Cases and Materials on Torts

Aspen Casebook Series

by Richard A. Epstein, Catherine M. Sharkey

Cases and Materials on Torts preserves historical and conceptual continuity between the present and the past, while addressing the most significant contemporary controversies in such fast-moving areas like public nuisance, global warming, and product liability, with new litigation against internet providers. Toward these dual ends, Richard A. Epstein and Catherine M. Sharkey have retained in the Twelfth Edition the great older cases, both English and American, that have proved themselves time and again in the classroom, and which continue to exert great influence on the modern law. Our book also provides a rich exploration of the dominant corrective justice and law-and-economics approaches to tort law, as exemplified both in the retained and new cases and materials.

New to the Twelfth

Extensive new treatment of public nuisance cases to address the profound expansion of the once-sleepy area of public nuisance law into the realms of the opioid crisis, toxic torts, and global warming.Major reconsideration of who counts as a seller in the chain of distribution for goods sold online with product liability updates for various forms of e-commerce, such as Amazon’s liability for defective products sold on its site.Updates to incorporate two major new Torts Restatements on Intentional Harms and Liability Insurance.The Reforms of the Michigan No-Fault LegislationEnhanced treatment of privacy in the era of “Big Data” to address trend of large data collectors like Facebook and Google to determine what is reasonable online, incorporating major privacy legislation such as California’s Consumer Privacy Act and the European GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation).Expansion of materials that address race and gender disparities in the setting of damages awards; and, in the realm of punitive damages innovative remedies directing some portion of the award to public interest groups.Professors and students will benefit

Clear organizational framework of the book.Important lines of cases that help understand legal reasoning and the evolution of precedentInclusion of key academic commentary and elaboration of central intellectual disputes over the nature and function of the tort lawAbility to pick and choose modules of interest – such as defamation, privacy, and economic harms – which are of increasing importance in real world of tort litigation.Extensive notes with topic headlines that elaborate basic concepts and extend into the most complex contemporary issues facing courts.Great attention given to cutting edge tort developments.

Genres: Law, Nonfiction, Legal

1356 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1959

About the author

Richard A. Epstein is the James Parker Hall Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Law and Senior Lecturer at The University of Chicago Law School.

Epstein started his legal career at the University of Southern California, where he taught from 1968 to 1972. He served as Interim Dean from February to June, 2001.

He received an LLD, hc, from the University of Ghent, 2003. He has been a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences since 1985 and a Senior Fellow of the Center for Clinical Medical Ethics at the University of Chicago Medical School, also since 1983. He served as editor of the Journal of Legal Studies from 1981 to 1991, and of the Journal of Law and Economics from 1991 to 2001.

His books include The Case Against the Employee Free Choice Act (Hoover 2009); Supreme Neglect Antitrust Decrees in Theory and Practice: Why Less Is More (AEI 2007); Overdose: How Excessive Government Regulation Stifles Pharmaceutical Innovation (Yale University Press 2006); How Progressives Rewrote the Constitution (Cato 2006). Cases and Materials on Torts (Aspen Law & Business; 8th ed. 2004); Skepticism and Freedom: A Modern Case for Classical Liberalism (University of Chicago 2003): Cases and Materials on Torts (Aspen Law & Business; 7th ed. 2000); Torts (Aspen Law & Business 1999); Principles for a Free Society: Reconciling Individual Liberty with the Common Good (Perseus Books 1998): Mortal Peril: Our Inalienable Rights to Health Care (Addison-Wesley 1997); Simple Rules for a Complex World (Harvard 1995); Bargaining with the State (Princeton, 1993); Forbidden Grounds: The Case against Employment Discrimination Laws (Harvard 1992); Takings: Private Property and the Power of Eminent Domain (Harvard 1985); and Modern Products Liability Law (Greenwood Press 1980). He has written numerous articles on a wide range of legal and interdisciplinary subjects.

He has taught courses in civil procedure, communications, constitutional law, contracts, corporations, criminal law, health law and policy, legal history, labor law, property, real estate development and finance, jurisprudence, labor law; land use planning, patents, individual, estate and corporate taxation, Roman Law; torts, and workers' compensation.

Reviews

[Joel Myers]

Poured one out for my boy learned hand

[David Goad · Rating 2 out of 5]

Holy moly, the notes after the cases were organized weirdly! It all felt more dense than it had to be...

