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Full-Text Articles in Law
Movement On Removal: An Emerging Consensus On The First Congress, Jed Handelsman Shugerman
Movement On Removal: An Emerging Consensus On The First Congress, Jed Handelsman Shugerman
Faculty Scholarship
What did the “Decision of 1789” decide about presidential removal power, if anything? It turns out that an emerging consensus of scholars agrees that there was not much consensus in the First Congress.
Two more questions follow: Is the “unitary executive theory” based on originalism, and if so, is originalism a reliable method of interpretation based on historical evidence?
The unitary executive theory posits that a president has exclusive and “indefeasible” executive powers (i.e., powers beyond congressional and judicial checks and balances). This panel was an opportunity for unitary executive theorists and their critics to debate recent historical research questioning …
Freehold Offices Vs. 'Despotic Displacement': Why Article Ii 'Executive Power' Did Not Include Removal, Jed Handelsman Shugerman
Freehold Offices Vs. 'Despotic Displacement': Why Article Ii 'Executive Power' Did Not Include Removal, Jed Handelsman Shugerman
Faculty Scholarship
The Roberts Court has relied on an assertion that Article II’s “executive power” implied an “indefeasible” or unconditional presidential removal power. In the wake of growing historical evidence against their theory, unitary executive theorists have fallen back on a claim of a “backdrop” or default removal rule from English and other European monarchies. However, unitary theorists have not provided support for these repeated assertions, while making a remarkable number of errors, especially in the recent “The Executive Power of Removal” (Harvard L. Rev. 2023).
This Article offers an explanation for the difficulty in supporting this historical claim: Because …
The Dependent Origins Of Independent Agencies: The Interstate Commerce Commission, The Tenure Of Office Act, And The Rise Of Modern Campaign Finance, Jed Handelsman Shugerman
The Dependent Origins Of Independent Agencies: The Interstate Commerce Commission, The Tenure Of Office Act, And The Rise Of Modern Campaign Finance, Jed Handelsman Shugerman
Faculty Scholarship
Independent regulatory agencies are some of the most powerful institutions in the United States, and we think of them today as designed to be insulated from political control. This Article shows that their origins were the opposite: this model first emerged in the late nineteenth century because it offered more political control.
The modern executive's design of unitary presidential control over most offices, alongside "independent" regulatory agencies, took shape in the winter of 1886-1887. Congress repealed the Tenure of Office Act, giving the President the unchecked power to dismiss principal officers and ending the Senate's power to protect those officers. …
Agora: Reflections On Zivotofsky V. Kerry : Historical Gloss, The Recognition Power, And Judicial Review, Curtis A. Bradley
Agora: Reflections On Zivotofsky V. Kerry : Historical Gloss, The Recognition Power, And Judicial Review, Curtis A. Bradley
Faculty Scholarship
No abstract provided.
The National Security State: The End Of Separation Of Powers, Michael E. Tigar
The National Security State: The End Of Separation Of Powers, Michael E. Tigar
Faculty Scholarship
No abstract provided.
Presidential Power, Historical Practice, And Legal Constraint, Curtis A. Bradley, Trevor W. Morrison
Presidential Power, Historical Practice, And Legal Constraint, Curtis A. Bradley, Trevor W. Morrison
Faculty Scholarship
The scope of the President’s legal authority is determined in part by historical practice. This Essay aims to better understand how such practice-based law might operate as a constraint on the presidency. Some scholars have suggested that presidential authority has become “unbounded” by law, and is now governed only or primarily by politics. At the same time, there has been growing skepticism about the ability of the familiar political checks on presidential power to work in any systematic or reliable fashion. Skepticism about law’s potential to constrain in this context is heightened by the customary nature of much of what …
Constitutional Backdrops, Stephen E. Sachs
Constitutional Backdrops, Stephen E. Sachs
Faculty Scholarship
The Constitution is often said to leave important questions unanswered. These include, for example, the existence of a congressional contempt power or an executive removal power, the role of stare decisis, and the scope of state sovereign immunity. Bereft of clear text, many scholars have sought answers to such questions in Founding-era history. But why should the historical answers be valid today, if they were never codified in the Constitution's text?
This Article describes a category of legal rules that weren't adopted in the text, expressly or implicitly, but which nonetheless have continuing legal force under the written Constitution. These …
Federalism As A Safeguard Of The Separation Of Powers, Jessica Bulman-Pozen
Federalism As A Safeguard Of The Separation Of Powers, Jessica Bulman-Pozen
Faculty Scholarship
States frequently administer federal law, yet scholars have largely overlooked how the practice of cooperative federalism affects the balance of power across the branches of the federal government. This Article explains how states check the federal executive in an era of expansive executive power and how they do so as champions of Congress, both relying on congressionally conferred authority and casting themselves as Congress's faithful agents. By inviting the states to carry out federal law, Congress, whether purposefully or incidentally, counteracts the tendency of statutory ambiguity and broad delegations of authority to enhance federal executive power. When states disagree with …