The primary focus of the Issues Paper is to analyze the relationship between law and ethics. To accomplish this we will first require you to identify a legal topic or law that falls within the subject matter of the textbook. The selection of a legal topic that we will cover in class in the second half of the course, however, is encouraged. Your syllabus identifies these chapters. For example, in Chapter 2 we cover wrongful discharge laws, in Chapter 3 there is discussion of various privacy laws such as the Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986, and Chapter 4 introduces Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. This list is by no means exhaustive; there are many more laws created by statute, case law and the Constitution discussed in these various chapters any of which you can select for your paper. You do not need our permission but some like to discuss their topics with us.

 Once you have chosen a law of interest to you, you will be required to conduct research into the law's background. For example, you should seek out and discuss such factors as the historical and political forces responsible for producing the law as well as the underlying policy reasons that justified its creation. There are numerous sources available for retrieving this information. They range from books and journals which you can find in the Lied Library, the Boyd School of Law’s library, as well as from databases such as Lexis/Nexis, which is available in the Business Information Center (BIC) located on the second floor of Beam Hall. 
 
The next step is to do an ethical analysis of your law. To accomplish this, you should analyze the law under the three major ethical approaches discussed in class: utilitarianism, rights and duties and fairness and justice. Keep in mind that some of these laws are quite broad. Therefore, you may need to narrow your ethical analysis to a part of the law rather than its whole. For example, the Americans with Disabilities Act prohibits discrimination against the disabled in both employment and in public accommodations. Accordingly, after you have addressed the general historical and political forces as well as the policy aspects of the ADA, you might want to limit your ethical analysis to just the employment discrimination section of that statute.

The first part on the law should be in typical research form. This means it must be footnoted (any style is acceptable as long as there is enough information for the professor to retrieve your source) with a bibliography. The more you footnote the better, and always give attribution when you quote material.  The second half, however, must be in a discussion form. Therefore, it does not require attribution since this will be your own analysis. 

Note: The issues paper will be a group project.  Groups of three will complete and submit one paper per group.  We will allow a period for those who wish to form groups to do so.  After this period, we will assign remaining students to groups.  Neither more nor fewer than three students will constitute a group. 

All students in each group will receive the same grade for the paper.  However, since it occasionally happens that one student does little or no work, and it violates the ethical principle of fairness and justice for that student to receive the same grade as those who did the work, there will be an “escape valve.”

On the night when the papers are due, each student will be asked to fill out a very brief form indicating whether any of the students in the group should receive a lower grade than the other students, and if so, why.  Since we cannot observe the process of preparing the finished product, this is the only way for us to know if someone is unfairly receiving a higher grade for the work of their project partners.

The paper should be 14 to 20 pages, typed and double-spaced with reasonable margins.

Please turn in two (2) copies, one each for Professors Aalberts and Gilbert.

 The paper must be turned on April 30, 2008.
 

Sample Mid-Semester Exam Question-Law, Fall-2000
 

Doug MacKenzie, an American lawyer in Seattle, and Uta Schmidt, a lawyer in Berlin, are both sitting in their respective offices pondering a similar legal problem. MacKenzie's American client and Schmidt's German client both signed contracts with parties from their own countries. In both cases, their clients' suffered loses. Both clients feel that they've been legally wronged and are seeking to sue the party that they feel did this to them. 
 Explain first what MacKenzie must do when he researches his case and then explain to his client its chances of prevailing or not in a lawsuit in the American (common law) legal system between two American parties.

 Next, explain what Schmidt must likewise do when she researches her case and what she will explain to her client about its chances of prevailing or not in a German (civil law) legal system between two German parties.

Sample Mid-Semester Exam Question, Fall-2001

William Cheeseman, one of the attorneys representing W.R. Grace in the book "A Civil Action" viewed himself as an aggressive litigator who specialized in pretrial procedures.  Discuss some of the pretrial actions Cheeseman pursued in an attempt to either end the lawsuit before trial or force the plaintiffs to settle.

MBA 706 Sample Ethics Mid-Semester Exam Question

If the case had gone the other way and the defendant Grace had not settled, Schlichtmann’s partners would have lost their houses and suppliers of services to Schlichtmann’s firm would have gone unpaid.  Was it moral for Jan Schlichtmann to spend as much borrowed money as he did pursuing this case?  Why or why not?  Use each of the three approaches to ethics to answer this question
  

Legal and Ethical Issues-A Civil Action


1.    “Forward:”

Contingency fee structure


2.    “The Lawyer:”

Fiduciary duties (loyalty and good faith duty to client)

Statute of Limitations

Complaint

Cause of Action

Damages


3.    “Rule 11”

Answer (called a reply in the book)

Pretrial motions

Subject-Matter Jurisdiction

    Diversity of Citizenship

    Federal Question

Removal Jurisdiction

Rule 11

Barratry

4.         “Orphans and Dogs”

Motion for Summary Judgment

Prima Facie case

Realist View of Jurisprudence

Impleading (Third Party Action)

Contribution and Indemnification

Joint and Several Liability


5.     “Discovery”

Work Product

Deposition

Interrogatories

Right to Inspect


6.      “The Woodshed”

The role and scope of expert witnesses

Settlement and Damages

    General Damages

    Special Damages

    Punitive Damages

Coaching witnesses

7.    “Billion Dollar Charlie”

Causation and statistics

    CERCLA  and  SARA


8.    “Facher’s Plea

Motion for change of venue

Jury selection (voir dire)

    For cause and peremptory challenges

    Constitutional issues in jury selection

Pretrial conference

Trifurcated trial


9.    “The Trial”

    Burden of Proof in a Civil Case

    Legal Experts-Frye Rule v. Daubert Rule

    Direct and Cross Examination of Witnesses

    Motion for Directed Verdict

    Proving negligence

        Duty of Care

        Proximate Cause

        Injury


10.           “The Vigil”

Jury Instructions

Jury Deliberations


11.    “Negotiation”

    Negotiating the settlement

   
12.           “Blindman’s Buff”

Attorney-client relationships

Legal expenses and risks

Abuse of discovery

Abuse of discretion by judge

Appeal and remand to trial judge

Perjury

Rule 11