Secrecy in Context: the Shadowy Life of Civil Rights Litigation
نویسندگان
چکیده
When did civil rights violations stop being considered a matter of interest and concern to the public? The articles in this Symposium on secrecy in litigation all focus on the public harm wrought by secrecy in litigation, but they largely ignore the category of cases that account for a substantial proportion of secret settlements in the federal courts. Indeed, civil rights litigation now represents some fourteen percent of federal cases filed.1 Extrapolating from available statistics, it is fair to assume that close to seventy percent of these cases are resolved by what I term “invisible settlements.”2 According to court records, these cases are concluded by stipulations of dismissal, just as if the plaintiff decided to withdraw the action. The terms of settlement are contained in private contracts, protected from public attention by confidentiality clauses that bar plaintiffs and their attorneys from revealing even the existence of the agreements. The notion that settlement entails “bargaining in the shadow of the law” is well established.3 If the trend towards invisible settlements is not abated, the shadows will overwhelm the law. The secrecy surrounding employment discrimination is not limited to settlement terms, however. Today, secrecy pervades every aspect of asserting a claim, from getting into court in the first place to appealing a final decision.4 In her article for this Symposium and in other work, Judith Res-
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تاریخ انتشار 2006