Law Commons^™

Rethinking Legislative Facts, Haley N. Proctor

Notre Dame Law Review

As the factual nature of legal inquiry has become increasingly apparent over the past century, courts and commentators have fallen into the habit of labeling the facts behind the law “legislative facts.” Loosely, legislative facts are general facts courts rely upon to formulate law or policy, but that definition is as contested as it is vague. Most agree that legislative facts exist in some form or another, but few agree on what that form is, on who should find them, and how. This Article seeks to account for and resolve that confusion. Theories of legislative fact focus on the role …

Interpreting State Statutes In Federal Court, Aaron-Andrew P. Bruhl

Notre Dame Law Review

This Article addresses a problem that potentially arises whenever a federal court encounters a state statute. When interpreting the state statute, should the federal court use the state’s methods of statutory interpretation—the state’s canons of construction, its rules about the use of legislative history, and the like—or should the court instead use federal methods of statutory interpretation? The question is interesting as a matter of theory, and it is practically significant because different jurisdictions have somewhat different interpretive approaches. In addressing itself to this problem, the Article makes two contributions. First, it shows, as a normative matter, that federal courts …

The Law Wants To Be Formal, Chaim Saiman

Notre Dame Law Review

This Article examines the relationship between the formalism of an area of law, and whether it plays a central role in the legal system. English and American law were traditionally comprised of formalist private law doctrines. The influence of legal realism and the New Deal, however, caused these systems to diverge. While American private law was recast in realist terms, it also became less significant to the overall legal system. In its place, procedure and statutory interpretation emerged, and in turn became more formalized. Realism was never as influential in England where private law remains more formal and at the …

Antitrust Antitextualism, Daniel A. Crane

Notre Dame Law Review

Judges and scholars frequently describe antitrust as a common-law system predicated on open-textured statutes, but that description fails to capture a historically persistent phenomenon: judicial disregard of the plain meaning of the statutory texts and manifest purposes of Congress. This pattern of judicial nullification is not evenly distributed: when the courts have deviated from the plain meaning or congressional purpose, they have uniformly done so to limit the reach of antitrust liability or curtail the labor exemption to the benefit of industrial interests. This phenomenon cannot be explained solely or even primarily as a tug-of-war between a progressive Congress and …

Locked, Loaded, And Registered: The Feasibility And Constitutionality Of A Federal Firearms Registration System, Dylan J. Mcdonough

Notre Dame Law Review

This Note is organized as follows. Part I outlines the evolving history of federal firearm legislation and its relevance to registration. Part I also presents promising state-level (or equivalent) systems of gun registration that may inform a like federal policy. Part II establishes the Supreme Court’s Second Amendment jurisprudence and its potential application to federal firearms registration. Part III then details a lower court’s application of Supreme Court precedent to existing firearm registration laws. Finally, this Note concludes by articulating how Congress can and why it must institute a federal firearms registration system.

From First Steps To Second Chances: Addressing Mass Incarceration In State Prisons, Molly Connor

Notre Dame Law Review

In order to address mass incarceration meaningfully, Congress must pass legislation aimed at reducing state prison populations. The legislation’s name (the First Step Act) suggests there will be follow-up legislation—that Congress’s end goal has yet to be fully realized. This Note explores the details of the First Step Act with an eye toward drafting the “Second Step Act” in a way that adequately addresses the root causes of mass incarceration. In Part I, this Note discusses the events leading up to the passage of the First Step Act and its key provisions addressing sentencing reform and rehabilitative programming. Part II …

Why Robert Mueller's Appointment As Special Counsel Was Unlawful, Steven G. Calabresi, Gary Lawson

Notre Dame Law Review

Since 1999, when the independent counsel provisions of the Ethics in Government Act expired, the Department of Justice (DOJ) has had in place regulations providing for the appointment of “special counsels” who possess “the full power and independent authority to exercise all investigative and prosecutorial functions of any United States Attorney.” Appointments under these regulations, such as the May 17, 2017 appointment of Robert S. Mueller to investigate the Trump campaign, are patently unlawful, for three distinct reasons.

