Law Commons^™

The Dangers Of Deference: International Claim Settlement By The President, Ingrid Wuerth

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

During the final months of the Clinton administration, the State Department entered into a trio of unprecedented international agreements with France (the "French Agreement"), Germany (the "German Agreement"), and Austria (the "Austrian Agreement"). These "sole" executive agreements, designed to resolve litigation pending in the U.S. courts that arose out of World War II and the Holocaust, were made without Senate ratification(as required for a treaty) or congressional authorization (as in a congressional- executive agreement). Although executive branch settlement of claims without Senate or congressional approval has a long history, these executive agreements mark an important departure from prior practice by …

Respecting Deference: Conceptualizing Skidmore Within The Architecture Of Chevron, Jim Rossi

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

This Article addresses critically the implications of the U.S. Supreme Court's recent decision in Christensen v. Harris County, 120 S.Ct. 1655 (2000), for standards of judicial review of agency interpretations of law. Christensen is a notable case in the administrative law area because it purports to clarify application of the deference doctrine first articulated in Skidmore v. Swift & Co., 323 U.S. 134 (1944). By reviving this doctrine, the case narrows application of the predominant approach to deference articulated in Chevron, U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837 (1984), thus reducing the level of deference in …

Deference And Its Dangers: Congress' Power To "Define ... Offenses Against The Law Of Nations", Charles D. Siegal

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

This Article has not sought to argue that we are today bound to the framers' limited conception of the law of nations. The way that law develops has changed dramatically in 200 years; there is no reason to believe that the framers would not have supported an evolving definition of offenses against the law of nations. And, even if they did not, an originalist interpretation of the offenses clause is still not warranted. Nor has this Article argued that Congress has no leeway in defining offenses; its points are less strict.

When Congress determines that a certain set of actions …