts insurance fraud, and is a crime. I am not even discussing the fraud of the lawyer. I am addressing the accepted doctrines.

[DaivdBehar]

Hasn't the Supreme Court ruled that tort defendants have Fifth Amendment procedural due process rights? One such right is to not be subjected to quack, fraudulent, ineffective legal doctrines. The entire torts bar needs to be cancelled based on Cardozo's opinion, quack, fraudulent, supernatural, ineffective, garbage opinion.

[DaivdBehar]

And a violation of the Establishment Clause, being plagiarized from St. Thomas Aquinas.

[Sarcastr0]

So this is mostly just a buncha muted posts. And I feel pretty good about that.

In other news, WTF is up with Florida's 'government gets to decide who private companies associate with' law? Usually there's headlines when an unconstitutional bill is brewing, much less this monstrosity.

https://www.flgov.com/2021/05/24/governor-ron-desantis-signs-bill-to-stop-the-censorship-of-floridians-by-big-tech/

I've got by biases, but how is this not a slam-dunk 1A facial unconstitutionality case?

[David Nieporent]

I’ve got by biases, but how is this not a slam-dunk 1A facial unconstitutionality case?

Because it violates the CDA, and therefore a court to enjoin it need not reach the constitutional argument.

Which would of course be a slam dunk.

[Cal Cetín]

Sadly not a big fan of incorporation (of the Bill of Rights).

But obviously a first-class brain.

And he didn't get his conscience shot off in the war like some Massachusetts-born veterans-turned-judges I could mention.

[Cal Cetín]

Did Hollywood adapt the events in Palsgraf for a scene in one of their action movies?

"Here, sir, let me help you with that package..."

"No, you fool, you don't know what you're..."

BOOM

But in this version, Thor or someone rushes in to save all the civilians. Except the guy with the bomb, of course.

Or they turn back time and Thor grabs the package away from the bad guy without anyone getting hurt.

[Michael P]

David Bernstein discussed this fairly recently, concluding that Cardozo was Portuguese rather than Hispanic: https://reason.com/volokh/2021/04/09/revisiting-the-issue-of-whether-justice-cardozo-was-the-first-hispanic-justice/

[Dr. Ed 2]

It's not his hatred of lawyers as much as his fragmented and disjointed thinking that concerns me. Sentence fragments are one thing, but the fragmented thoughts are another.

And, as I read it, the railroad *won* Palsgraf....

[Krychek_2]

As with anything else in life, lawyers are a mixed bag. If I wanted to take the time to do it, I could write a comment about all the ways the legal system has benefitted society. Whether you love lawyers or hate them, it's not that difficult to cherry pick facts that support your position.

But the broader question is what kind of mindset spends his days going onto a legal blog to constantly harp on his hatred of lawyers. One might certainly be justified in wondering if there is a mental health issue involved, or maybe he was badly hurt by lawyers at some point. I myself have a low opinion of religion, but I don't spend hours on religious blogs commenting on how stupid and idiotic they are for being religious. I read one or two of them to keep myself informed of what is being said, and occasionally I'll comment if a particular topic interests me. But all day, every day, non-stop vicious attacks on them? Nope; I have a life.

[Dr. Ed 2]

It depends on your definition of "Hispanic" -- a definition that excludes Portuguese also excludes Brazilians -- and Brazilians are definitely considered "Hispanic" -- at least in Massachusetts where they are a major immigrant group.

[DaivdBehar]

Portuguese are not Hispanic. They are more Celtic and other ethnic groups. Cardozo is Irish looking.

[LawTalkingGuy]

That's true. But interestingly, a full embrace of Cardozo's position that foreseeability is a limitation on duty, actually empowers judges/lawyers more since that is (typically) a question of law in most jurisdictions which won't be resolved by the jury. So in a completely round-about and incorrect way, he is sort of on the right path that the Cardozo position empowers lawyers and judges at the expense of juries.

