Covid-era eviction elicits ancient injunction plea

Clameur de Haro was invoked to block the burial of William the Conqueror in 1087.

Image from Amable Tastu, La Normandie Historique (1858).

We've all seen the strain of the pandemic on our socioeconomic fabric and the rule of law.

Last week came the alarming news that a federal district judge in Texas ruled unconstitutional the eviction moratorium issued by the Centers for Disease Control.  Judge Campbell Barker held in Terkel v. CDC that the moratorium exceeded the federal power that the CDC could exercise on behalf of Congress under the Article I Commerce Clause and Necessary and Proper Clause of the U.S. Constitution.

A friend and colleague on Jersey, a Crown dependency close to France, sent along this fascinating item from the Jersey Evening Post.  A Jersey resident who was served with eviction papers after being unable to pay the mortgage invoked "an ancient legal right" called "the Clameur de Haro."  The Post explained:

To enact the Clameur the aggrieved party must go down on one knee in the location of the offence and then, with hands in the air and in the presence at least two witnesses, must call out: "Haro! Haro! Haro! A l'aide, mon Prince, on me fait tort." This translates as: "Hear me! Hear me! Hear me! Come to my aid, my Prince, for someone does me wrong." The offending activity must cease. The individual then needs to put the grievance down in writing and lodge it with the Judicial Greffe within 24 hours.

Jersey
(image of ESA Copernicus Sentinel-2 CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO)

Jersey is a fascinating study in comparative law.  One might expect the island to be legally indistinguishable from the UK, but that is not the case at all.  Jersey has its own parliament and legal system.  Unlike the UK, Jersey is not a member of the Hague Convention on the enforcement of foreign civil and commercial judgments, so a foreign entity wishing to enforce there must seek to register the judgment through a domestic legal process.

Collas Crill, "an offshore law firm that never stands still," wrote an explainer in 2018 on the Clameur de Haro in neighboring Channel Island Guernsey, where the process seems to be the same.  The explainer added, "After the cry, both the Lord's prayer and a Grace must be recited by the complainant in French."

Quartz reported how a woman in Guernsey stopped construction on a road improvement project in 2018 by invoking the Clameur de Haro.  According to Quartz, "[t]he clameur was first recorded in Norman law in the 13th century. Its use is believed to have originated in the 10th century as an appeal to Rollo, Viking founder of the Norman dynasty, according to a 2008 article in the Jersey and Guernsey Law Review by lawyer and legal historian Andrew Bridgeford."

Collas Crill lawyers further explained, "Arguably the main reason for the continued use of the Clameur is the immediacy of its effect, although in modern times an additional perceived benefit is the publicity it can draw to your cause."

Covid court backlog, solved: 'Night Court' returns

I've been reading about how courts are struggling to overcome coronavirus backlogs in their caseload.  To me, the answer is obvious.  I saw it on TV.

Anderson, 1987
(Alan Light CC BY 2.0)

Created by writer Reinhold Weege after his Barney Miller wrapped up, Night Court (wiki) ran for 193 episodes over nine seasons on NBC, from 1984 to 1992, a hit by any measure.  Harry Anderson, who passed away in 2018, managed the underbelly of New York criminal process as Judge Harry T. Stone.

Night Court launched many ships.  If already 10 years into his acting career, John Larroquette became a household name as deadpan prosecutor Dan Fielding.  Selma Diamond is unforgettable as gruff bailiff Selma Hacker, even though she appeared only in the first two seasons, passing away in 1985 at age 64.  (Read more about her at the Encyclopedia of Jewish Women.)  A parade of guest stars passed through Judge Stone's Manhattan courtroom, including some who went on to greater notoriety, such as Michael Richards, Seinfeld's Kramer, and Brent Spiner, Star Trek's Data.

