“Clarifying” Amendments to the Federal Rules?

Abstract

A request to contribute to a memorial review in honor of Robert M. Hunter is for me a must. Bob Hunter was a rare person, one of the most completely free spirits I have ever known. Gay, witty, high-spirited, his gentleness belied the force which was in him, for no man stood firmer for principles of personal liberty; none showed more courage and independence. In an age when sterile conformity, if not abject fear, must be the rule, it is good to recall someone who stood out against the trend. We shall miss him grievously. The loss of his high capabilities, his moral strength, and his capacity for leadership, in times when those qualities have become priceless, is hard to bear. Even though my daily preoccupations have made it impossible for me to frame a composition worthy of a place in his honor, I feel that I must give what I can. So I have turned to a portion of my daily task, thinking that such an ordinary course would appeal to his modest approach to things scholastic. And immediately I am confronted, in work for the Advisory Committee on the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, with a problem in his own field of procedural law which I think would have intrigued him greatly. Accordingly I present this small offering in tribute to the memory of a fine scholar and a gallant gentleman.