Law Commons^™

Original Intent And Article Iii, Michael L. Wells, Edward J. Larson

Scholarly Works

Article III of the United States Constitution sets limits on the ability of the legislature to expand or contract the jurisdiction of the federal courts. The Supreme Court has generally held that Article III's restraints on the power of the legislature to restrict the jurisdiction of the federal courts are few and extremely permissive. Many scholars, however, argue that Article III imposes some strong limitations on the legislature's ability to define federal jurisdiction. Strangely, both sides of the debate rely on originalist arguments. This Article argues that reliance on the Framers' intent to resolve issues of federal courts law is …

Commerce Clause Restraints On State Taxation After Jefferson Lines, Walter Hellerstein, Michael J. Mcintyre, Richard D. Pomp

Scholarly Works

The Supreme Court's 1977 decision in Complete Auto Transit, Inc. v. Brady signaled a paradigmatic shift in the Court's approach to state tax adjudication under the dormant Commerce Clause. In Complete Auto, the Court repudiated the formalistic school of interpretation that once had governed Commerce Clause analysis of state taxation because it bore ‘no relationship to economic realities.’ In its place, the Court embraced a decisional framework that ‘considered not the formal language of the tax statute but rather its practical effect.’ In furtherance of this objective, the Court suggested a four-part test to guide the constitutional analysis of state …

Constitutional Torts: Combining Diverse Doctrines And Practicality, Thomas A. Eaton, Michael Wells

Scholarly Works

Constitutional Torts is, in part, a response to our sense that the upper level curriculum could be improved by courses that bring together areas of doctrine that are often studied in isolation. We think there is substantial value in bringing together seemingly disparate areas of doctrine that bear on a common real-world problem. Students benefit from learning how to put together concepts from different substantive areas in order to solve problems they will face in practice.

The Impact Of The Garcia Decision On The Market-Participant Exception To The Dormant Commerce Clause, Dan T. Coenen

Scholarly Works

In National League of Cities v. Usery, the Supreme Court recognized a strong state-sovereignty-based limit on Congress's exercise of its commerce power. In Garcia v. San Antonio Metropolitan Transit Authority, however, the Court overruled National League of Cities, relying in part on past difficulties in trying to distinguish between protected state “governmental” activities and unprotected state “proprietary” activities. In the wake of Garcia, commentators have urged that its reasoning undermines the Court's longstanding exemption of state proprietary activities from dormant Commerce Clause challenge under the so-called “market-participant” doctrine.

In this article, Professor Dan Coenen refutes this argument by showing that …