Law Commons^™

Bitcoin: Order Without Law In The Digital Age, John O. Mcginnis, Kyle Roche

Indiana Law Journal

Modern law makes currency a creature of the state and ultimately the value of its currency depends on the public’s trust in that state. While some nations are more capable than others at instilling public trust in the stability of their monetary institutions, it is nonetheless impossible for any legal system to make the pre-commitments necessary to completely isolate the governance of its money supply from political pressure. This proposition is true not only today, where nearly all government institutions manage their money supply in the form of central banking, but also true of past private banking regimes circulating their …

The Idea Of Property: A Comparative Review Of Recent Empirical Research Methods, Paul T. Babie, Peter D. Burdon Mr, Francesca Da Rimini, Cherie M. Metcalf Prof., Geir Stenseth

Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies

While theory offers important insights into property's normative content, it sometimes fails to tell us about what people understand property to mean and how they interact with those things said to be owned by them. This has significant implications for some of the challenges facing humanity, including climate change, unequal distributions of wealth and resources, biodiversity loss, and innovation. In response, a growing body of literature is emerging that looks at property through a different lens; rather than theorizing property in an abstract way or attempting to craft a normative account of and justification for the institution, this new scholarship …

Enforcement Mechanisms For International Standards Of Judicial Independence: The Role Of Government And Private Actors, Rachel Stopchinski

Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies

In 2017, the prevailing political party in Poland, Law and Justice (Prawo i Sprawiedliwos6), proposed a series of radical legislative changes designed to strip the Polish judiciary of its independence. Though the European Union (EU) has extensively investigated this egregious attack on the rule of law, no concrete steps have been taken to impose sanctums on, or otherwise discipline, the Polish government for defying EU ideals. Despite the fundamental importance of judicial independence in maintaining the rule of law, there are presently no widely adopted international standards of judicial independence. Therefore, no guidelines are promulgated for governments to follow, and …

Taming Sherman's Wilderness, Derrian Smith

Indiana Law Journal

This Note proceeds in four Parts. Part I outlines the interpretive difficulties spawned by the vagueness of the Sherman Act—particularly, the judiciary’s necessary but undeniable departures from the text of the statute and the resulting doctrinal confusion. Part II considers ways in which the judiciary’s decision-making in Sherman Act cases approximates agency rulemaking and whether it makes sense to delegate interpretive authority to an antitrust agency. Yet, while the agency solution has upside, it would not easily escape criticisms that the Act does not provide sufficient notice of the conduct it proscribes and that the Act is an impermissible delegation …

Anticompetitive Mergers In Labor Markets, Ioana Marinescu, Herbert J. Hovenkamp

Indiana Law Journal

Mergers of competitors are conventionally challenged under the federal antitrust laws when they threaten to lessen competition in some product or service market in which the merging firms sell. In many of these cases the threat is that in concentrated markets—those with only a few sellers—the merger increases the likelihood of collusion or collusion-like behavior. The result will be that the post-merger firm will reduce the volume of sales in the affected market and prices will rise.

Mergers can also injure competition in markets in which the firms purchase, however. Although that principle is widely recognized, very few litigated cases …

Procompetitive Justifications In Antitrust Law, John M. Newman

Indiana Law Journal

The Rule of Reason, which has come to dominate modern antitrust law, allows defendants the opportunity to justify their conduct by demonstrating procompetitive effects. Seizing the opportunity, defendants have begun offering increasingly numerous and creative explanations for their behavior.

But which of these myriad justifications are valid? To leading jurists and scholars, this has remained an “open question,” even an “absolute mystery.” Examination of the relevant case law reveals multiple competing approaches and seemingly irreconcilable opinions. The ongoing lack of clarity in this area is inexcusable: procompetitive-justification analysis is vital to a properly functioning antitrust enterprise.

This Article provides answers …

Reforming Institutions: The Judicial Function In Bankruptcy And Public Law Litigation, Kathleen G. Noonan, Jonathan C. Lipson, William Simon

Indiana Law Journal

Public law litigation (PLL) is among the most important and controversial types of dispute that courts face. These civil class actions seek to reform public agencies such as police departments, prison systems, and child welfare agencies that have failed to meet basic statutory or constitutional obligations. They are controversial because critics assume that judicial intervention is categorically undemocratic or beyond judicial expertise.

This Article reveals flaws in these criticisms by comparing the judicial function in PLL to that in corporate bankruptcy, where the value and legitimacy of judicial intervention are better understood and more accepted. Our comparison shows that judicial …

Draining The Flooded Markets: Tariffs, Suniva & Solar Energy Investment, Michael A. Stroup

Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies

Demand for solar energy in the United States has increased significantly over the past half century. Despite the falling costs of solar infrastructure, the United States solar energy market is at a turning point. In 2017, two insolvent U.S. solar manufacturers, Suniva and SolarWorld America, successfully petitioned the International Trade Commission (ITC) to invoke Section 201 of the 1974 Trade Act. The two U.S. manufacturers argued that a surplus of imported Chinese solar panels has driven the cost of solar infrastructure too low and forced them out of the market. The ITC responded by recommending tariffs on global solar photovoltaic …

What Is Puerto Rico?, Samuel Issacharoff, Alexandra Bursak, Russell Rennie, Alec Webley

Indiana Law Journal

Puerto Rico is suffering through multiple crises. Two are obvious: a financial crisis triggered by the island’s public debts and the humanitarian crisis brought on by Hurricane Maria. One is not: the island’s ongoing crisis of constitutional identity. Like the hurricane, this crisis came from outside the island. Congress, the U.S. Supreme Court, and the Executive Branch have each moved in the last twenty years to undermine the “inventive statesmanship” that allowed for Puerto Rico’s self-government with minimal interference from a federal government in which the people of Puerto Rico had, and have, no representation. From the point of view …

Public Regulation And Private Enforcement In A Global Economy: Strategies For Managing Conflict, Hannah L. Buxbaum

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.