Opinion ID: 1987708
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Federal Courts: The Standards Are The Same

Text: The federal courts have had a similar split of authority between the inclusive and exclusive standards for scope of review. But no longer  the United States Supreme Court recently concluded in Reeves v. Sanderson Plumbing Products, Inc. that the two tests are the same. [126] Under Rule 50 of the federal rules of procedure, a court should render judgment as a matter of law when there is no legally sufficient evidentiary basis for a reasonable jury to find for that party on that issue. [127] In deciding whether all or only part of the evidence should be considered, the Supreme Court stated: The Courts of Appeals have articulated differing formulations as to what evidence a court is to consider in ruling on a Rule 50 motion. Some decisions have stated that review is limited to that evidence favorable to the nonmoving party, while most have held that review extends to the entire record, drawing all reasonable inferences in favor of the nonmovant. On closer examination, this conflict seems more semantic than real. Those decisions holding that review under Rule 50 should be limited to evidence favorable to the nonmovant appear to have their genesis in Wilkerson v. McCarthy [ [128] ]. In Wilkerson, we stated that in passing upon whether there is sufficient evidence to submit an issue to the jury we need look only to the evidence and reasonable inferences which tend to support the case of the nonmoving party.[ [129] ] But subsequent decisions have clarified that this passage was referring to the evidence to which the trial court should give credence, not the evidence that the court should review. In the analogous context of summary judgment under Rule 56, we have stated that the court must review the record taken as a whole. And the standard for granting summary judgment mirrors the standard for judgment as a matter of law, such that the inquiry under each is the same. It therefore follows that, in entertaining a motion for judgment as a matter of law, the court should review all of the evidence in the record. [130] We address the Supreme Court's conclusion as to the most appropriate standard below; the relevant point here is its conclusion that differences between the inclusive and exclusive standards are more semantic than real.