Law Commons^™

The Immigration Court System: Unconstitutionality At The Hands Of The Executive To Push Nativism, Chloe Wigul

Journal of the National Association of Administrative Law Judiciary

The United States’ immigration court system is located within the U.S. Department of Justice’s Executive Office for Immigration Review and operated under the power of the attorney general. Consequently, the attorney general can review and overrule decisions made by the Board of Immigration Appeals, the immigration appellate body. If the attorney general uses this authority, his decision cannot be reconsidered, and his opinion becomes precedent. Immigration courts are unique in that no other court system is located within or controlled by the executive branch. Focusing on key historical eras, this Comment compares the development of immigration law and policy with …

Jazz Improvisation And The Law: Constrained Choice, Sequence, And Strategic Movement Within Rules, William W. Buzbee

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This Article argues that a richer understanding of the nature of law is possible through comparative, analogical examination of legal work and the art of jazz improvisation. This exploration illuminates a middle ground between rule of law aspirations emphasizing stability and determinate meanings and contrasting claims that the untenable alternative is pervasive discretionary or politicized law. In both the law and jazz improvisation settings, the work involves constraining rules, others’ unpredictable actions, and strategic choosing with attention to where a collective creation is going. One expects change and creativity in improvisation, but the many analogous characteristics of law illuminate why …

Judicial Deference To Agency Action Based On Ai, Cade Mallett

Catholic University Journal of Law and Technology

No abstract provided.

Biden V. Nebraska: The New State Standing And The (Old) Purposive Major Questions Doctrine, Jed Handelsman Shugerman

Faculty Scholarship

Chief Justice Roberts’s majority opinion in Biden v. Nebraska does not sufficiently explain how Missouri has standing under established Article III doctrine, nor how the Court approaches the major questions doctrine as a method of statutory interpretation. Clarification can come from other opinions, even other cases entirely, in which Justice’s counterarguments are suggestive of the real arguments underlying the decisions.

MOHELA may have faced a concrete injury from the student debt waiver, but there was no evidence that Missouri would – and the majority had no answer for how Missouri had standing without an injury. A debate over special state …

The Rule Of Recognition And Presidential Power, Austin Piatt

Northwestern University Law Review

Professor H.L.A. Hart’s theory of the rule of recognition, introduced in 1961, asserts that every legal system requires a rule of recognition to tell society what the law is. Though much scholarship has been dedicated to analyzing America’s theoretical rule of recognition, Hart’s theory has not yet been applied to the numerous actions and operations of America’s Executive Branch. The rule of recognition should be able to tell us which executive actions have the authority of law. Yet, when we try to make sense of various recent orders, memos, guidance documents, and letters emanating from the White House and administrative …

Table Of Contents

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

The Emerging Lessons Of Trump V. Hawaii, Shalini Bhargava Ray

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

In the years since the Supreme Court decided Trump v. Hawaii, federal district courts have adjudicated dozens of rights-based challenges to executive action in immigration law. Plaintiffs, including U.S. citizens, civil rights organizations, and immigrants themselves, have alleged violations of the First Amendment and the equal protection component of the Due Process Clause with some regularity based on President Trump’s animus toward immigrants. This Article assesses Hawaii’s impact on these challenges to immigration policy, and it offers two observations. First, Hawaii has amplified federal courts’ practice of privileging administrative law claims over constitutional ones. For example, courts considering …

Who Constrains Presidential Exercise Of Delegated Powers?, Rebecca L. Brown

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

Building on the work of administrative law scholars who have identified and illuminated the several components of the problem over the years, this Article will seek to show what has happened when a cluster of separate circumstances have come together to create a new and serious threat to individual liberty when the President exercises expansive delegated authority. Several doctrinal components lead to this confluence: First, the moribund “intelligible principle” test has evolved to provide little or no constraint on this or any other delegation. Second, a delegation to the President, specifically, is not subject to the procedural requirements of the …

Presidential Control Of Elections, Lisa Marshall Manheim

Articles

An election that is “disputed” lacks two qualities after Election Day: a clear winner and a concession. These elections instead depend on legal processes — recounts, court proceedings, and more — for resolution. As a result, when a sitting President, running for reelection, becomes immersed in a disputed presidential election, he potentially enjoys an advantage over his opponent. He can attempt to exploit the powers of the presidency to push these legal proceedings in his favor. As a practical matter, this advantage can be formidable. A sitting president can resort to his extraordinary bully pulpit, for example, to influence public …

A Typology Of Justice Department Lawyers' Roles And Responsibilities, Rebecca Roiphe

Articles & Chapters

President Trump’s administration has persistently challenged the legitimacy of the Department of Justice (“DOJ”). In the past, DOJ, like other governmental institutions, has been fairly resilient. Informal norms and practices have served to preserve its proper functioning, even under pressure. The strain of the past three years, however, has been different in kind and scale. This Article offers a typology of different roles for DOJ lawyers and argues that over time the institution has evolved by allocating different functions and responsibilities to different positions within DOJ. By doing so, it has for the most part maintained the proper balance between …

Administrative Law: Whose Job Is It Anyway?, Allison Mather

Pepperdine Law Review

This Note examines the current state of judicial deference to administrative agencies and suggests modifying the doctrine to better comport with the Constitution. It examines the history of administrative agencies and the rise of judicial deference. The Note explores the present-day applications of judicial deference and analyzes whether the current doctrine is consistent with both its initial underlying policies and the Constitution. Ultimately, judicial deference to administrative agencies raises serious separation of powers concerns and should be modified to remain faithful to the nation’s founding principles.

