Nothing On The Trial On The Verdict Tonight, Yet Again

Since the latest episode of The Verdict had nothing on the Conrad Black trial, I've prepared a substitute, a quick look at the Delaware Court of Chancery. This is the court where Conrad Black got his action, as controlling shareholder, to change the Hollinger International corporate by-laws shot down in 2004.

The Chancery Court of Delaware is a court whose jurisdiction is "matters and cases in equity" in the state. Back in colonial days, it was intended to be Delaware's answer to the more august and established Court of Chancery in the U.K.; so, "equity" is interpreted in a similar manner in the former as it was in the latter, which decided issues on the spirit of the law rather than by the law's letter. Once American independence was implemented, it became a court hearing a variety of civil, typically commercial, cases. According to Wikipedia, the jurisdiction of the Delaware Court of Chancery is a catch-all, for cases that are not within the purview of any other Delaware court of law. (The relevant section in Wikipedia cites Title 10, Section 342 of the Delaware Code as the enabling statute for this jurisdiction.) Also, the Delaware Chancery Court has the authority to remand cases that require trial by jury to the Delaware Superior Court, according to Title 10, Section 369 of the Delaware Code as cited in the same Wikipedia article on it. This latter provision implements the declaration that the Chancery court is on an equal footing with any other Delaware court, as does equal enforcement of decisions made by it.

The Delaware Chancery Court's Website has been good enough to put all of its decisions online, in PDF form, from 2000 to the present. If you poke around the 2004 decisions, you'll find the "Memorandum Opinion " in the "Hollinger International v. Black, Et. Al" case, written by Vice-Chancellor Leo E. Strine, Jr.