"Night court" is a real thing, here and there, in the United States, not just in Manhattan.  Like in the TV show, night courts specialize in preliminary criminal proceedings, namely arraignment.  The courts don't run through the night, but after hours, Manhattan's wrapping up around 1 a.m.  Many jurisdictions have found night courts efficient to handle arraignments on drug charges or to settle minor matters, such as outstanding misdemeanor warrants, for people whose life challenges will be compounded if they're forced to get to court during the usual workday hours.  How many times have I complained that the retail counter of the post office should be open at night, when people have time to wait in line?  Though for obvious reasons, night court doesn't work as well for American jury trials. 

Rauch, 2013
(Dominick D CC BY-SA 2.0)

Night Court should be one of those sitcoms that doesn't stand the test of time.  Its humor seems to me pretty specific to the cultural moment of the 1980s.  Nevertheless, Night Court stuck around over the years in cable reruns, and, lately, with retro content pouring into streaming services and being discovered by new audiences, the show has earned its own little niche as a cult classic.  The real Manhattan night court has been a real thing since 1907, according to the New York Post, but in recent years, in part thanks to a listing in the Lonely Planet, the Manhattan night court has become a tourist attraction, appealing to visitors from around the world.

Whether real night court might help unjam our covid court backlog, I don't really know.  But TV Night Court might be getting a new lease on life.  According to a Deadline exclusive in December 2020, Melissa Rauch, The Big Bang Theory's Bernadette Rostenkowski, was a fan of the original in her New Jersey childhood and pitched a reboot to NBC.  Rauch is now set to executive produce the new show, which will feature "unapologetic optimist" Judge Abby Stone, daughter of the late Harry.  John Larroquette is lined up to return as an older and wiser Dan Fielding.

Comparative law talks look to Biden Administration, covid-19 aftermath, EU market, juvenile justice

The winter-spring lecture series, "Contemporary Challenges in Global and American Law," from the Faculty of Law and Administration at Jagiellonian University (JU) in Kraków, Poland, and the Columbus School of Law at the Catholic University of America (CUA) in Washington, D.C., is free and already under way.

The series promises an exciting lineup, continuing from six lectures in fall 2020, all of which may be viewed online.  This semester's offerings kicked off last week, January 13, with London-Milan lawyer Vincenzo Senatore talking about covid-19 as force majeure in contract law, and comparing common law and civil law approaches.

One week from today, January 27, Professor Geoffrey P. Watson, director of the Comparative and International Law Institute at CUA, will talk on "International Law and the New Biden Administration."  Free registration is now open.

Stryjniak

Here's the line-up for February and March.  Watch the website for more in April and May.  Free registration is required for contemporaneous participation.

• February 10 - Katarzyna Stryjniak, "EU and US Budget-Making: Process, Politics, and Policy in a COVID-Challenged World" 
• February 24 - Heidi Mandanis Schooner, "How Well Did the Post-2008 Financial Crisis Regime Prepare the World for the COVID-19 Pandemic?"
• March 2 - Cara H. Drinan, "The War on Kids: Progress and the Path Forward on Juvenile Justice"
• March 24 - Gaspar Kot, "Sustainable Investment – The New Heart of EU Financial Market Regulation"

The lecture series grew out of a summer 2020 pilot program in which I was privileged to participate, and it's been a welcome way, during the pandemic, to connect with colleagues in Europe and take pride in former students.  Now a legal and policy officer with the European Commission, Kasia Stryjniak is a graduate of JU and CUA master's programs.  Gaspar Kot is near completion of the Ph.D. at JU, holds an LL.M. from CUA, coordinates the LL.M. program at JU, and was my co-author on a recent book chapter.

Talk traces 'nuisance' from King Henry I to COVID-19

Yesterday I had the privilege to present in a lecture series (virtually) at Jagiellonian University (UJ) on the tort of nuisance in American common law.  I sketched out the historical background of nuisance relative to the recent lawsuit by the State of Missouri, against the People's Republic of China, alleging public nuisance, among other theories, and seeking to establish responsibility and liability for the coronavirus pandemic.  Here is a video (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) of the presentation, also available from Facebook, where the lecture streamed live.  A narrative abstract is below the video.

