"What's Sauce for the Goose Depends on Whose Ox Is Being Gored"

Animal wisdom from the great Prof. Herbert Wechsler (Columbia), as quoted by H. Richard Uviller at 145 F.R.D. 149, 180 (1993). I was alerted to this by Judge Robert Sack (2d Cir.), who recalled it from his own experience as a student at Columbia, circa 1963.

Comments

[Mr. Bumble]

Sounds like that came out of the Yogi Berra School of Law.

[FilioScotia]

It does sound like something Yogi would say, but the saying goes back many centuries in Common Law. If one man's ox kills another man's ox, compensation depends on whose ox got gored. It's a useful metaphor for all manner of disputes and situations, including politics.

[FilioScotia]

Clarification: "It depends on whose ox got gored" isn't mentioned with those words anywhere in a law book, I don't think, but it is a useful metaphor for deciding who the victim is in a tort.