The Life Of Administrative Democracy, Joshua Galperin

Articles

Imagine if Congress, the President, and the industries they hoped to regulate all decided that neither politically isolated bureaucrats nor a popularly sanctioned President should wield the power to administer Congress’ laws, to make legislative-type policy, to enforce that policy, and to adjudicate disputes under it. Imagine if there were another experiment, one that has persisted, but few have noticed.

Imagine no longer. Overlooked by most, there is a model for federal administration that does not rely on isolated administrators or Presidential control, but instead on elected bureaucrats. Today, the United States Department of Agriculture houses over 7,500 elected farmer-bureaucrats …

Presidential Control Over Disputed Elections, Lisa Marshall Manheim

Articles

An election that is “disputed” lacks two qualities after Election Day: a clear winner and a concession. These elections instead depend on legal processes — recounts, court proceedings, and more — for resolution. As a result, when a sitting President, running for reelection, becomes immersed in a disputed presidential election, he potentially enjoys an advantage over his opponent. He can attempt to exploit the powers of the presidency to push these legal proceedings in his favor. As a practical matter, this advantage can be formidable. A sitting president can resort to his extraordinary bully pulpit, for example, to influence public …

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 …

Information Mischief Under The Trump Administration, Nathan Cortez

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

The Trump administration has used government information in more cynical ways than its predecessors. For example, it has removed certain information from the public domain, scrubbed certain terminology from government web sites, censored scientists, manipulated public data, and used “transparency” initiatives as a pretext for anti-regulatory policies, particularly environmental policy. This article attempts to tease out an emerging “information policy” for the Trump administration, explain how it departs from the information policies of predecessors, and evaluate the extent to which both legal and non-legal mechanisms might constrain executive discretion.

Administrative Truth: Comments On Cortez’S Information Mischief, David Thaw

Articles

This short essay responds to Professor Nathan Cortez’s argument describing an emerging “information policy” reflecting on the practices of President Donald J. Trump’s executive administration (the “Trump Administration”) regarding the development, release, and management of official information. Professor Cortez argues that viewed holistically, this information policy suggests a shift toward the use of information practices by administrative agencies for purposes other than “neutral principles” and rather focusing on a “more cynical [use] of government information.”

This argument may be well-founded, and the Trump Administration certainly has been criticized widely for the relationship between its public statements and widespread media interpretation …

Lucia Et Al. V. Securities And Exchange Commission: Brief Amicus Curiae Of Administrative Law Scholars In Support Of Neither Party, Richard J. Pierce Jr.

Journal of the National Association of Administrative Law Judiciary

No abstract provided.

Lucia Et Al. V. Securities And Exchange Commission: Brief Amicus Curiae Of Federal Administrative Law Judges Conference In Support Of Neither Party, John M. Vittone

Journal of the National Association of Administrative Law Judiciary

No abstract provided.

When Influence Encroaches: Statutory Advice In The Administrative State, William C. Hudson

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

This Article revisits the D.C. Circuit’s 1993 decision in FEC v. NRA Political Victory Fund, and concludes that the separation of powers reasoning applied in NRA Political Victory Fund could invalidate other common practices in the administrative state, such as statutory requirements that Executive Branch officers serve on the boards of corporations created and staffed by Congress.

Closing The Door To Lost Earnings Under The National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act Of 1986, Aaron M. Levin

Aaron M Levin

After a wave of lawsuits against vaccine manufacturers hindered the profitability and production of life-saving vaccines, Congress enacted The National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986. The Act offers an incentive for individuals to get vaccinated in order to mitigate the population’s exposure to disease, while encouraging the continued production of these serums by pharmaceutical companies. Although imperfect, the Vaccine Act fosters promise in filtering out frivolous claims and provides a central route for due process to the individuals who suffer from a vaccine-related injury. By removing a potential state tort issue to the Federal Circuit, Congress created a reasonably …

Inside Agency Statutory Interpretation, Christopher J. Walker

Christopher J. Walker

The Constitution vests all legislative powers in Congress, yet Congress grants expansive lawmaking authority to federal agencies. As positive political theorists have long explored, Congress intends for federal agencies to faithfully exercise their delegated authority, but ensuring fidelity to congressional wishes is difficult due to asymmetries in information, expertise, and preferences that complicate congressional control and oversight. Indeed, this principal-agent problem has a democratic and constitutional dimension, as the legitimacy of administrative governance may well depend on whether the unelected bureaucracy is a faithful agent of Congress. Despite the predominance of lawmaking by regulation and the decades-long application of principal-agent …