The Tort of 'Nuisance' in American Common Law:

From Hedge Trimming to Coronavirus in 900 Years

Nuisance is one of the oldest civil actions in Anglo-American law, dating to the earliest written common law of the late middle ages.  Nuisance for centuries referred to an offense against property rights, like trespass, interfering with a neighbor’s enjoyment of land.  But a nuisance need not be physical, and colorful cases have addressed nuisance achieved by forces such as sound, light, and smell.  In recent decades, nuisance has undergone a radical transformation and generated a new theory of civil liability that has become untethered from private property.  State and local officials have litigated a broad new theory of “public nuisance” to attack problems on which the federal government has been apathetic, if not willfully resistant to resolution, such as climate change and the opioid epidemic.  Just last month, the State of Missouri sued the People’s Republic of China, asserting that COVID-19 constitutes a public nuisance.  Emerging from understandable frustration, public nuisance nevertheless threatens to destabilize the fragile equilibrium of state and federal power that holds the United States together.

Here are some links to read more, as referenced in the presentation:

• Oral argument in Oakland v. BP (9th Cir. argued Feb. 5, 2020)
• Complaint in Missouri v. PRC (E.D. Mo. filed Apr. 21, 2020) (item 1)
• The English Game (Netflix 2020)

Here is a two-minute video (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) of only my PowerPoint (no audio), if you want an idea about the course of the talk:

The four-part lecture series, "American Law in Difficult Times," comprises:

Paul Kurth: The American Low-Income Taxpayer: Legal Framework and Roles Law Students Play
May 12, 18:00
Event - Video

May 19, 18:00
Richard Peltz-Steele: “Nuisance” in American Common Law Tort: COVID-19 as a Public Nuisance?
Event - Video

May 26, 18:00
Susanna Fischer: Art Museums in Financial Crisis: Legal and Ethical Issues Related to Deaccessioning
Event - Video

June 2, 18:00
Cecily Baskir: American Criminal Justice Reform in the Time of COVID-19
Event - Video

Here is the lecture series invitation (Polish) from the American Law Students' Society (ALSS) at UJ, via Facebook:

Here is an "about" from ALSS and partners:

❖ ABOUT AMERICAN LAW IN DIFFICULT TIMES:

The American Law Program (Szkoła Prawa Amerykańskiego) run by the Columbus School of Law, The Catholic University of American [CUA], Washington D.C., and the Faculty of Law and Administration, Jagiellonian University, Kraków, as well as the American Law Students’ Society (Koło Naukowe Prawa Amerykańskiego) at the Jagiellonian University, Kraków, sincerely invite you to participate in a series of four one-hour online open lectures and discussion sessions delivered by professors from the American Law Program.

The lectures will be devoted to a variety of legal issues mainly relating to COVID-19 difficulties facing people and institutions, for which legal solutions may be useful.

The lectures will be available through Microsoft Teams as well as a live-stream via Facebook. Participants willing to participate through Microsoft Teams are kindly asked to provide the organizers with their e-mails no later than 6 hours before the commencement of the lecture, by e-mail to kn.prawaamerykanskiego@gmail.com.

Your participation in all four lectures will be certified by the American Law Students’ Society. Only those participants who provide the organisers with their name, surname and e-mail will be granted such certificates.

I am grateful to Jagoda Szpak and Agnieszka Zając of ALSS at UJ; Wojciech Bańczyk, Piotr Szwedo, Julianna Karaszkiewicz-Kobierzyńska, and Gaspar Kot at UJ; and Leah Wortham at CUA.  The lecture series is sponsored by, and I am further grateful to, the Koło Naukowe Prawa Amerykańskiego (ALSS), Szkoła Prawa Amerykańskiego (School of American Law), and the Ośrodek Koordynacyjny Szkół Praw Obcych (Coordination Center for Foreign Law Schools) at the Uniwersytet Jagielloński w Krakowie (UJ in Kraków), and to CUA.