Law Commons^™

Prosecuting Executive Branch Wrongdoing, Julian A. Cook, Iii

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Attorney General William Barr’s handling of Robert Mueller’s Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference in the 2016 Presidential Election was undeniably controversial and raised meaningful questions regarding the impartiality of the Department of Justice. Yet, Barr’s conduct, which occurred at the conclusion of the Mueller investigation, was merely the caboose at the end of a series of controversies that were coupled together from the outset of the investigation. Ensnarled in dissonance from its inception, the Mueller investigation was dogged by controversies that ultimately compromised its legitimacy.

Public trust of criminal investigations of executive branch wrongdoing requires prosecutorial independence. To …

Law Matters, Even To The Executive, Julian Davis Mortenson

Michigan Law Review

In both constitutional and international law, many legal rules cannot be implemented without what most people would describe as the voluntary compliance of their target. Is that really “law”? Or is rule compliance in such circumstances just an expression of “interests”? Forget jurisprudence for the moment. As a practical matter, what does it mean to work as a lawyer in a field where the rules are not coercively enforced against private parties by an independent judiciary whose orders are implemented by a cooperative executive? This question has particularly high stakes for national security policy, where we find judicial deference at …

Global Markets And The Evolution Of Law In China And Japan, Takao Tanase

Michigan Journal of International Law

The first angle of this Article concerns the exclusivity of rights, which is the notion that a right has an exclusive boundary of ownership. The socialist system and traditional customary law in China gave only weak recognition to this concept, especially prior to China's move toward a market economy and the introduction of modern law. The second angle addresses the functionality of extralegal norms. Law reforms tend to be measured by the efficiency gains they produce, a process intensified by competition among systems. The third angle involves the ideological nature of the market-oriented development of law. The foreign enterprises and …

Reply: Criminal Law's Pathology, William J. Stuntz

Michigan Law Review

I thank Kyron Huigens for devoting his time and his considerable talent to responding to my article, The Pathological Politics of Criminal Law. I also thank editors of the Michigan Law Review for giving me the opportunity to reply. It is best to begin by defining the contested territory. Huigens and I agree (I think) on three propositions. First, American criminal law, both federal and state, is very broad; it covers a great deal more conduct than most people would expect. Second, American criminal law is very deep: that which it criminalizes, it criminalizes repeatedly, so that a single …

The Conditions Of Discretion: Autonomy, Community, Bureaucracy, Steven F. Cherry

Michigan Law Review

A Review of The Conditions of Discretion: Autonomy, Community, Bureaucracy/em by Joel F. Handler