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Full-Text Articles in Jurisprudence
The Anti-Messiness Principle In Statutory Interpretation, Anita S. Krishnakumar
The Anti-Messiness Principle In Statutory Interpretation, Anita S. Krishnakumar
Faculty Publications
Many of the Supreme Court's statutory interpretation opinions reflect a juisprudential aversion to interpreting statutes in a manner that will prove "messy" for implementing courts to administer. Yet the practice of construing statutes to avoid "messiness" has gone largely unnoticed in the statutory interpretation literature. This Article seeks to illuminate the Court's use of "anti-messiness" arguments to interpret statutes and to bring theoretical attention to the principle of "messiness" avoidance. The Article begins by defining the concept of anti-messiness and providing a typology of common anti-messiness arguments used by the Supreme Court. It then considers some dangers inherent in the …
Representation Reinforcement: A Legislative Solution To A Legislative Process Problem, Anita S. Krishnakumar
Representation Reinforcement: A Legislative Solution To A Legislative Process Problem, Anita S. Krishnakumar
Faculty Publications
One of the most valuable—and disturbing—insights offered by public choice theory has been the recognition that wealthy, well-organized interests with narrow, intense preferences often dominate the legislative process while diffuse, unorganized interests go under-represented. Responding to this insight, legal scholars in the fields of statutory interpretation and administrative law have suggested that the solution to the problem of representational inequality lies with the courts. Indeed, over the past two decades, scholars in these fields have offered up a host of John Hart Ely-inspired representation reinforcing "canons of construction," designed to encourage judges to use their role as statutory interpreters to …