PrepTest 151, Section 1, Question 4
The United States Supreme Court’s 1948 ruling in(440 more words not shown)
Which one of the following(30 more words not shown)
- AIf a trucking(22 more words not shown)
- BIf an individual(27 more words not shown)
- CIf a newspaper(22 more words not shown)
- DIf a person(30 more words not shown)
- EIf a company(21 more words not shown)
Reading the passage
Separate the two actors. Private parties create the agreement. A court then enforces it. Under the attribution rationale, that second step makes the state responsible for the agreement's content, even though the state did not write it.
What we’re looking for
So we want a second actor becoming responsible for content created by someone else because of what the second actor does with it. Looking only for a contract or a constitutional issue would miss the relationship the question asks us to match.
Working the answers
- A
The trucking company is responsible because it failed to inspect its own vehicles. This attributes responsibility for harm to the company's own failure. It does not give us someone else's content that the company then adopts or puts into effect.
- B
The person is responsible for a contract they signed, whether or not they understood it. The familiar word contract is tempting, but the missing relationship matters: there is no second actor becoming responsible by enforcing the first actor's agreement. Understanding the terms was not the issue in Shelley.
- CCorrect
The columnist creates the piece, just as the private parties create the agreement. The newspaper publishes it, just as the court enforces the agreement. Publication makes the newspaper responsible for content it did not originate, matching enforcement's attribution of responsibility to the state. The answer does not have to involve constitutional law to reproduce that structure.
- D
The person fails to rescue someone and is held responsible for the resulting injuries. That is responsibility for a failure to help. There is no first actor's content that a second actor publishes, enforces, or otherwise puts into effect.
- E
The company must recall a faulty product that it manufactured and distributed. The responsibility stays with the producer of the defective product. That differs from attributing responsibility to a second party that acts on something another party created.
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