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Articles 1 - 11 of 11
Full-Text Articles in Election Law
The Forgotten Law Of Lobbying, Zephyr Teachout
The Forgotten Law Of Lobbying, Zephyr Teachout
Faculty Scholarship
For most of American history, until the 1950s, courts treated paid lobbying as a civic wrong, not a protected First Amendment right. Lobbying was presumptively against public policy, and lobbying contracts were not enforced. Paid lobbying threatened the integrity of individuals, legislators, lobbyists, and the integrity of society as a whole. Some states had laws criminalizing lobbying; Georgia had an anti-lobbying provision in its Constitution. Inasmuch as there was a personal right to either petition the government, or share views with officers of the government, this right was not something one could sell -- it was not, in the term …
Neoliberal Political Law, Zephyr Teachout
The Political Morality Of Voting In Direct Democracy, Michael Serota, Ethan J. Leib
The Political Morality Of Voting In Direct Democracy, Michael Serota, Ethan J. Leib
Faculty Scholarship
The voting levers in candidate elections and in direct democracy elections are identical. The political obligations that bind the citizens that pull them are not. This Essay argues that voters in direct democracy elections, unlike their counterparts in candidate elections, serve as representatives of the people and are, accordingly, bound by the ethics of political representation. Upending the traditional dichotomy between representative and direct democracy, this Essay explains why citizens voting in direct democracy are representative legislators who must vote in the public interest and must not vote in their private interests.
Historical Roots Of Citizens United Vs. Fec: How Anarchists And Academics Accidentally Created Corporate Speech Rights, The General Essay, Zephyr Teachout
Historical Roots Of Citizens United Vs. Fec: How Anarchists And Academics Accidentally Created Corporate Speech Rights, The General Essay, Zephyr Teachout
Faculty Scholarship
This paper looks at how the early rhetoric around the First Amendment enabled later development of corporate political speech rights.
The Unenforceable Corrupt Contract: Corruption And Nineteenth Century Contract Law, Zephyr Teachout
The Unenforceable Corrupt Contract: Corruption And Nineteenth Century Contract Law, Zephyr Teachout
Faculty Scholarship
This paper explores the 19th century practice of courts refusing to enforce "corrupt" contracts as against public policy.
Extraterritorial Electioneering And The Globalization Of American Elections, Zephyr Teachout
Extraterritorial Electioneering And The Globalization Of American Elections, Zephyr Teachout
Faculty Scholarship
This Essay explores a fascinating new truth: because of the Internet, governments, corporations, and citizens of other countries can now meaningfully participate in United States elections. They can phone bank, editorialize, and organize in ways that impact a candidate's image, the narrative structure of a campaign, and the mobilization of base support. Foreign governments can bankroll newspapers that will be read by millions of voters. Foreign companies can enlist employees in massive cross-continental email campaigns. Foreign activists can set up offline meetings and organize door-to-door campaigns in central Ohio. They can, in short, influence who wins and who loses. Depending …
Anti-Corruption Principle, The, Zephyr Teachout
Anti-Corruption Principle, The, Zephyr Teachout
Faculty Scholarship
There is a structural anti-corruption principle, akin to federalism or the separation-of-powers principle, embedded in the Constitution. The Constitution was designed, in large part, to protect against corruption. This structural principle - like the other structural principles - should inform how judges "do" modern political process cases. This paper documents the corruption concerns at the Constitutional convention in detail. It then examines how the modern Supreme Courts' conception of corruption is fractured and ahistorical, and has led to an incoherent jurisprudence. Instead of starting with Buckley v. Valeo, as so many modern cases do, the Court should return to the …
Democratic Principle And Electoral College Reform, Ethan J. Leib, Eli J. Mark
Democratic Principle And Electoral College Reform, Ethan J. Leib, Eli J. Mark
Faculty Scholarship
The Electoral College is a relic from another time and is in tension with the modern constitutional command of “one person, one vote.” But the Electoral College is, nevertheless, ensconced in our Constitution—and, as a result, we would need to amend the document to alter or abolish it from our political fabric. Still, some states are toying with state-based Electoral College reforms. Thus, irrespective of whether voters in those states favor the abolition of the Electoral College through a federal constitutional amendment, they must critically examine the democratic merits of these state-based reform options. Categorically rejecting all state-based reform is …
Can Direct Democracy Be Made Deliberative?, Ethan J. Leib
Can Direct Democracy Be Made Deliberative?, Ethan J. Leib
Faculty Scholarship
Every election cycle a great number of citizens take to the polls to vote on public policy matters directly. Direct democracy has problems. And an account of deliberative democracy—far from being a source to critique direct democracy—might provide a solution. I have three goals here. First, I hope to identify some problems with the mechanisms of direct democracy that most states and many cities throughout the country employ: the initiative and the referendum. Next, I will offer a potential solution to these institutional problems using aspects of the theory of deliberative democracy, a theory often marshaled to undermine direct democracy. …
Is There A First Amendment Defense For Bush V. Gore , Abner S. Greene
Is There A First Amendment Defense For Bush V. Gore , Abner S. Greene
Faculty Scholarship
Could so many well-established scholars be wrong? Is it possible that Bush v. Gore is defensible, after all? The two pillars of the decision-the Equal Protection Clause justification for the merits holding and the "safe harbor" remedial ruling - indeed seem weak. The alternative merits view-that the Florida Supreme Court had engaged in statutory amendment under the guise of statutory interpretation, thus violating Article II of the federal Constitution-runs aground against the plausible (albeit not necessarily correct) readings of the state high court. If one agrees that these merits and remedial arguments are indefensible, then mustn't one agree with the …
Electoral College - Its Defects And Dangers, The, John D. Feerick
Electoral College - Its Defects And Dangers, The, John D. Feerick
Faculty Scholarship
In a few months we will witness the operation of the electoral college system of electing the President and Vice President of the United States. Due partly to the appearance of George C. Wallace's American Independent Party,' the 1968 election could be decided in the House of Representatives, where each state has one vote regardless of its population. The election seems certain to point up the perils in our present system. Although our system of electing the President is now under scrutiny by Congress, reform does not appear imminent. As in the case of presidential inability, a tragedy or near …