Law Commons^™

Recovering The Lost General Welfare Clause, David S. Schwartz

William & Mary Law Review

The General Welfare Clause of Article I, Section 8, Clause 1 of the Constitution enumerates a power to “provide for the common defense and general welfare.” A literal interpretation of this clause (“the general welfare interpretation”) would authorize Congress to legislate for any national purpose, and therefore to address all national problems— for example, the COVID-19 pandemic—in ways that would be precluded under the prevailing understanding of limited enumerated powers. But conventional doctrine rejects the general welfare interpretation and construes the General Welfare Clause to confer the so-called “Spending Power,” a power only to spend, but not to regulate, for …

State Regulations Are Failing Our Children: An Analysis Of Child Marriage Laws In The United States, Rachel L. Schuman

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Enforcing Principled Constitutional Limits On Federal Power: A Neo-Federalist Refinement Of Justice Cardozo's Jurisprudence, Robert J. Pushaw Jr.

William & Mary Law Review

Since the New Deal of the mid-1930s, Congress has asserted virtually absolute power to (1) “regulate Commerce ... among the States,” (2) tax and spend for the “general Welfare,” and (3) delegate “legislative Power[ ]” to the executive branch. From 1937 until 1994, the Supreme Court rejected every claim that such statutes had exceeded Congress’s Article I authority and usurped the states’ reserved powers under the Tenth Amendment. Over the past quarter century, conservative Justices have tried, and failed, to develop principled constitutional limits on the federal government while keeping the modern administrative and social welfare state largely intact.

The …

The Theory And Practice Of Contestatory Federalism, James A. Gardner

William & Mary Law Review

Madisonian theory holds that a federal division of power is necessary to the protection of liberty, but that federalism is a naturally unstable form of government organization that is in constant danger of collapsing into either unitarism or fragmentation. Despite its inherent instability, this condition may be permanently maintained, according to Madison, through a constitutional design that keeps the system in equipoise by institutionalizing a form of perpetual contestation between national and subnational governments. The theory, however, does not specify how that contestation actually occurs, and by what means.

This paper investigates Madison’s hypothesis by documenting the methods actually deployed …

Pricing The Fourth Amendment, Miriam H. Baer

William & Mary Law Review

Critics have long decried the Fourth Amendment’s lack of an adequate remedy to secure its compliance. Neither the exclusionary rule nor the threat of civil liability deters police misconduct, leaving scholars to cast about for alternative measures. The emphasis on penalties, however, overlooks a different problem: detection. Because of policing’s fast-paced nature, even so-called “flagrant” Fourth Amendment violations trigger insufficient liability due to low probabilities of detection.

This Article addresses this problem by drawing on the Pigouvian tax literature. The Pigouvian tax—sometimes referred to as a “corrective tax”—is a pricing instrument imposed by regulators in an amount equal to the …

Implementing Enumeration, Andrew Coan

William & Mary Law Review

The enumeration of legislative powers in Article I of the U.S. Constitution implies that those powers must have limits. This familiar “enumeration principle” has deep roots in American constitutional history and has played a central role in recent federalism decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court. Courts and commentators, however, have seldom rigorously considered what follows from embracing it. The answer is by no means straightforward. The enumeration principle tells us that federal power must be subject to some limit, but it does not tell us what that limit should be. Nor does it tell us how the Constitution’s commitment to …

Windsor Beyond Marriage: Due Process, Equality & Undocumented Immigration, Anthony O'Rourke

William & Mary Law Review

The Supreme Court’s recent decision in United States v. Windsor, invalidating part of the federal Defense of Marriage Act, presents a significant interpretive challenge. Early commentators have criticized the majority opinion’s lack of analytical rigor, and expressed doubt that Windsor can serve as a meaningful precedent with respect to constitutional questions outside the area of same-sex marriage. This Article offers a more rehabilitative reading of Windsor and shows how the decision can be used to analyze a significant constitutional question concerning the use of state criminal procedure to regulate immigration.

From Windsor’s holding, the Article distills two concrete doctrinal propositions …

The Federal Circuit As A Federal Court, Paul R. Gugliuzza

William & Mary Law Review

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has exclusive jurisdiction over patent appeals and, as a consequence, the last word on many legal issues important to innovation policy. This Article shows how the Federal Circuit augments its already significant power by impeding other government institutions from influencing the patent system. Specifically, the Federal Circuit has shaped patent-law doctrine, along with rules of jurisdiction, procedure, and administrative law, to preserve and expand the court's power in four interinstitutional relationships: the court's federalism relationship with state courts, its separation of powers relationship with the executive and legislative branches, its vertical …

The States Of Immigration, Rick Su

William & Mary Law Review

Immigration is a national issue and a federal responsibility. So why are states so actively involved? Their legal authority over immigration is questionable. Their institutional capacity to regulate it is limited. Even the legal actions that states take sometimes seem pointless from a regulatory perspective. Why do they enact legislation that essentially copies existing federal law? Why do they pursue regulations that courts are likely to enjoin or strike down? Why do they give so little priority to the immigration laws that do survive?