First, all federal offices must be “established by Law,” and there is no statute authorizing such an office in the DOJ. We …

Is Congress Holding Itself To Account? Addressing Congress's Sexual Harassment Problem And The Congressional Accountability Act Of 1995 Reform Act, Christina C. Hopke

Notre Dame Law Review

This Note explores how the Congressional Accountability Act of 1995 ("CAA") contributed to the underreporting of the sexual harassment occurring in Congress and evaluates both the original proposals offered by the House and Senate to reform the CAA and the Reform Act in its final form. Part I will offer brief background information on the ‘me too’ Movement and the specific allegations of harassment against individuals in Congress. Part II will explore the issue of underreporting when it comes to instances of sexual harassment, with a particular focus on reporting considerations of professional women such as those employed in the …

A Repeated Call For Omnibus Federal Cybersecurity Law, Carol Li

Notre Dame Law Review

In Part I, this Note discusses the concerning regularity of high-profile data breaches that have occurred within the United States’ weak and patchwork landscape of cybersecurity law. Part II discusses the challenges companies face when attempting to comply with the current cybersecurity law, and why companies who are deemed compliant are still falling victim to hackers and data breaches. Part III makes a call for federal legislation to replace the current, inadequate, fragmented, and uneven landscape of cybersecurity law. Part IV discusses numerous factors and incentives to consider in creating an omnibus federal cybersecurity law. Finally, Part V offers some …

The Marketplace Of Ideas Online, Dawn C. Nunziato

Notre Dame Law Review

This Article surveys the severe problems in today’s online marketplace of ideas and the efforts that regulators—and the online platforms themselves—have recently adopted in an attempt to address such problems. In Part I, this Article examines the historical foundations of the “marketplace of ideas” model, as articulated in Holmes’s early opinions, as well as the Court’s eventual adoption of the marketplace model and, with it, the adoption of counterspeech, instead of censorship, as the default response to harmful speech. Part II then examines the scope and extent of the problems besieging the modern online marketplace of ideas, focusing on problems …

On Public Employees And Judicial Buck-Passing: The Respective Roles Of Statutory And Constitutional Protections For Government Whistleblowers, Heidi Kitrosser

Notre Dame Law Review

In Garcetti v. Ceballos, the Supreme Court held that public employees have no First Amendment protections for speech made “pursuant to their official duties.” Writing for the majority, Justice Kennedy assured readers that the holding did not undermine “the potential societal value of employee speech.” Among other things, Kennedy pointed to a “powerful network of legislative enactments—such as whistle-blower protection laws and labor codes—available to [public employees] who seek to expose wrongdoing.” Yet as Justice Souter pointed out in dissent and as several amici had informed the Court in their briefs, “the combined variants of statutory whistle-blower definitions and …

The Equal Rights Amendment Revisited, Bridget L. Murphy

Notre Dame Law Review

This Note proceeds in three Parts. Part One chronicles the history of the Equal Rights Amendment, from the original attempt at passage through the various reiterations thereafter. Part Two describes the legal background, including constitutional and legislative protection against discrimination on the basis of sex. Part Three of this Note then demonstrates that a faithful understanding of the existing constitutional and legislative protections reveals inherent weaknesses. Specifically, the original understanding of the Fourteenth Amendment did not contemplate protection from sex-based discrimination, and the word “sex” as a prohibited basis for discrimination in Title VII was added as a last-minute attempt …

Computationally Assisted Regulatory Participation, Michael A. Livermore, Vladimir Eidelman, Brian Grom

Notre Dame Law Review

With the increased politicization of agency rulemaking and the reduced cost of participating in the notice-and-comment rulemaking process, administrative agencies have, in recent years, found themselves deluged in a flood of public comments. In this Article, we argue that this deluge presents both challenges and opportunities, and we explore how advances in natural language processing technologies can help agencies address the challenges and take advantage of the opportunities created by the recent growth of public participation in the regulatory process. We also examine how scholars of public bureaucracies can use this important new publicly available data to better understand how …

