Solomonic Bargaining: Dividing a Legal Entitlement To Facilitate Coasean Trade

t William K. Townsend Professor of Law. Yale Law School; J.D.. Yale Law School: Ph D. (Economics), Massachusetts Institute of Technology. It J.D., Stanford University Law School; Ph.D. Candidate (Economics). Stanford University WVe are grateful to Jennifer Brown, Peter Cramton, Dick Craswell. Bob Ellickson. Lewis Komhauscr. Dean Leuck. Sandy Meiklejohn, Paul Milgrom, Barry Nalebuff. Mitch Polinsky. Jeffrey Rachlhnski. Eric Rasmusen. Roberta Romano, Carol Rose, Alan Schwartz, Matthew Spitzer. and Scott Stem for helpful comments The fundamental insights of Jason Scott Johnston---especially as contained in his excellent manuscript. Bargaining Under Rules Versus Standards (June 28. 1994)-have inspired much of the analysis in this Article. Support from the John M. Olin Program in Law and Economics is gratefully acknowledged. WVe also benefited from comments at a Harvard conference on property and liability rules