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Benjamin P. Edwards

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Benjamin Edwards joined the faculty of the William S. Boyd School of Law in 2017. He researches and writes about business and securities law, corporate governance, arbitration, and consumer protection.

Prior to teaching, Professor Edwards practiced as a securities litigator in the New York office of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP. At Skadden, he represented clients in complex civil litigation, including securities class actions arising out of the Madoff Ponzi scheme and litigation arising out of the 2008 financial crisis. Read More

A friend who is a member of a university faculty (non-law) some years ago recommended that I read Straight Man, by Richard Russo. I am forever thankful.  The book is a novel set in a small town in Pennsylvania and follows the trials and tribulations of an English-department faculty member at a college besieged by budget challenges, a dysfunctional department, and his own lack of motivation.   

The book is funny — sometimes laugh-out-loud funny — and for anyone on a faculty, I am willing to wager that, despite occasional absurdity, this faculty will feel like it could be yours.  The main character is sympathetic, to a point, but he is also part of the problem.  It is a fast read, and it’s one I come back to every couple years.  Perhaps it is just a guilty pleasure, but the universality of the characters and the bit of hope that emerges are things I find to be comforting in some way. It may be that the book serves as a reminder that we’re not alone in our craziness.  Everyone who has taught for a while knows a Hank, a Finny, a Gracie DuBois, Jacob Rose, a Billy Quigley.  …

I am such a fan of Sinclair Oil Corp. v. Levien,  280 A.2d 717 (Del. 1971), that I use the case in both Business Organizations and in Energy Law. The case does a great job of giving a basic overview of parent-subsidiary relationships, some of the basic fiduciary duties owed in such contexts, and it sets up the discussion of why companies use subsidiaries in the first place. 

On fiduciary duties and when the intrinsic (entire) fairness test applies: 

A parent does indeed owe a fiduciary duty to its subsidiary when there are parent-subsidiary dealings. However, this alone will not evoke the intrinsic fairness standard. This standard will be applied only when the fiduciary duty is accompanied by self-dealing — the situation when a parent is on both sides of a transaction with its subsidiary. Self-dealing occurs when the parent, by virtue of its domination of the subsidiary, causes the subsidiary to act in such a way that the parent receives something from the subsidiary to the exclusion of, and detriment to, the minority stockholders of the subsidiary

On what test to apply to parent-subsidiary dividends: 

We do not accept the argument that the intrinsic fairness test can never

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More than two years ago, I posted Shareholder Activists Can Add Value and Still Be Wrong, where I explained my view on shareholder proposals: 

I have no problem with shareholders seeking to impose their will on the board of the companies in which they hold stock.  I don’t see activist shareholder as an inherently bad thing.  I do, however, think  it’s bad when boards succumb to the whims of activist shareholders just to make the problem go away.  Boards are well served to review serious requests of all shareholders, but the board should be deciding how best to direct the company. It’s why we call them directors.    

Today, the Detroit Free Press reported that shareholders of automaker GM soundly defeated a proposal from billionaire investor David Einhorn that would have installed an alternate slate of board nominees and created two classes of stock.  (All the proposals are available here.) Shareholders who voted were against the proposals by more than 91%.  GM’s board, in materials signed by Mary Barra, Chairman & Chief Executive Officer and Theodore Solso, Independent Lead Director, launched an aggressive campaign to maintain the existing board (PDF here) and the split shares proposal (PDF here…

Regular readers know that I monitor courts and other legal outlets for improper references to LLCs as “limited liability corporations” when the writer means “limited liability companies.” I get a Westlaw update every day. Really. Every day. So while it may seem that I write about examples a lot, I tend to think I am showing great restraint.  

At times, this is just a semantic issue, or at least a more amorphous “how one thinks about entities” issue.  Usually, at a minimum such cases can cause confusion about entity type and what laws apply, which may eventually lead courts to an improper analysis and application of the wrong laws.  It certainly leads some lawyers to incorrectly characterize their clients and their cases.  

For example, a recent case from the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington gets the law right, but still creates some potential confusion. Consider this excerpt: 

Cash & Carry asserts that the court’s jurisdiction is based on diversity of citizenship. (Not. at 2.) For purposes of assessing diversity, the court must consider the domicile of all members of a limited liability company. Johnson v. Columbia Props. Anchorage, LP, 437 F.3d 894, 899 (9th Cir. 2006) (“[A]n LLC

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Last weekend, retired NFL receiver Calvin Johnson made news when he revealed that he was not pleased with the Detroit Lions and how they handled his retirement. Johnson is apparently frustrated that the Lions required him to pay back about 10% of the  unearned $3.2 million remaining on his $16 million signing bonus from his 2012 contract. This is apparently a thing for the Lions, who sought all of the unearned signing bonus money remaining on Barry Sanders’ contract when he abruptly retired in 1999.

This is in contrast to Tony Romo’s retirement, in which the Dallas Cowboys released him, making the $5 million remaining on the signing bonus Romo’s.  Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said he was following the “Do Right Rule” when he allowed the team to release him.  The Seattle Seahawks made a similar decision with Marshawn Lynch.  