Qui Tam Litigation Against Government Officials: Constitutional Implications Of A Neglected History, Randy Beck

Notre Dame Law Review

The Supreme Court concluded twenty-five years ago, in Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, that uninjured private plaintiffs may not litigate “generalized grievances” about the legality of executive branch conduct. According to the Lujan Court, Congress lacked power to authorize suit by a plaintiff who could not establish some “particularized” injury from the challenged conduct. The Court believed litigation to require executive branch legal compliance, brought by an uninjured private party, is not a “case” or “controversy” within the Article III judicial power and impermissibly reassigns the President’s Article II responsibility to “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.” …

Illegitimate Overprescription: How Burrage V. United States Is Hindering Punishment Of Physicians And Bolstering The Opioid Epidemic, Alyssa M. Mcclure

Notre Dame Law Review

Due to the concerns Burrage raises and its implications for the nation’s current opioid crisis, this Note proposes that Congress should broaden the circumstances in which the penalty enhancement of section 841(b) may be applied. Part I of this Note discusses the opioid crisis and the role physicians play in it. Part II explores the section of the Controlled Substances Act used to criminally charge physicians and the exception the Act provides for physicians prescribing opioids within the scope of relevant medical conduct and professional practice. Part III analyzes Burrage v. United States and examines the immediate legal consequences of …

Compensatory Damages Are Not For Everyone: Section 1997e(E) Of The Prison Litigation Reform Act And The Overlooked Amendment, Eleanor M. Levine

Notre Dame Law Review

Since the 2013 Amendment was passed, courts have continued to split regarding how to interpret § 1997e(e), but they have failed to consider whether the 2013 Amendment alters the meaning or clarifies Congress’s intentions with respect to § 1997e(e). This Note argues that the 2013 Amendment changes the plain meaning of § 1997e(e) such that it could lead to different outcomes in cases on both sides of the circuit split, ultimately concluding that it shows Congress intended the more restrictive interpretive approach to prevail. This Note further illustrates how the 2013 Amendment fails to adhere to the goals of either …

On Viewing The Courts As Junior Partners Of Congress In Statutory Interpretation Cases: An Essay Celebrating The Scholarship Of Daniel J. Meltzer, Richard H. Fallon Jr

Notre Dame Law Review

In this Essay, written in tribute to Dan Meltzer, I shall attempt to explicate his views regarding statutory interpretation in general, thematic terms. In doing so, I shall register my agreement with virtually all of Dan’s conclusions and frequently echo his practically minded arguments in support of them. But I shall also advance arguments—with which I cannot be entirely sure he would have agreed—that seek to show that his position reflected theoretical insights about how language works, not only in law, but also more generally in life. By seeking simultaneously to defend Dan’s views and to build on them, this …

Honoring Dan Meltzer—Congressional Standing And The Institutional Framework Of Article Iii: A Comparative Perspective, Vickie C. Jackson

Notre Dame Law Review

In this short Essay, I focus on only one aspect of the broader question of government standing to sue: congressional standing. For one thing, separation of powers problems are more acutely presented in federal level disputes.

Given an increased interest by parts of the Congress, especially the House of Representatives, in seeking to intervene in ongoing litigation, there are pressing new issues in the lower federal courts: U.S. District Court Judge Rosemary Collyer recently upheld congressional standing to challenge an asserted violation of the Appropriations Clause in connection with spending under the Affordable Care Act, while rejecting the House’s standing …

The Origins Of Legislation, Ganesh Sitaraman

Notre Dame Law Review

Although legislation is at the center of legal debates on statutory interpretation, administrative law, and delegation, little is known about how legislation is actually drafted. If scholars pay any attention to Congress at all, they tend to focus on what happens after legislation is introduced, ignoring how the draft came to exist in the first place. In other words, they focus on the legislative process, not the drafting process. The result is that our account of Congress, the legislative process, and the administrative state is impoverished, and debates in statutory interpretation and administrative law are incomplete. This Article seeks to …

