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Full-Text Articles in Law
Presidential Progress On Climate Change: Will The Courts Interfere With What Needs To Be Done To Save Our Planet?, Michael B. Gerrard
Presidential Progress On Climate Change: Will The Courts Interfere With What Needs To Be Done To Save Our Planet?, Michael B. Gerrard
Faculty Scholarship
The Biden Administration is undertaking numerous actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and transition away from fossil fuels as part of the fight against climate change. Many of these actions are likely to be challenged in court. This paper describes the various legal theories that are likely to be used in these challenges, assesses their prospects of success given the current composition of the Supreme Court, and suggests ways to minimize the risks.
Power Transitions In A Troubled Democracy, Peter L. Strauss, Gillian E. Metzger
Power Transitions In A Troubled Democracy, Peter L. Strauss, Gillian E. Metzger
Faculty Scholarship
Written as our contribution to a festschrift for the noted Italian administrative law scholar Marco D’Alberti, this essay addresses transition between Presidents Trump and Biden, in the context of political power transitions in the United States more generally. Although the Trump-Biden transition was marked by extraordinary behaviors and events, we thought even the transition’s mundane elements might prove interesting to those for whom transitions occur in a parliamentary context. There, succession can happen quickly once an election’s results are known, and happens with the new political government immediately formed and in office. The layer of a new administration’s political leadership …
Judicial Credibility, Bert I. Huang
Judicial Credibility, Bert I. Huang
Faculty Scholarship
Do people believe a federal court when it rules against the government? And does such judicial credibility depend on the perceived political affiliation of the judge? This study presents a survey experiment addressing these questions, based on a set of recent cases in which both a judge appointed by President George W. Bush and a judge appointed by President Bill Clinton declared the same Trump Administration action to be unlawful. The findings offer evidence that, in a politically salient case, the partisan identification of the judge – here, as a “Bush judge” or “Clinton judge” – can influence the credibility …
Fixing America's Founding, Maeve Glass
Fixing America's Founding, Maeve Glass
Faculty Scholarship
The forty-fifth presidency of the United States has sent lawyers reaching once more for the Founders’ dictionaries and legal treatises. In courtrooms, law schools, and media outlets across the country, the original meanings of the words etched into the U.S. Constitution in 1787 have become the staging ground for debates ranging from the power of a president to trademark his name in China to the rights of a legal permanent resident facing deportation. And yet, in this age when big data promises to solve potential challenges of interpretation and judges have for the most part agreed that original meaning should …
Presidential Use Of Force In East Asia: American Constitutional Law And The U.S.-Japan Alliance, Matthew C. Waxman
Presidential Use Of Force In East Asia: American Constitutional Law And The U.S.-Japan Alliance, Matthew C. Waxman
Faculty Scholarship
The U.S. Constitution’s allocation of military authority has adapted over time to major shifts in American power and grand strategy. This paper explains, with a focus on U.S. military actions in East Asia and possible scenarios of special joint concern to the United States and Japan, that the president in practice wields tremendous power and discretion in using military force. Although formal, legal checks on the president’s use of force rarely come into play, Congress nevertheless retains some political power to influence presidential decision-making. The president’s powers are also constrained by interagency processes within the executive branch, and alliance relations …
Executive Underreach, In Pandemics And Otherwise, David E. Pozen, Kim Lane Scheppele
Executive Underreach, In Pandemics And Otherwise, David E. Pozen, Kim Lane Scheppele
Faculty Scholarship
Legal scholars are familiar with the problem of executive overreach, especially in emergencies. But sometimes, instead of being too audacious or extreme, a national executive's attempts to address a true threat prove far too limited and insubstantial. In this Essay, we seek to define and clarify the phenomenon of executive underreach, with special reference to the COVID-19 crisis; to outline ways in which such underreach may compromise constitutional governance and the international legal order; and to suggest a partial remedy.
President Obama's Approach To The Middle East And North Africa: Strategic Absence, Paul Williams
President Obama's Approach To The Middle East And North Africa: Strategic Absence, Paul Williams
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
Many commentators argue that the White House does not have a policy regarding the Middle East and North Africa. Based on observations of the White House's foreign policy decisions over a breadth of seven years, this article argues that The White House does have a clear policy and it is one of Strategic Absence. The term Strategic Absence is used to describe political behavior that arises from a belief that sometimes, in foreign affairs, it is better to be absent rather than present. Strategic Absence has led to a degradation of American influence in the Middle East and has contributed …
Presidential Power And Constitutional Responsibility, Thomas P. Crocker
Presidential Power And Constitutional Responsibility, Thomas P. Crocker
Faculty Publications
Some constitutional theorists defend unbounded executive power to respond to emergencies or expansive discretionary powers to complete statutory directives. Against these anti-Madisonian approaches, this Article examines how the textual assignment of republican virtues helps to constitute and constrain the president's power. The Madisonian solution for constitutional constraint both creates institutions for unenlightened statesmen and relies on virtue to make governing possible. Constitutional responsibility is a consistent textual theme found in the command to "take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed," the responsibility to remain faithful to the office of president, and the obligation to preserve the Constitution itself. Although …
Why Care About The Polar Bear?: Economic Analysis Of Natural Resources Law And Policy [Outline], Lisa Heinzerling
Why Care About The Polar Bear?: Economic Analysis Of Natural Resources Law And Policy [Outline], Lisa Heinzerling
The Future of Natural Resources Law and Policy (Summer Conference, June 6-8)
1 page.
"Lisa Heinzerling, Georgetown Law School" -- Agenda
Antiquities Act Monuments: The Elgin Marbles Of Our Public Lands?, James R. Rasband
Antiquities Act Monuments: The Elgin Marbles Of Our Public Lands?, James R. Rasband
Celebrating the Centennial of the Antiquities Act (October 9)
13 pages.
Includes bibliographical references
Slides: The Monumental Legacy Of The Antiquities Act Of 1906: The Rainbow Bridge National Monument In Context, Mark Squillace
Slides: The Monumental Legacy Of The Antiquities Act Of 1906: The Rainbow Bridge National Monument In Context, Mark Squillace
Celebrating the Centennial of the Antiquities Act (October 9)
Presenter: Professor Mark Squillace, Director, Natural Resources Law Center, University of Colorado School of Law
35 slides
Slides: The Centennial Of The Antiquities Act: A Cause For Celebration?, James R. Rasband
Slides: The Centennial Of The Antiquities Act: A Cause For Celebration?, James R. Rasband
Celebrating the Centennial of the Antiquities Act (October 9)
Presenter: Professor James R. Rasband, Brigham Young University School of Law
20 slides