Over at druganddevicelaw.blogspot.com, Jim Beck and Mark Hermann have a comprehensive summary of the current draft version of ALI’s Principles of the Law of Aggregate Litigation, which ALI intends to influence the future of class action litigation in the United States. Despite improvements over the prior draft, Beck and Hermann caution that it “still suffers from the same two fundamental problems that have been there all along: (1) it would do away with predominance as a practical restriction on the types of claims that can be certified as class actions, and (2) it would allow routine certification of what it calls ‘common issues’ – pieces of litigation or of a cause of action – without regard to the litigation or cause of action as a whole.”
Another ALI member who is familiar with the project, Reed Smith’s Jim Martin, explains that some in the ALI Members’ Consultative Group seemingly fail to appreciate the real-world hardships that classes create for the targeted companies, and labor under the misapprehension that common adjudication should be preferred above all else under the euphemism of judicial efficiency. With more attention focused on the problems with these draft Principles, it is hoped that the project may yet change course.