Providing Plaintiffs With Tools: The Significance Of Eeoc V. United Airlines, Inc., Michelle Letourneau

Notre Dame Law Review

This Note will analyze the language of the United Airlines II decision, in light of Barnett, Seventh Circuit precedents regarding the reasonable accommodation of reassignment, and cases from other circuits that the Seventh Circuit cited in relevant part in its United Airlines II decision. Part I will provide an introduction to the relevant provisions of the ADA. Part II will summarize relevant portions of a series of cases predating United Airlines II that deal with the concept of reassignment as a reasonable accommodation under the ADA. These cases are discussed in considerable detail in order to highlight in Part III …

Hierarchically Variable Deference To Agency Interpretations, Aaron-Andrew P. Bruhl

Notre Dame Law Review

When courts review agency action, they typically accord agency decisions a degree of deference. As many courts and commentators have recognized, the law in this area is complicated because it features numerous standards of review, including several distinct regimes for evaluating agencies’ legal interpretations. There is, however, at least one important respect in which uniformity rather than variety prevails: the applicable standards of review do not vary depending on which court is reviewing the agency. Whichever standard governs a particular case—Chevron, Skidmore, or something else—all courts in the judicial hierarchy are supposed to apply that same standard.

This Article proposes …

The Politics Of Statutory Interpretation, Margaret H. Lemos

Notre Dame Law Review

In a new book, Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts, Justice Antonin Scalia and Bryan Garner describe and defend the textualist methodology for which Justice Scalia is famous. For Scalia and Garner, the normative appeal of textualism lies in its objectivity: by focusing on text, context, and canons of construction, textualism offers protection against ideological judging—a way to separate law from politics. Yet, as Scalia and Garner well know, textualism is widely regarded as a politically conservative methodology. The charge of conservative bias is more common than it is concrete, but it reflects the notion that textualism narrows the …

Tyranny By Proxy: State Action And The Private Use Of Deadly Force, John L. Watts

Notre Dame Law Review

The Article begins in Part I with a discussion of the Supreme Court’s opinion and holding in Tennessee v. Garner. It then describes the continuing application of the fleeing felon rule to private actors despite the Court’s holding in Garner.

Part II describes the state action doctrine, examines its history, and clarifies its purpose. It explains why the Court’s early focus on enhancing individual autonomy and federalism as the purpose of the state action doctrine was only partially correct. In fact, the doctrine enhances many of the familiar constitutional strategies for the prevention of tyranny including: separation of powers, democratic …

Banking And The Social Contract, Mehrsa Baradaran

Notre Dame Law Review

This Article asserts that there are three major tenets of the social contract: (1) safety and soundness, (2) consumer protection, and (3) access to credit. Regulators can and should require banks to meet standards in these areas to benefit society even if these measures reasonably reduce bank profits. Implicit in the social contract is the idea that each party must give up something in the exchange. This Article provides policymakers not only the appropriate narrative and justifications needed to frame their regulatory philosophy, but it also provides important textual support from the most prominent acts of banking legislation to give …

Why Should We Care About An Agency’S Special Insight?, Stephen M. Degenaro

Notre Dame Law Review

This Note offers some additional thoughts on the outer limits of Seminole Rock deference. Part I discusses the three concerns associated with unchecked Seminole Rock deference that comprise the self-delegation problem—violation of constitutional norms, exploitation of a statutory loophole, and perverse incentives. It explores the potential for abuse they create and recommends what the limitations should look like in order to avoid this potential. Part II explains the two rationales for Seminole Rock deference: the pragmatic and originalist rationales. It describes how the two rationales relate to each other, explains how courts use pragmatic and originalist arguments in their opinions, …