Some have argued that Johnson is being “pettier” than the Lions in this spat.  Mike Florio, a sports writer and graduate of WVU College of Law, where I teach, argued that “while Johnson has every right to be miffed at the Lions, Johnson also should be miffed at himself. Or at whoever advised him to retire instead of biding his time until…

This past week was a big one for loyalty stories.  First, we have the New York Times reporting that President Trump asked former FBI director James Comey for his pledge of loyalty, to which Comey apparently promised “honesty.”  (The White House disputes this report.) 

Then, we have a high school quarterback in Illinois being forced to decommit from the University of Wisconsin’s, apparently because he tweeted that the University of Georgia had offered him a scholarship.  The student called Wisconsin Coach Budmayr, telling him he had the offer and said he was “still 100% committed to the Badgers.” The next day Budmayr apparently told him that he was no longer a good fit for Wisconsin and that he should keep looking.  The reason: lack of loyalty.  

Obviously, I only have the facts as they have been portrayed in these articles, and there are two sides to every story.  Nonetheless, these anecdotes got me to thinking about loyalty and how people tend to perceive the concept. 

To some, loyalty means fidelity.  This can be in the physical or emotional sense, as in the marriage context.  Some view extend it to ideological loyalty.  And to some, it means undying, uncompromising agreement and support.  It…

Back in 2013, Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic wrote Why Do So Many Incompetent Men Become Leaders? on the Harvard Business Law Review site.  He argues,

the main reason for the uneven management sex ratio is our inability to discern between confidence and competence. That is, because we (people in general) commonly misinterpret displays of confidence as a sign of competence, we are fooled into believing that men are better leaders than women. In other words, when it comes to leadership, the only advantage that men have over women (e.g., from Argentina to Norway and the USA to Japan) is the fact that manifestations of hubris — often masked as charisma or charm — are commonly mistaken for leadership potential, and that these occur much more frequently in men than in women.

He further notes that the qualities that the same traits that often lead to a male manager to get hired (i.e., be perceived as a leader) are the characteristics that get in the way of being an effective and successful leader.  ( “[L]eaderless groups have a natural tendency to elect self-centered, overconfident and narcissistic individuals as leaders, and that these personality characteristics are not equally common in men and…

It’s exam-grading time, so my focus is largely on that.  I did do my usual peruse of the news, though, and I found a whole host of news outlets discussing President Trump’s tax plan, which proposes to lower income tax rates on pass-through entities.  As one of the pieces explains: 

Pass-through income, for those of you who aren’t tax nerds, is business income that’s reported on a personal return. It comes from partnerships, limited-liability corporations and other closely held businesses, including Trump’s own family real estate operation.

First of all, knowing about pass-through income does not make you a tax nerd. I don’t think. 

Beyond that, though, limited liability corporations are not a thing.  And, limited liability companies (LLCs) are generally chosen for pass-though tax status, but they don’t have to be. They can chose to be taxed as C corporations at the federal level, if they wish.  Furthermore, partnerships, such as MLPs, and LLCs don’t have to be closely held. They can be publicly traded.  

Multiple outlets got on the incorrect”limited-liability corporations” bandwagon. Even Barron’s! Oh, well.. For now, I guess I will just continue to note that LLCs are still limited liability companies.  …

More than a few legal blogs and scholars have taken note of a recent paper by Adam Bonica (Stanford University), Adam S. Chilton (University of Chicago), Kyle Rozema (Northwestern University) and Maya Sen (Harvard University), “The Legal Academy’s Ideological Uniformity.”  The paper finds that those in the legal academy are more liberal than those in legal profession generally.  Anecdotally, I have to say I am not surprised. 

The abstract of the piece is as follows:

We find that approximately 15% of law professors are conservative and that only approximately one out of every twenty law schools have more conservative law professors than liberal ones. In addition, we find that these patterns vary, with higher-ranked schools having an even smaller presence of conservative law professors. We then compare the ideological balance of the legal academy to that of the legal profession. Compared to the 15% of law professors that are conservative, 35% of lawyers overall are conservative. Law professors are more liberal than graduates of top 14 law schools, lawyers working at the largest law firms, former federal law clerks, and federal judges. Although we find that professors are more liberal than the alumni at all but a handful of law schools, there is a strong relationship between

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Before I became a lawyer, I had the privilege of working with a number of great people at a public relations firm in Los Angeles. That firm was founded by Al Golin, who passed away last week, and by all accounts, he will be missed. Mr. Golin was the PR person behind McDonald’s, and it was a very symbiotic relationship.

I did not meet Mr. Golin, personally, but his vision was definitely part of the firm culture. Early on, his vision of good business was on display. As the New York Times reported:

Before corporate social responsibility and cause-related marketing became fashionable, Mr. Golin was instrumental in creating what he called a trust bank. He encouraged the McDonald’s Corporation to sponsor Ronald McDonald Houses for children with life-threatening illnesses, an All-American High School Marching Band, an All-American High School Basketball Game and the Jerry Lewis Muscular Dystrophy Telethon — all to build good will that could be drawn upon when the company needed public support.

I can’t say Mr. Golin is the reason I believe firms can be good corporate citizens without laws requiring them to do so, but I frankly like the idea that firms can compete to …