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After Ten Years, Sarbanes-Oxley Might Be Statutory Overkill

Harvey Gilmore

The start of the twenty first century brought with it some spectacular corporate accounting scandals: Enron, World-Com, Adelphia, and Tyco, to name a few. The subsequent congressional hearings investigating the accounting and ethical failures of these companies resulted in a parade of one corporate executive after another claiming they had no knowledge of the massive fraud in their firms. In response to this rapid-fire succession of corporate scandals, Congress enacted the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (“SOX”). It is a statute first introduced by Senator Paul Sarbanes and Congressman Michael Oxley, and signed into law by President George W. Bush in …