The framework for a successful franchise relationship governs procedures, performance, and standards. The franchisor agrees to lend, in effect, its intellectual property and guidance, among other things, in exchange for the franchisee’s royalties and other payments. Before entering into an...

The rapid expansion of franchising requires that the courts, and the law in general, adapt to new circumstances, including the franchise parties’ rightful expectations. Franchisees and franchisors may not act in the spirit of the contract, and the traditional approach under contract damages...

Could North Korea (officially, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) actually become Northeast Asia’s next big free market economy? At first blush, economic optimism about the Hermit Kingdom seems incredibly misplaced. North Korea is one of the most repressive countries in the world;...

Some commentators have recently proclaimed the U.S. Alien Tort Claims Act to be dead. In Nevsun Resources, the Canadian Supreme Court took a seemingly bold step in providing access to justice to victims of human rights abuses against corporate entities, presumably to partly fill this void. This...

The strangest airline route in America is between Pago Pago and the Manu’a Islands in American Samoa. No U.S. carrier serves this “domestic” route. Therefore, it is the only route between two points in the United States (or, more accurately, its territories) that is regularly scheduled...

COVID-19 nearly wiped out demand for commercial air travel in 2020, driving down passenger traffic by a jaw-dropping 94.3% from the previous year. The airline industry thus understandably lobbied for a government bailout to manage what was nothing short of an existential crisis, with losses...

Distilled to its most basic sense, § 363(k) has always given secured creditor the right “credit bid,” or to use, up to the full amount of the debt owed to the secured creditor by the debtor, as currency in any sale of the collateral securing the debt owed to that claimant under § 363(b)...

As of the a bankruptcy petition’s filing date (the “petition date”), § 362(a)(1) stays “the commencement or continuation ... of a judicial, administrative, or other action or proceeding against the debtor that was or could have been commenced before the commencement of the case under...

Establishing (e.g., perfecting) and enforcing a lien presents technical pitfalls and practical problems with which practitioners and courts are often unfamiliar or uncomfortable. After all, the law of liens requires an understanding of many different areas of the law, including the law of...

Commercial airplanes are vectors of infectious disease, advancing, if not sparking, global epidemics and potentially pandemics by exporting pathogens from endemic areas of the world to non-endemic places. For example, according to the global scientific community, the Zika virus was introduced to...