What is a Pirate’s Favorite Letter?

So began Jennifer Martin (Oregon/St. Thomas) when discussing her paper at the Spring Contracts Conference at UNLV.  The article, “Fighting Piracy with Private Security Measures:   When Contract Law Should Tell the Parties to Walk the Plank,” is slated for publication in the American University Law Review’s symposium on piracy. Jennifer’s presentation discussed the hiring of  private security forces to protect ships from pirates and why sometimes this level of resistance might result in harm.  As the Somali pirate problem has captured the headlines, the legal academy has been paying attention; last year Pacific-McGeorge hosted a conference on the international law issues concerning Somali pirates. 

 

So, pirates and contract law?  In some ways this isn’t anomalous.  Letters of Marque, after all, were government licenses that allowed the captain to seize enemy ships, then auction off those ships and cargo as prizes, combining patriotism and profit.  In his book review, “Bootylicious,” Caleb Crain entertainingly comments on “Invisible Hook: The Hidden Economics of Pirates,” by Peter Leeson stating:

 

Marcus Rediker spent the following decades researching pirate life and came to believe that pirate society “built a better world”—one with vigorous democracy, economic fairness, considerable racial tolerance, and even health care—in many ways more praiseworthy than, say, the one that Snelgrave supported by slave trading. True, pirates were thieves and torturers, but there was something promising about their alternative to capitalism. Other scholars claimed pirates as precursors of gay liberation and feminism. But, as pirate scholarship flourished, so did dissent. In 1996, David Cordingly dismissed the idea of black equality aboard pirate ships, pointing out that a number of pirates owned black slaves, and warned against glamorizing criminals renowned among their contemporaries for “their casual brutality.” Before long, the contending voices of pirate studies had become a “cacophony,” according to one academic. Meanwhile, the idea that pirates are in some way dissident, rather than merely criminal, entered the mainstream. 

 

But I digress, back to Jennifer’s paper.  Two years ago, when we hosted the Spring Contracts Conference in Sacramento, Jennifer presented a paper on contracts and private security firms in Iraq.  Taken together, both that paper and now this latest one on piracy are unique in developing a niche around the question of when contracts authorize the use of force, and when the law should either sanction or excuse that behavior, thus intriguely playing on the "public-private" dichotomy.

 

P.s. The answer to the title "joke" is below the fold.

 

While Jennifer Martin got the entire room of contracts professors to say “R” in an exaggerated pirate fashion (Arrr….!), the answer, we were told was “C,” because a pirate’s true love is always the sea.  (Arrrgh…!)

Comments

[buy viagra]

I hope this helps you. Feel free to request for a clarification if you
find something unclear and/or incomplete.

[buy viagra]

I have a model ship that is nearly complete. I am ready to start on
the rigging. A spool of thick thread and a frame is provided. Once the
rigging is on the frame, the instructions indicate that I should cut
it to shape.

[viagra online]

Meanwhile, the idea that pirates are in some way dissident, rather than merely criminal, entered the mainstream.

[viagra online]

Hi, I love your design and am interested in learning more about how the project is going.
This is just the most wonderful house I have seen ever, absolutely brilliant. Kepp up the good work.

[Kids Spelling Games]

This doesn't make any sense.