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Introduction, Ezra Rosser

Contributions to Books

This is the introduction to Holes in the Safety Net: Federalism and Poverty (Ezra Rosser ed., Cambridge University Press, 2019). The table of contents for the book, with links to the other chapters, can be found below: Introduction (this document) Ezra Rosser Part I: Welfare and Federalism Ch. 1 Federalism, Entitlement, and Punishment across the US Social Welfare State Wendy Bach Ch. 2 Laboratories of Suffering: Toward Democratic Welfare Governance Monica Bell, Andrea Taverna, Dhruv Aggarwal, and Isra Syed Ch. 3 The Difference in Being Poor in Red States versus Blue States Michele Gilman Part II: States, Federalism, and Antipoverty …

Guns N' Ganja: How Federalism Criminalizes The Lawful Use Of Marijuana, Ira P. Robbins

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

Federalism is a vital tenet of our Republic. Although federal law is the supreme law of the land, our Constitution recognizes the integral role that state law plays in the national scheme. Like any pharmaceutical drug that withstands rounds of clinical testing, state law functions as a laboratory in which Congress can evaluate and potentially adopt novel policies on a nation-wide basis. Most of the time, federal and state law exist harmoniously, complementing one another; other times, however, the two systems clash, striking a dissonant chord.

In the United States, state marijuana laws are currently on a crash course with …

The Perils And Possibilities Of Refugee Federalism, Burch Elias

American University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Independence And Immigration, Amanda Frost

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

No abstract provided.

Inferiority Complex: Should State Courts Follow Lower Federal Court Precedent On The Meaning Of Federal Law?, Amanda Frost

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

The conventional wisdom is that state courts need not follow lower federal court precedent when interpreting federal law. Upon closer inspection, however, the question of how state courts should treat lower federal court precedent is not so clear. Although most state courts now take the conventional approach, a few contend that they are obligated to follow the lower federal courts, and two federal courts of appeals have declared that their decisions are binding on state courts. The Constitution’s text and structure send mixed messages about the relationship between state and lower federal courts, and the Supreme Court has never squarely …

Fracking, Federalism, And Private Governance, Amanda Leiter

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

The United States is in the midst of a natural gas boom, made possible by advances in drilling and extraction technologies. There is considerable disagreement about the relative benefits and costs of the boom, but one thing is certain: it has caught governments flat-footed. The federal government has done little more than commission a study of some associated public health and environmental risks. States have moved faster to address natural gas risks, but with little consistency or transparency.

Numerous private organizations are beginning to fill the resulting governance gaps with information-gathering and standards-setting efforts. This Paper documents these efforts and …

Fracking As A Federalism Case Study, Amanda Leiter

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

No abstract provided.

Tax Planning For Marijuana Dealers, Benjamin Leff

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

In recent years, many states have legalized marijuana while the federal government continues to consider all marijuana sales and use illegal. But marijuana industry insiders consider not federal criminal law but federal tax law to be the biggest impediment to the development of a legitimate marijuana industry. State-sanctioned marijuana sellers are required to pay federal income taxes pursuant to § 280E, a formerly largely symbolic provision that Congress enacted to punish drug dealers, but which now could potentially drive legitimate marijuana sellers underground. This paper proposes a tax strategy that enables state-sanctioned marijuana sellers to avoid the impact of § …

Countering The Majoritarian Difficulty, Amanda Frost

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

Most state court judges are elected to office, and thus must be attentive to voter preferences just like other elected officials. Critics of judicial elections fear that subjecting judges to majoritarian pressures jeopardizes the rights of disfavored groups and undermines the rule of law, and accordingly call for their abolition. The reality, however, is that judicial elections are firmly entrenched in thirty-eight states, and thus appear to be a permanent part of the legal landscape. This article suggests that the so-called “majoritarian difficulty” posed by elected judges can be tempered by regular interactions with appointed, life-tenured federal judges, who are …

Rethinking The Political Future: An Alternative To The Ethno-Sectarian Division Of Iraq, Paul Williams, Matt Simpson

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

In the coming year, the political leadership in Iraq will need to make a final determination as to whether they are going to structure the state of Iraq as a federal state with ethnically heterogeneous provinces, a loose federal state with ethnically defined provinces or regions, or whether they are going to divide the state into three new states based on ethno-sectarian lines.

A number of prominent American law makers and foreign policy shapers have strongly advocated for the soft, and sometimes hard, partition of Iraq — either through the creation of a loose federal structure based on ethno-sectarian lines, …

Molecular Federalism And The Structures Of Private Lawmaking, David Snyder

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

No abstract provided.

The Federal Marriage Amendment: To Protect The Sanctity Of Marriage Or Destroy Constitutional Democracy?, Joan Schaffner

American University Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Impact Of Federalism Over The Formation Of Personal Jurisdiction Rules In Two Different Legal Traditions: Limited Comparison To The Civil Law Model Of The United Arab Emirates And The Common Law Model Of The United States, Abaid Al-Mutairi

SJD Dissertation Abstracts

In the last decade, a massive growth of international trade and cross-border commercial and civil transactions occur among individuals and entities of different jurisdictions and legal backgrounds, this international trend results in corresponding conflicts. This fact makes it critical to identify the nature of process involving the dispute resolution mechanisms under the various legal systems especially those rules addressing the instances in which a person is held subject to certain foreign adjudicative authority because of the contact.

In general, there is always a need in some circumstances to analyze the frameworks under one system to explore the nature of the …

Re-Balancing State And Federal Power: Toward A Political Principle Of Subsidiarity In The United States, Jared Bayer

American University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Inter-American System, Diego Rodriguez-Pinzon

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

No abstract provided.

Toward A Unifying Theory Of The Separation Of Powers, Bruce G. Peabody, John D. Nugent

American University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Enforcement Of Federal Rights Against States: Alden And Federalism Non-Sense , Daan Braveman

American University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Federalism Myth, Fernando Laguarda

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

INTRODUCTION: The late Justice Louis Brandeis once remarked on the benefit that our system of government derives from the states acting as the "laboratories of democracy."' This remark not only implies that states should be given the discretion to experiment, it presumes that states actually have the ability to do so. In order to understand Justice Brandeis and those who have followed in his rhetorical footprints, it is important to understand federalism, which is the organizing principle of American government.

O'Connor: A Dual Role - An Introduction, Stephen Wermiel

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

No abstract provided.

Federalism, State Prison Reform, And Evolving Standards Of Human Decency: On Guessing, Stressing, And Redressing Constitutional Rights, Ira P. Robbins

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

No abstract provided.

Punitive Conditions Of Prison Confinement: An Analysis Of Pugh V. Locke And Federal Court Supervision Of State Penal Administration Under The Eighth Amendment, Ira P. Robbins, Michael B. Buser

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

No abstract provided.