"Disparate Impact" Theory Available In Age Discrimination Cases
Client Alert | less than 1 min read | 04.07.05
Resolving a split in the circuit courts, a divided Supreme Court in Smith v. City of Jackson, (Mar. 30, 2005) held that the "disparate impact" theory of liability, which does not require a showing of discriminatory intent, applies to claims asserted under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA). However, the Court noted that "the scope of disparate-impact liability under ADEA is narrower" than under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, due to statutory language in ADEA that permits employers to take "otherwise prohibited" employment action where the "differentiation is based on reasonable factors other than age," such as seniority or rank.
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Client Alert | 8 min read | 06.30.25
AI Companies Prevail in Path-Breaking Decisions on Fair Use
Last week, artificial intelligence companies won two significant copyright infringement lawsuits brought by copyright holders, marking an important milestone in the development of the law around AI. These decisions – Bartz v. Anthropic and Kadrey v. Meta (decided on June 23 and 25, 2025, respectively), along with a February 2025 decision in Thomson Reuters v. ROSS Intelligence – suggest that AI companies have plausible defenses to the intellectual property claims that have dogged them since generative AI technologies became widely available several years ago. Whether AI companies can, in all cases, successfully assert that their use of copyrighted content is “fair” will depend on their circumstances and further development of the law by the courts and Congress.
Client Alert | 3 min read | 06.30.25
Client Alert | 3 min read | 06.26.25
FDA Targets Gene Editing Clinical Trials in China and other “Hostile Countries”
Client Alert | 3 min read | 06.26.25