Foreword — Chevron At 30: Looking Back And Looking Forward, Peter M. Shane, Christopher J. Walker

Christopher J. Walker

This Foreword introduces a Fordham Law Review symposium held in March 2014 to mark the thirtieth anniversary of Chevron U.S.A. v. Natural Resources Defense Council. The most-cited administrative-law decision of all time, Chevron has sparked thirty years of scholarly discussion concerning what Chevron deference means, when (or even if) it should apply, and what impact it has had on the administrative state. Part I of the Foreword discusses the symposium contributions that address Chevron’s scope and application, especially in light of City of Arlington v. FCC. Part II introduces the contributions that explore empirically and theoretically Chevron’s impact outside of …

Signing Statements And Statutory Interpretation In The Bush Administration, Neil Kinkopf

Neil J. Kinkopf

No abstract provided.

The Unintended Consequences Of Safety Regulation, Sherzod Abdukadirov

Sherzod Abdukadirov

This study examines how risk trade-offs undermine safety regulations. Safety regulations often come with unintended consequences in that regulations attempting to reduce risk in one area may increase risks elsewhere. The increases in countervailing risks may even exceed the reduction in targeted risks, leading to a policy that does more harm than good. The unintended consequences could be avoided or their impacts minimized through more careful analysis, including formal risk trade-off analysis, consumer testing, and retrospective analysis. Yet agencies face strong incentives against producing better analysis; increased awareness of risk trade-offs would force agencies to make unpalatable and politically sensitive …

Building A Framework For Governance: Retrospective Review And Rulemaking Petitions, Reeve T. Bull

Reeve T Bull

Of the various regulatory reform efforts advocated by legal scholars and politicians in recent years, perhaps none holds greater promise than retrospective review of agency regulations, whereby agencies revisit existing rules to determine whether they remain appropriate in light of changed circumstances. The Obama Administration has embraced the principles of retrospective review, issuing three executive orders on the subject, and it has trumpeted billions of dollars in economic savings resulting from those efforts. Nevertheless, numerous scholars have criticized these initiatives, contending that agencies reviewing their own regulations are unlikely to repeal or fundamentally overhaul existing rules. This article addresses the …

The Ordinary Remand Rule And The Judicial Toolbox For Agency Dialogue, Christopher J. Walker

Christopher J. Walker

When a court concludes that an agency’s decision is erroneous, the ordinary rule is to remand to the agency to consider the issue anew (as opposed to the court deciding the issue itself). Despite that the Supreme Court first articulated this ordinary remand rule in the 1940s and has rearticulated it repeatedly over the years, little work has been done to understand how the rule works in practice, much less whether it promotes the separation-of-powers values that motivate the rule. This Article is the first to conduct such an investigation—focusing on judicial review of agency immigration adjudications and reviewing the …

Three-Dimensional Sovereign Immunity, Sarah L. Brinton

Sarah L Brinton

The Supreme Court has erred on sovereign immunity. The current federal immunity doctrine wrongly gives Congress the exclusive authority to waive immunity (“exclusive congressional waiver”), but the Constitution mandates that Congress share the waiver power with the Court. This Article develops the doctrine of a two-way shared waiver and then explores a third possibility: the sharing of the immunity waiver power among all three branches of government.

The Implausibility Of Secrecy, Mark Fenster

Mark Fenster

Government secrecy frequently fails. Despite the executive branch’s obsessive hoarding of certain kinds of documents and its constitutional authority to do so, recent high-profile events—among them the WikiLeaks episode, the Obama administration’s celebrated leak prosecutions, and the widespread disclosure by high-level officials of flattering confidential information to sympathetic reporters—undercut the image of a state that can classify and control its information. The effort to control government information requires human, bureaucratic, technological, and textual mechanisms that regularly founder or collapse in an administrative state, sometimes immediately and sometimes after an interval. Leaks, mistakes, open sources—each of these constitutes a path out …

Regulating The Family: The Impact Of Pro-Family Policy Making Assessments On Women And Non-Traditional Families, Robin S. Maril

Robin S. Maril

Beginning in the 1980s, pro-family advocates lobbied the Reagan administration to take a stronger, more direct role in enforcing traditional family norms through agency rulemaking. In 1986 the White House Working Group on the Family published a report entitled, The Family: Preserving America’s Future, detailing what its authors perceived to be the biggest threats to the “American household of persons related by blood, marriage or adoption – the traditional . . . family.” These threats included a lax sexual culture carried over from the 1960s, resulting in rising divorce rates, children born “out of wedlock,” and increased acceptance of “alternative …

Moving Forward With Regulatory Lookback, Cary Coglianese

All Faculty Scholarship

President Obama has rightly called on government agencies to establish ongoing routines for reviewing existing regulations to determine if they need modification or repeal. Over the last two years, the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) has overseen a signature regulatory “lookback” initiative that has prompted dozens of federal agencies to review hundreds of regulations. This regulatory initiative represents a good first step toward increasing the retrospective review of regulation, but by itself will do little to build a lasting culture of serious regulatory evaluation. After all, past administrations have made similar review efforts, but these ad …