Document Type

Article

Publication Title

Fordham Law Review

Abstract

This Essay considers the idea of the “helpless” group—that is, the group comprising individuals who are thought to be incapable of protecting their own interests. That idea plays a particularly important role in the history of the modern class action, which has been justified as a device providing redress for “small claims held by small people.” The helpless group is at once hero and victim. The group serves as champion of the law by seeking to vindicate its rights. At the same time, the group may be preyed upon by the party opposing it and, potentially, by its own counsel. Indeed, courts, whether in the class action or in the new world of nonclass aggregate litigation, are called upon to give special protection to the helpless group for that reason.

First Page

3213

Volume

81

Publication Date

2013

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