This Article sheds light on this seemingly irrational behavior. It argues that state laws are being …

Can Erie Survive As Federal Common Law?, Craig Green

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

General Law In Federal Court, Anthony J. Bellia Jr., Bradford R. Clark

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Untethered Norms After Erie Railroad Co. V. Tompkins: Positivism, International Law, And The Return Of The "Brooding Omnipresence", Lea Brilmayer

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Critical Guide To Erie Railroad Co. V. Tompkins, Caleb Nelson

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

A General Theory Of Governance: Due Process And Lawmaking Power, Louise Weinberg

William & Mary Law Review

This Article proposes a general theory describing the nature and sources of law in American courts. Erie Railroad Co. v. Tompkins is rejected for this purpose. Better, more general theory is available, flowing from the Due Process Clauses. At its narrowest, the proposed theory is consonant with Erie but generalizes it, embracing federal as well as state law and statutory as well as decisional law in both state and federal courts. More broadly, beyond this unification of systemic thinking, the interest-analytic methodology characteristic of due process extends to a range of substantive constitutional problems. These include problems concerning both the …

The Federal Common Law Of Statutory Interpretation: Erie For The Age Of Statutes, Abbe R. Gluck

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Valid Rule Due Process Challenges: Bond V. United States And Erie's Constitutional Source, Kermit Roosevelt Iii

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Our Federalism(S), Heather K. Gerken

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Role Of Charity In A Federal System, Brian Galle

William & Mary Law Review

This Article critiques the prevailing justification for subsidies for the charitable sector and suggests a new alternative. Existing rationales are based on an economic model that assumes a single government whose decisions are guided by a single median voter. I argue that this theory is unpersuasive when translated to federal systems, such as the United States, in which there may instead be thousands of competing local governments.

I then attempt to construct a theory of the charitable sector that takes account of interactions between charity, local government, and national government. In this revised account, charity is most important when federalism …

Globalization And Structure, Julian Ku, John Yoo

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Laws For Learning In An Age Of Acceleration, John O. Mcginnis

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Federalism Under Obama, Gillian E. Metzger

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Vote From Beyond The Grave, Krysta R. Edwards

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Federalism, Forum Shopping, And The Foreign Injury Paradox, Elizabeth T. Lear

William & Mary Law Review

This Article explores the contours of state regulatory power in the foreign injury context. The Supreme Court has long declined to question forum choice in domestic cases, apparently concluding that any other response would be inconsistent with our federalism. But move the injury offshore and the judicial deference to state regulatory supremacy evaporates. Federal judges subject forum choice in transnational tort actions to exacting scrutiny, routinely dismissing such claims on forum non conveniens grounds with no examination of the state interests at stake. This Article first considers whether the offshore nature of a foreign injury diminishes or even extinguishes traditional …

Contingent Constitutionalism: State And Local Criminal Laws And The Applicability Of Federal Constitutional Rights, Wayne A. Logan

William & Mary Law Review

Americans have long been bound by a shared sense of constitutional commonality, and the Supreme Court has repeatedly condemned the notion that federal constitutional rights should be allowed to depend on distinct state and local legal norms. In reality, however, federal rights do indeed vary, and they do so as a result of their contingent relationship to the diversity of state and local laws on which they rely. Focusing on criminal procedure rights in particular, this Article examines the benefits and detriments of constitutional contingency, and casts in new light many enduring understandings of American constitutionalism, including the effects of …

Political Judges And Popular Justice: A Conservative Victory Or A Conservative Dilemma?, George D. Brown

William & Mary Law Review

Most of the judges in America are elected. Yet the institution of the elected judiciary is in trouble, perhaps in crisis. The pressures of campaigning, particularly raising money, have produced an intensity of electioneering that many observers see as damaging to the institution itself. In an extraordinary development, four justices of the Supreme Court recently expressed concern over possible loss of trust in state judicial systems. Yet mechanisms that states have put in place to strike a balance between the accountability values of an elected judiciary and rule of law values of unbiased adjudication are increasingly invalidated by the federal …

Erie, The Class Action Fairness Act, And Some Federalism Implications Of Diversity Jurisdiction, David Marcus

William & Mary Law Review

The Class Action Fairness Act of 2005 (CAFA) expands diversity jurisdiction to allow most significant class actions based on state law to proceed in federal court. Hoping to limit the application of state law through class actions, CAFA's supporters believe that federal judges harbor a collective animosity toward the large, multistate class actions the statute targets. CAFA has no substantive component, and it does not tighten Rule 23's certification requirements. Nonetheless, if supporters are right about judicial preferences and their likely impact on certification decisions, CAFA will weaken the regulatory reach of state law.

Arguments about diversity jurisdiction and judicial …

Federalism, Positive Law, And The Emergence Of The American Administrative State: Prohibition In The Taft Court Era, Robert Post

William & Mary Law Review

This Article offers a detailed analysis of major Taft Court decisions involving prohibition, including Olmstead v. United States, Carroll v. United States, United States v. Lanza, Lambert v. Yellowley, and Tumey v. Ohio. Prohibition, and the Eighteenth Amendment by which it was constitutionally entrenched, was the result of a social movement that fused progressive beliefs in efficiency with conservative beliefs in individual responsibility and self-control.

During the 1920s the Supreme Court was a strictly "bone-dry"institution that regularly sustained the administrative and law enforcement techniques deployed by the federal government in its losing effort to prevent the manufacture and sale of …

"Tucker's Rule": St. George Tucker And The Limited Construction Of Federal Power, Kurt T. Lash

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

St. George Tucker And The Limits Of States' Rights Constitutionalism: Understanding The Federal Compact In The Early Republic, David Thomas Konig

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Making Federalism Doctrine: Fidelity, Institutional Competence, And Compensating Adjustments, Ernest A. Young

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.