[DaivdBehar]

Please, cite a fragmented thought, not due to auto correction on the phone. If you are picking on that, that is internet rudeness. Otherwise, I am referring to unstated ideas, you do not know. You need to ask people to explain any statements you cannot follow. The real lawyers here know what I am talking about.

[DaivdBehar]

Does religion take $trillion and produce nothing of value? Does religion drop the economic growth rate from its natural 10% a year to 2% in a good year?

Religion is an effective competitor of the lawyer profession. It is 100 times more effective at explaining why people should do the right thing, where the law is in total failure at doing that.

[DaivdBehar]

Feel free to comment on how lawyers have benefited society. I welcome such an argument. All I get are personal remarks that commit the Fallacy of Irrelevance.

[DaivdBehar]

Hi, Kry. This is how I relax. Bashing the scumbag lawyer profession helps me forget my real world problems.

[Krychek_2]

It takes a lot of money and produces a lot of wars. Ask the people of Afghanistan, as they are bracing themselves to be ruled by the Taliban again, if religion has been a blessing or a curse. Or the people who lived through Northern Ireland's troubles; ask them if their lives are better off for religion. Or the victims of 9/11.

As with anything else, religion is a mixed bag. Whether you love it or hate it, it's not tough to cherry pick facts that support your position.

But all of this is beside the point, which is what kind of mental health issues do you have that you spend hours of every day coming here to tell us what terrible people you think we are? A lot of people have a low opinion about a lot of things but they don't spend their time going to blogs run by people they hate to keep harping about it. Is your life really so empty that you really have nothing better to do?

[Krychek_2]

They played a large role in ending segregation in the South.

[LawTalkingGuy]

The American Revolution?

[Krychek_2]

Money given to swindlers, con artists and pyramid schemers is mostly voluntarily given too. So what?

And if you think leftists support jihad, then you really need to get out more.

[Krychek_2]

There is a difference in that it is voluntarily given, but that is not a difference that is relevant to the conversation we are actually having, which is whether it is a drain on society.

Respectfully, I spend more time with leftists than you do. Most leftists (you can probably find exceptions) have the same opinion of the Taliban that you do. Most leftists take the position that Islam should not be singled out when it is no worse than other religions are or have been. Islam actually looks a lot like Christianity did about 500 years ago. But not singling it out is not the same as excusing it. Do you hold Christianity to the same standard you would hold Islam?

[Krychek_2]

I'm not telling other people how to spend their money. They can flush it down the toilet for all I care. I do reserve the right to point out that some uses for money are more socially beneficial than others. Had the money that went into erecting the Vatican instead gone to science, we might have landed on the moon 300 years before we did. Or eradicated poverty.

You might be surprised at how many atheists aren't leftists, and, assuming you are right that the left stopped bashing Islam about 15 years ago, do you have a theory as to why?

I did live in a Muslim country for three years. I've also traveled extensively (62 countries, adding two more later this year assuming Covid goes away). In answer to your question about whether I would rather live in a Christian country or a Muslim country (assuming I had a good job wherever I landed), it depends on the country. If my choices are Christian Uganda (where the death penalty for homosexuality was actually seriously discussed not too long ago) or Muslim Jordan (where women are emancipated), I'd have to go with Jordan. On the other hand, if my choices are Christian South Africa or Muslim Saudi Arabia, I'll check out real estate in Cape Town. Your problem is that you are sweeping with too broad a brush. You seem never to have heard of nuance, or to understand that different things are practiced differently in different places.

But set the clock back 1000 years and it's no contest. Put me in a time machine back to the year 1000 and give me a choice between Muslim Cordoba or Baghdad, versus anywhere in Christian Europe, and I'll cheerfully have Muslim neighbors.

[Armchair Lawyer]

"Had the money that went into erecting the Vatican..."

The Catholic church is the single largest non-government provider of health care in the world. 18,000 Clinics. 16,000 homes for the elderly or special needs. 5500 Hospitals, a majority in developing countries. Key Medical Centers throughout history have been run by the Catholics with funding from the church.

