A Fish Story: Alaska Packers' Association v. Domenico

Although history is interesting for its own sake, the point of developing as fully as possible the history of the Alaska Packers' case is to contribute to our understanding of the law. This article attempts to do that by looking beyond the authoritative narrative enshrined in the judicial opinions to a more complete, and more complex, story. An important lesson that emerges from this work is the insidious way in which assumptions about how the world works influence litigation outcomes. Because District Judge De Haven assumed the "self-evident fact" that Alaska Packers would want the men to catch as many fish as possible, he did not find the men's testimony regarding the inadequate nets to be credible.

Because of his assumption, he could see no motive for the company to provide substandard nets. The possibility that there could be too many fish, or that the cannery was trying to cut corners on its equipment, did not occur to him.