[cass · Rating 4 out of 5]

beautiful day to learn about battery when everything is a tort. i couldn't have done this w out you pi. and best of all- NO SHARKS HELD LIABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Youlia]

the most enjoyable of my case books tbh

[Elan Levine · Rating 2 out of 5]

Note to self I can’t fly while driving even if I think I’m Batman

[Josh · Rating 2 out of 5]

I liked torts, but this book was not the best. Lots of annoying little note cases, poor organization, and Esptein's law-and-economics bias shines through a little too clearly.

[W · Rating 2 out of 5]

"This is the key: You must break up the 30-year life expectancy into finite detailed periods of time. You must take these small periods of time, seconds and minutes, and determine in dollars and cents what each period is worth. . . . You must start at the beginning and show that pain is a continuous thing, second by second, minute by minute, hour by hour, year after year for thirty years. You must interpret one second, one minute, one hour, one year of pain and suffering into dollars and cents and then multiply to your absolute figure to show how you have achieved your result . . . "

Basically, while reading this book: "pain is a continuous thing, second by second, minute by minute, hour by hour." My god, this book is terribly organized. Many fun/interesting cases, but, the structure makes it unnecessarily difficult to get to the doctrinal point.

[Michael Nichols]

Technically only read half of it. But 500 pages of dense tort law oughta qualify as reading 5 books, if you ask me.

[Sarah Bittner · Rating 2 out of 5]

Really did not enjoy her

[Clé]

tbh wouldn’t read again

[widowanchor · Rating 4 out of 5]

i hate richard j posner

[Erin Langan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rating my law school textbooks on Goodreads is truly something me 5 years ago would never have imagined me doing

[Toe · Rating 1 out of 5]

Richard Epstein is a brilliant legal scholar, and I agree with many of his points of view (expanded use of strict liability, his focus on economic efficiency in legal decisions, etc.). However, his casebook was just awful. It was a long, disjointed look at an already scattered topic. Epstein did a horrible job of condensing and organizing the material. There were literally hundreds of mini-cases listed in the notes section followed with unanswered questions or topics to ponder. There was no overall tying of themes or explicit referencing to general themes. It was merely a compilation of cases, which I could have produced.

Additionally, Epstein at least once seemed to intentionally make the subject matter more confusing than it needed to be. For example, in the introduction to proximate cause, he chose Ryan v. New York Central R.R. as the lead case. There, the defendant was not held liable for negligently maintaining his railroad when the plaintiff's house burned down. The court reasoned that the damage must stop somewhere or civilization could not function under the threat of such massive liability. The problem is that this decision is not the current law! In fact, this case is known because so many other cases said it was decided incorrectly.

To my mind, explaining legal rules in a given subject could be very easy, and the organization of the casebook very straightforward. Start with a case highlighting the most current and widely adopted rule on a particular issue. If there are multiple, competing rulings, include a case for each with perhaps a few explanatory sentences in between. If there is a major exception, include a case on that too. Then, in the notes, you can provide the history or other details deemed relevant. Here, Epstein doesn't do that. He head fakes us with what is widely considered an incorrectly ruled case. What is the point of that when someone is trying to learn new information?

Reading some of Epstein's articles and watching him lecture on youtube gave me high hopes for this man's book. It was an utter disappointment.

[Anthony · Rating 4 out of 5]

honestly, i kind like the way epstein sets up this book. generous coverage of the historical foundations of tort law, which you can dive into or skip as needed, and lots of notes on the important cases. probably best to pair this with something to counterbalance epstein's rather unique viewpoint, but his editors have worked his text into a fairly comprehensive introduction as it is.

[Amelia]

What I learned from this book is that I could read faster than I ever had before, I also learned that railroads, automobiles, dogs, horses, fires, and flaming squibs are exceedingly dangerous and cause a lot of lawsuits. Especially watch out for railroads!

[Jace · Rating 1 out of 5]

This casebook was awful. It doesn't help that my professor was an incredibly poor instructor. You can lecture about the Law and Economics movement until the cows come home, but it doesn't mean squat if you never talk about Torts in the first place.

[Courtney · Rating 3 out of 5]

Learn about Torts! Amaze your friends!

[Meredith · Rating 2 out of 5]

If you're thinking about a spring gun, I would recommend against going through with that project.

[casey · Rating 5 out of 5]

DONE. thank you epstein, for making torts enjoyable. lies, all lies.

[Purple Wimple]

my torts casebook; there's a lot of history in tort law, which is what makes it interesting to me.

[Zoe · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my Torts textbook and so far it has been decent to learn from, a little dry, but has good notes sections.

[Alison]

Law school keeps me from pleasure reading...

[Jeff Brenner · Rating 3 out of 5]

A little dry, but informative.