The Catholic Church is the single largest private provider of Health Care in the US. 1 in 6 Hospital beds.

The Catholic Church has perhaps the most extensive private health-care delivery system in the nation. It operates 12.6 percent of hospitals in the U.S., according to the Catholic Health Association of the U.S., accounting for 15.6 percent of all admissions and 14.5 percent of all hospital expenses, a total for Catholic hospitals in 2010 of $98.6 billion. Whom do these hospitals serve? Catholic hospitals handle more than their share of Medicare (16.6 percent) and Medicaid (13.65) discharges, meaning that more than one in six seniors and disabled patients get attention from these hospitals, and more than one in every eight low-income patients as well. Almost a third (32 percent) of these hospitals are located in rural areas, where patients usually have few other options for care.

So, next time you're harping on religion....consider that. Consider the sick....

[Krychek_2]

And all of that medical care could have been provided just as well secularly without the attendant religious nuttery.

I never said religion can’t or doesn’t do good works. I’m just not sure that the good outweighs the bad, or that the religious aspect of it is necessary. The Taliban feeds the poor too. Islam in fact requires charity; its one of the five pillars of Islam.

[Armchair Lawyer]

"And all of that health care could've been delivered just as well secularly"..

But it wasn't. Different choices were made with secular funds. Because there were different priorities.

[Krychek_2]

The ones on the good side ultimately won though, and the good side wouldn't have won without them.

[DaivdBehar]

That was hideous in its impact on black people. De Jure segregation, the KKK, genocidal maniac rampages were an all lawyer operation. Then the lawyer totally immunized this massive law breaking.

Prior to the 1960's, racial disparity in social pathology was 10% worse for blacks. After the feminist lawyer destroyed the black family, those shot up to 400%. Good job, lawyers. That black family had survived unbelievable stresses for 350 years. It did not survive the feminist lawyer, that destroyed the black patriarchal family. The Klan took 100 years to lynch 4000 black males. The excess number of murders is 4000 murders a year, thanks to the pro-criminal lawyer profession.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

"The lawyers helped the “bad side” win since the end of Reconstruction, when the Supreme Court decided cases that allowed the South to impose segregation despite the 14th Amendment. The “bad side”, with the help of lawyers, got their way for about 140 years."

Those lawyers are not called the "bad side" at this blog. Instead, they are described as having "traditional values," or "conservative values," or "heartland values." Some here call them "regular Americans" or "normal Americans." Others call them "colleagues."

[Krychek_2]

Kalak, here is what you're arguing: Generals are useless in war because for every one on our side, there's one on the other side. Do you really believe that?

[Krychek_2]

Ah, so you agree with me that lawyers are a mixed bag, and you're arguing just to be argumentative. Got it.

[Krychek_2]

Oh, I can give you a long list of things wrong with the lawyer profession, including some you have probably overlooked. And I did read your original comment, which you then walked back when you responded to me. But nothing in your comment was on point to what I actually said.

[Michael P]

Considered by whom? https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/09/15/who-is-hispanic/ has some interesting statistics on that topic:

"For the most part, people who trace their ancestry to these countries do not self-identify as Hispanic when they fill out their census forms. Only about 3% of immigrants from Brazil do so, as do 1% of immigrants from Portugal and 1% from the Philippines, according to Pew Research Center tabulations of the 2018 American Community Survey.

These patterns likely reflect a growing recognition and acceptance of the official definition of Hispanics. In the 1980 census, 18% of Brazilian immigrants and 12% of both Portuguese and Filipino immigrants identified as Hispanic. But by 2000, the shares identifying as Hispanic dropped to levels close to those seen today."

[Krychek_2]

I once had a neighbor who relaxed by beating his wife and kids. That it helps you relax says more about you than it does about the lawyer profession.

[DaivdBehar]

Loving criticism of the lawyer profession is the same as wife beating and as child physical abuse in your book? They are not at all the same.

[Krychek_2]

They're not the same, but the dynamic behind you and him is the same. You take pleasure in abusing people you don't like very much.