ABSTRACT
Multidistrict litigation (MDL) is exploding. MDL makes up a large and increasing portion of the federal civil docket. It has been used in recent years to manage and resolve some of our largest controversies: opioids, NFL concussions, Volkswagen ‘clean’ diesel, and many more. And, given its growing importance, MDL has come to dominate the academic literature on complex litigation. At its base, MDL is a tool to coordinate related cases across different courts in service of justice, efficiency, and fairness. These goals are not unique to the federal courts. State courts handle far more cases than federal courts, including the kinds of complex disputes that could benefit from coordination. Yet state MDL procedures are virtually absent from the scholarly literature.
This article offers a systematic study of state MDLs. Surveying the laws of every state, we find that about half the states have developed their own MDL-like procedural devices …
Clopton, Zachary D and Rave, D Theodore, MDL in the States (April 8, 2020). 115 Northwestern University Law Review (2021 Forthcoming); U of Houston Law Center No 2020-A-12.
First posted 2020-06-19 05:28:23
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