Class Actions Brief Blog

Last month, the United States House of Representatives passed the Forced Arbitration Injustice Repeal Act, or the “FAIR Act.” The FAIR Act, should it be passed by the Senate and signed into law, would prohibit class action waivers and mandatory pre-dispute arbitration agreements in a wide range of disputes:

• Employment disputes that arise out of or relate to the work relationship or prospective work relationship, including disputes regarding discipline and/or termination of employment and terms of payment for advertising, recruiting, referrals and arrangements.
• Consumer ...

As class action litigation under ERISA continues its upward trend across the country, could Article III standing serve as a means through which a Court can fairly assess claims before costly discovery is imposed on defendants and judicial resources are expended? Several recent federal court decisions suggest as much.

ERISA, which provides protection to employees who participate in employee benefit plans, confers statutory standing on plan participants and beneficiaries to seek relief against their benefit plans as well as fiduciaries of these plans in federal court. Although ...

This post concerns a recurring topic in class-action practice: how a party—through its own litigation conduct—can waive its right to arbitrate.

The topic warrants attention, or at least came to our attention, because of a recent decision from a federal appellate court. The case, called Morgan v. Sundance, Inc., is a putative nationwide collective action filed under the Fair Labor Standards Act.

The defendant (Sundance) owns Taco Bell franchises in multiple states. The plaintiff (Robyn Morgan) worked at a Sundance restaurant in Iowa. She has accused Sundance of not paying her ...

It appears that the answer may be yes. In 2017, the General Assembly amended G.S. § 7A-27 to permit defendants to take interlocutory appeals from orders granting class certification. Prior to the amendment, plaintiffs could pursue interlocutory appeals from orders denying class certification, but defendants had no reciprocal right of appeal.

As amended, section 7A-27(a) states that “[a]ppeal lies of right directly to the Supreme Court” from “any trial court’s decision regarding class action certification under G.S. § 1A-1, Rule 23.” It also states that appeal lies of ...

House Bill 239, which reduces the number of judges on the North Carolina Court of Appeals and provides for direct appeals of decisions regarding class action certification to the North Carolina Supreme Court, is now law. On April 26, the General Assembly voted to override Governor Cooper’s veto, and the bill has been enacted as Session Law 2017-7.

Our earlier analysis of the law did not address when the provision regarding appeals of class certification decisions would become effective. Similar legislative changes have generally informed practitioners and courts that they ...

Governor Cooper vetoed House Bill 239 on April 21, rejecting the General Assembly’s effort to reduce the number of judges on the North Carolina Court of Appeals from 15 to 12. The bill has been quite controversial, and four former North Carolina Supreme Court justices have said it would “seriously harm our judicial system.”  Although the bill does not speak in partisan terms, its practical effect would be to prevent Governor Cooper from appointing three (or perhaps two) new judges to the Court of Appeals to replace Republican judges who will reach the mandatory retirement age ...

Largely following party lines, the House of Representatives on March 9, 2017, passed H.R. 985: Fairness in Class Action Act of 2017, which we highlighted in this space. One central feature of this bill, which we noted, is an appeal as of right of class certification decisions. This provision represents a radical departure from current practice, in which discretionary appeals are infrequently granted to the U.S. Courts of Appeal. A study done several years ago, which looked at seven years of filings, concluded that less than one quarter of such appeals are granted.

As we have ...

Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), the Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, recently introduced a bill that would make significant changes to federal class action litigation. The Fairness in Class Action Litigation Act of 2017 (H.R. 985) states that it is intended to allow prompt recoveries to plaintiffs with legitimate claims and “diminish abuses in class action and mass tort litigation that are undermining the integrity of the U.S. legal system.”

In its current form, the draft bill would likely eclipse the 2005 passage of the Class Action Fairness Act as the most significant ...