Specter of Terrorism Prompts Conservatives on Seventh Circuit to Abandon Centuries of Tort Law

Boim v. Holy Land Foundation for Relief & Development, 549 F.3d 685 (7th Cir. 2008) -

"This is judicial activism at its most plain… Our own response to a threat can sometimes pose as much of a threat to our civil liberties and the rule of law as the threat itself."  
-Dissenting judge Ilana Rovner

Is a possible connection to terrorism a good reason to throw out well-established law governing liability?  For the majority of the Seventh Circuit, when a case touches on terrorism, assumptions and generalizations will do just fine, even if relying on them requires re-inventing age-old legal rules.

 

» Read Full Case Study