Nature of the Motion

Judgment as a Matter of Law

Nature of the Motion

A judge in a jury trial can sometimes decide an issue without the jury. Rule 50(a)(1) sets the condition: a party has been fully heard on the issue, and a reasonable jury would not have a legally sufficient evidentiary basis to find for that party on it.¹ When the condition is met, the court may resolve the issue against the party² and may grant a motion for judgment as a matter of law against that party on any claim or defense that, under the controlling law, can be maintained or defeated only with a favorable finding on the issue.³ The motion thus takes an issue, or a whole claim or defense, away from the jury because the record would not let a reasonable jury decide it the other way. This section defines the motion, sorts out its names, and places it between judge and jury. The sufficiency standard itself comes next.

Three names attach to the same idea, and the older two still turn up in state practice and casebooks. A party who thinks the opponent's proof falls short asks for a directed verdict at the close of that opponent's evidence.⁴ A party who loses before the jury and still thinks the proof was too thin asks for a judgment notwithstanding the verdict, or JNOV, which is a judgment in its favor despite the jury's contrary verdict.⁵ The federal rules replaced both labels with one. The Rule 50(a) motion for judgment as a matter of law is the federal directed verdict,⁶ and the same motion took over the JNOV's work: it must be presented before the case goes to the jury, and it can be reasserted if the court denies it and the jury returns an unfavorable verdict.⁷ Rule 50(a) governs the first moment. The motion may be made at any time before the case is submitted to the jury, and it must specify the judgment sought and the law and facts that entitle the movant to it.⁸ A state rule can say the same thing in different words. CR 50(a)(1), quoted in Elliott v. Custom Apple Packers, Inc., asks whether a reasonable jury would have a sufficient basis to “find or have found” for the party.⁹ A problem that speaks of a directed verdict or a JNOV therefore calls for the same sufficiency analysis.

A missing element in the plaintiff's proof shows the motion at work.

Penny must prove negligence, and she has offered nothing on it. Desmond can move under Rule 50(a), arguing that no reasonable jury could find the facts Penny needs and that judgment should be entered for him as a matter of law. If the judge agrees, the judge enters judgment for Desmond.¹⁰ He need not put on a defense first, because a party may move at the close of the opponent's evidence.¹¹

The motion tests whether there is enough evidence, not whether the evidence is credible or persuasive, and that places it on the law side of the fact/law divide.¹² A one-sided record shows the test from the grant side. Mr. A sues Ms. B for negligence after a collision but cannot recall the accident. Ms. B and three eyewitnesses testify that the light was green in her favor, and two other eyewitnesses testify that it was red against him. Given a legal rule that a driver who runs a red light cannot recover for injuries, the court would grant Ms. B's motion, because on that evidence no reasonable person could find for Mr. A.¹³

A direct conflict in testimony shows the test from the deny side.

The judge must deny the motion. Hale's testimony gives a reasonable jury a basis to find for him, and choosing between his account and Ortiz's is a question of credibility, which the motion does not reach.¹⁴

The motion also depends on the controlling law, so the same record can produce opposite rulings in different states. A plaintiff injured diving into an above-ground pool with aluminum sides offers evidence of the design's dangers, causation, and damages. The defendant moves on the ground that the plaintiff offered no evidence that a safer alternative design was feasible. A court grants the motion in a state that treats a feasible alternative as a necessary part of a design-defect case and denies it in a state that does not.¹⁵ Rule 50(a) builds this dependence into its text when it speaks of a claim or defense that “under the controlling law” turns on the issue.¹⁶

Design-defect claims also show how the motion differs from a motion to dismiss. Peter Painter's complaint against Toyota gives little more than minimal notice of a design-defect claim over a Camry sedan, yet if it states the claim adequately, it survives a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim.¹⁷ A motion to dismiss tests the pleading. Rule 50 tests the proof, and it asks its question only after the evidence is in.

Granting the motion takes the case away from the jury, which raises a jury-trial question. The motion rests on one of two theories: the evidence is insufficient to go to the jury, or it is so compelling that only one result could follow.¹⁸ The Supreme Court has held that the motion does not offend the Seventh Amendment. The common law gave judges some way, the demurrer to the evidence among them, to decide that the evidence was too thin for a jury to consider.¹⁹ The Seventh Amendment basis gets fuller treatment later in this chapter.

A granted motion produces a judgment, which Rule 54 defines as the court's final determination of the parties' rights and obligations and extends to any order from which an appeal lies.²⁰ That label matters on review. Suppose the court rules after a verdict and an appellate court finds the grant was error. The appellate court can reverse and enter judgment for the party in whose favor the jury ruled, and no new trial is needed to learn what the jury would have decided, because the jury already had that chance.²¹