Fuentes v. Shevin: Due Process and the Consumer, A Legal and Empirical Study

A discussion of the U.S. Supreme Court’s holding in Fuentes v. Shevin, which concerned due process in prejudgment replevin procedures. Part I, will examine the background and the decision in Fuentes, its place in the constitutional development of procedural due process, its impact on the prejudgment replevin statutes of the several states,' and the import of the decision for the practicing lawyer. In Part II, the focus of the article will shift to an empirical study of the actual effects of the decision on business practices and the business responses of selected creditor groups to those effects. An analysis of these overall results indicates that there is no need for the credit market to be unduly concerned with the possible effects of Fuentes and Adams; it will affect only a minute portion of the credit markets' transactions.