Law Commons^™

Mending Holes In The Rule Of (Administrative) Law, Evan J. Criddle

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

"Relative Checks": Towards Optimal Control Of Administrative Power, David S. Rubenstein

William & Mary Law Review

Administrative agencies wield a necessary but dangerous power. Some control of that power is constitutionally required and normatively justified. Yet widely discordant views persist concerning the appropriate means of control. Scholars have proposed competing administrative control models that variably place the judiciary, the President, and Congress at the helm. Although these models offer critical insights into the institutional competencies of the respective branches, they tend to understate the limitations of those branches to check administrative power and ultimately marginalize the public interest costs occasioned by second-guessing administrative choice. The “relative checks” paradigm introduced here seeks to improve upon existing models …

Fiduciary Administration: Rethinking Popular Representation In Agency Rulemaking, Evan J. Criddle

Faculty Publications

Do administrative agencies undermine popular sovereignty when they make federal law? Over the last several decades, some scholars have argued that rulemaking by unelected agency officials imperils popular sovereignty and that federal law should resolve the apparent tension between regulatory practice and democratic principle by allowing the President to serve as a proxy for the "will of the people" in the administrative state. According to this view, placing federal rulemaking power firmly within the President's managerial control would advance popular preferences throughout the federal system.

This conventional wisdom is misguided. As political scientists have long recognized, the electorate's relative disengagement …

Don't Take The Bait: Why Usda Organic Certification Is Wrong For Salmon, Jessica Hass

William & Mary Environmental Law and Policy Review

No abstract provided.

New Governance, Preemptive Self-Regulation, And The Blurring Of Boundaries In Regulatory Theory And Practice, Jason M. Solomon

Faculty Publications

In the literature on "new governance" forms of regulation, the blurring of traditional boundaries is a pervasive but largely implicit theme. This Article makes this theme explicit, and argues that the capacity to blur boundaries is one of new governance's signature strengths. New governance regulation frequently blurs the roles of regulatory actors, the stages of regulation, the modes of regulation, the functions of a regulatory regime; and the structure of the regulatory regime. The Article applies this lens to a series of case studies, and demonstrates how industry attempts at preemptive self-regulation have created opportunities where new governance forms of …