Reflections on Our First Two Female Supreme Court Justices

MARCI A. HAMILTON

In honor of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, University of Pennsylvania professor Marci A. Hamilton and former clerk to Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, reflects on our country’s first two female Supreme Court Justices and their similarities and differences. Hamilton points out that a majority of Americans support a woman’s right to choose abortion in at least some circumstances and the right to contraception and warns the President and the Senate to think long and hard before they replace Ginsburg on the fly with a someone who is a threat to abortion and contraception.

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Flanzman v. Jenny Craig, Inc.

Docket: a-66-18

Opinion Date: September 11, 2020

Judge: Anne M. Patterson

Areas of Law: Arbitration & Mediation, Contracts, Labor & Employment Law

Jenny Craig, Inc. hired Marilyn Flanzman to work as a weight maintenance counselor in 1991. In May 2011, Flanzman signed a document entitled “Arbitration Agreement” in connection with her employment. In February 2017, when the dispute that led to this appeal arose, Flanzman was eighty-two years old. Flanzman’s managers informed her that her hours would be reduced from thirty-five to nineteen hours per week. In April 2017, Flanzman’s managers further reduced her hours to approximately thirteen hours per week. In June 2017, they reduced her hours to three hours per week, at which point she left her employment. Flanzman brought suit, asserting claims for age discrimination, constructive discharge, discriminatory discharge, and harassment. Relying on the Agreement, defendants moved to dismiss the complaint and to compel arbitration. Defendants contended that California law governed the Agreement and that the Agreement was enforceable. The trial court granted the motion to dismiss and ordered the parties to arbitrate Flanzman’s claims. It held that California law governed the arbitration and that the proper forum was assumed to be California. Finding no reversible error, the New Jersey Supreme Court affirmed the trial court's judgment.

Estate of Brandon Narleski v. Gomes

Docket: a-9-10-19

Opinion Date: September 17, 2020

Judge: Barry T. Albin

Areas of Law: Civil Procedure, Personal Injury

Nineteen-year-old Mark Zwierzynski permitted underage adult friends to consume alcoholic beverages in his home. Nineteen-year-old Brandon Narleski and twenty-year-old Nicholas Gomes left the home severely intoxicated. Shortly afterwards, Gomes lost control of his vehicle and crashed. Narleski died at the scene. Gomes’s blood alcohol concentration was twice the legal limit. The issue this case presented for the New Jersey Supreme Court's review was whether the common law imposed a duty on underage adults -- over the age of eighteen but under twenty-one -- to refrain from making their homes a safe haven for underage guests to consume alcoholic beverages and, if so, what the standard for liability would be if an underage guest, who becomes intoxicated, afterwards drives a motor vehicle and injures or kills a third party. The Court held an underage adult defendant may be held civilly liable to a third-party drunk driving victim if the defendant facilitated the use of alcohol by making his home available as a venue for underage drinking, regardless of whether he was a leaseholder or titleholder of the property; if the guest causing the crash became visibly intoxicated in the defendant’s home; and if it was reasonably foreseeable that the visibly intoxicated guest would leave the residence to operate a motor vehicle and cause injury to another. The Appellate Division was reversed, the trial court's grant of summary judgment to Zwierzynski was vacated, and the matter remanded for further proceedings.