Opinion ID: 852926
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Dépeçage

Text: Dépeçage is the process of analyzing different issues within the same case separately under the laws of different states. Although Indiana allows different claims to be analyzed separately, it does not allow issues within those counts to be analyzed separately. For example, an Indiana court might analyze a contract claim and a tort claim independently but would not separately analyze and apply the law of different jurisdictions to issues within each claim. Dépeçage has not been part of Indiana's lexicon. [1] Under our history as a lex loci delecti state, Indiana courts applied the law of the state in which the tort was committed. Hubbard Manufacturing Co. v. Greeson, 515 N.E.2d 1071, 1073 (Ind.1987). Courts did not consider whether the law of a different state might be more relevant to the claim, much less to individual issues within the claim. Plaintiffs argue that our liberalization of the lex loci rule in Hubbard implicitly adopted dépeçage. (Appellants Br. 24-25.) They say that because the opinion employs language similar to that used in the Restatement (Second) of Conflict of Laws and cites the Restatement for factors courts might consider when the place of the tort is insignificant, Hubbard must have also adopted the Restatement's use of dépeçage. Id. This argument is unpersuasive. First, our opinion in Hubbard made it clear that the Second Restatement factors listed in Hubbard were mere examples of factors that courts might consider. We cited the Restatement as the source of the listed contacts, but the list was not an exclusive one. We did not adopt the Restatement's approach to resolving conflicts. Second, the Hubbard language relied on by plaintiffs, though similar to the language used in the Restatement, does not amount to an adoption of dépeçage, a matter not even contemplated in the resolution of that appeal. The language at issue is the Court's instruction that [t]hese factors should be evaluated according to their relative importance to the particular issues being litigated. Hubbard, 515 N.E.2d at 1074. Read alone or in the context of the opinion, the statement recognizes that the relevance of the various factors will vary from case to case due to the particular issues being litigated and instructs courts to analyze the factors according to their relative importance. It does not suggest that a court apply different law to individual issues. Any ambiguity is easily eliminated by the Court's application of the test to the facts of Hubbard: the Court applied the factors to the wrongful death action and found that Indiana law applied; it did not make separate determinations for individual issues within the action. [2] Moreover, because Indiana is still primarily a lex loci state and lex loci analysis does not allow for the application of dépeçage, most cases necessarily would not deploy dépeçage. It would be illogical, therefore, to incorporate it into the second step of the Hubbard analysis. On the simple merits of dépeçage as a judicial technique, we find ourselves unimpressed. By making separate determinations for each issue within a claim, the process amalgamates the laws of different states, producing a hybrid that may not exist in any state. This is a problem for several reasons. First, legislatures may enact a given law only because of its expected interaction with a complementary law. Erin A. O'Hara & Larry E. Ribstein, From Politics To Efficiency In Choice-Of-Law, 67 U. Chi. L.Rev. 1151, 1193 (2000). For example, a legislature may allow recovery for certain injuries or impose a low standard of proof for liability but place a cap on the damages that might be recovered or adopt immunities for certain potential defendants. Id. Consequently, applying the law outside the context of the other laws in the jurisdiction may contravene legislative intent. In addition, applying a law in isolation increases the likelihood that its purpose and importance will be misconstrued, thereby thwarting state policy. William H. Allen & Erin A. O'Hara, Second Generation Law And Economics Of Conflict Of Laws: Baxter's Comparative Impairment And Beyond, 51 Stan. L.Rev. 1011, 1033 (1999). Ultimately, by applying dépeçage a court may hinder the policy of one or more states without furthering the considered policy of any state. Dépeçage may also produce unfair results because the hybrid law may be more favorable to one party than another, allowing a result that could not be reached if the laws of any one state were applied. As Brainerd Currie said, a party should not be allowed to put `together half a donkey and half a camel, and then ride to victory on the synthetic hybrid.' Christopher G. Stevenson, Depecage: Embracing Complexity to Solve Choice-of-Law Issues, Note, 37 Ind. L.Rev. 303, 320 (2003) (quoting Frederick K. Juenger, How Do You Rate a Century?. 37 Williamette L.Rev. 89, 106 (2001) (quoting Brainerd Currie)). Moreover, dépeçage compounds the advantage of parties with greater access to legal resources because it requires a separate analysis of each issue for each state involved. Because D.C.'s choice-of-law rules permit dépeçage [3] and Indiana's do not, there is a true conflict between the choice-of-law rules used by D.C. and Indiana.