Also known as: undue burden framework · undue burden test · undue-burden test · undue burden standard · undue burden · Casey framework
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
2 senses
A procedural rule permitting a party to withhold electronically stored information from discovery when the sources are not reasonably accessible due to undue burden or cost. The responding party must demonstrate inaccessibility on a motion to compel or for protective order. A court may still order production upon a showing of good cause by the requesting party.
A standard for reviewing regulations that substantially interfere with protected constitutional interests. The regulation is invalid if it places a substantial obstacle in the path of the protected interest. The framework requires courts to assess the practical effect of the restriction.
Each sense below has its own examples, sources, and questions.
A procedural rule permitting a party to withhold electronically stored information from discovery when the sources are not reasonably accessible due to undue burden or cost. The responding party must demonstrate inaccessibility on a motion to compel or for protective order. A court may still order production upon a showing of good cause by the requesting party.
Select any source to read its text and confirm it supports the definition.
Uptown Apparel served discovery requests on Urban Logistics seeking ten years of archived email backups stored on decommissioned servers. Urban Logistics moved for a protective order, showing that restoring the data would require specialized vendors and cost over four hundred thousand dollars with no active system holding copies. The court evaluated whether good cause justified ordering production despite the inaccessibility.
Ulysses Maritime sought extensive production from Upstream Petroleum covering five years of lab notebooks and offsite archives. Upstream Petroleum moved for a protective order after certifying that it had conferred with opposing counsel and that the archives were not reasonably accessible. The court considered whether the requested scope imposed undue burden warranting limits on frequency or extent of discovery.
Umar Underwood served a subpoena on Ugo Uberti demanding production of confidential commercial records held in remote storage. Ugo Uberti moved to quash, demonstrating that compliance would require extensive forensic work and impose significant expense on a nonparty. The court assessed whether the subpoena subjected the recipient to undue burden requiring modification or denial.
The responding party must demonstrate that the sources are not reasonably accessible because of undue burden or cost. Once that showing is made, the requesting party may still obtain an order by establishing good cause after considering proportionality factors.
Supporting sources
A party may move for a protective order when discovery would cause undue burden or expense. The motion must certify a good-faith effort to resolve the dispute, and the court may limit the scope or allocate costs to protect the responding party.
Supporting sources
A standard for reviewing regulations that substantially interfere with protected constitutional interests. The regulation is invalid if it places a substantial obstacle in the path of the protected interest. The framework requires courts to assess the practical effect of the restriction.
Select any source to read its text and confirm it supports the definition.
State regulations required all nonprescription contraceptives to be sold only through licensed pharmacists and barred sales to minors under sixteen without physician approval. Adult and minor plaintiffs challenged the rules, showing that the channeling and approval requirements created substantial practical obstacles to obtaining lawful products. The court examined whether the restrictions imposed an undue burden on the fundamental privacy right to contraception.
The framework asks whether the regulation places a substantial obstacle in the path of adults or minors seeking lawful contraception. Restrictions that channel all sales through pharmacists or impose physician approval for minors are invalid if they significantly impair practical access.
Supporting sources
The framework no longer supplies a federal constitutional right to abortion. States may regulate or prohibit abortion without violating a federal privacy right, though other constitutional claims remain available.
Supporting sources
…of our dormant Commerce Clause jurisprudence has been the principle that the States may not impose regulations that place an undue burden on interstate commerce, even where those regulations do not discriminate between in-state and out-of-state businesses. See Brown-Forman Distillers Corp. v. New York State Liquor…
…the District Court agreed, and concluded that Washington's assisted-suicide ban is unconstitutional because it "places an undue burden on the exercise of [that] constitutionally protected liberty interest." The District Court also decided that the Washington statute violated the Equal Protection Clause's requirement that…
…turn to the specific provisions of the Pennsylvania statute at issue. The Court of Appeals applied what it believed to be the
…instance, the welfare residence requirements are alleged to be unconstitutional on two grounds: first, because they impose an undue burden upon the constitutional right of welfare applicants to travel interstate; second, because they deny to persons who have recently moved interstate and would otherwise be eligible for…
…in that it makes unlawful a range of alternative responses that would be reasonable but would fall short of imposing an "
A court must quash or modify a subpoena that subjects a person to undue burden. The analysis focuses on the expense, time, and technical difficulty of compliance, particularly for nonparties.
Supporting sources
State C enacted a procurement statute limiting bids on certain projects to firms with a principal place of business inside the state and imposing a special tax only on out-of-state awardees. National Steel, an out-of-state bidder, challenged the provisions after being declared ineligible. The court assessed whether the location rule and tax constituted an undue burden on interstate commerce.
Congress enacted a statute prohibiting possession of firearms in school zones. A student charged under the law moved to dismiss, arguing that the prohibition exceeded federal authority. The court evaluated whether the regulation imposed an undue burden on interstate commerce by reaching purely local activity without a sufficient nexus to economic effects.