Administrative Law Commons^™

Is The Time Allocated To Review Patent Applications Inducing Examiners To Grant Invalid Patents?: Evidence From Micro-Level Application Data, Michael D. Frakes, Melissa F. Wasserman

Faculty Scholarship

We explore how examiner behavior is altered by the time allocated for reviewing patent applications. Insufficient examination time may hamper examiner search and rejection efforts, leaving examiners more inclined to grant invalid applications. To test this prediction, we use application-level data to trace the behavior of individual examiners over the course of a series of promotions that carry with them reductions in examination-time allocations. We find evidence demonstrating that such promotions are associated with reductions in examination scrutiny and increases in granting tendencies, as well as evidence that those additional patents being issued on the margin are of below-average quality.

Empirical Scholarship On The Prosecution Process At The Pto, Michael D. Frakes, Melissa F. Wasserman

Faculty Scholarship

In this book chapter, we summarize empirical scholarship examining the patent prosecution process at the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

Beyond Absurd: Jim Thorpe And A Proposed Taxonomy For The Absurdity Doctrine, Hillel Y. Levin, Joshua M. Segal, Keisha N. Stanford

Scholarly Works

In light of the Third Circuit's recent decision interpreting the Native American Graves Repatriation Act, this Article argues that the Supreme Court must clarify the Absurdity Doctrine of statutory interpretation. The Article offers a framework for doing so.

Public Participation In Risk Regulation: The Flaws Of Formality, Emily Hammond

Utah Law Review

Dread risks draw significant public attention in both the administrative process and the courts. Yet there are a number of dysfunctions at the intersection of procedures, participation, and agency decision-making regarding such risks. This Article elaborates the participatory dysfunctions for dread risk regulation, considering formal APA procedures as well as casting complexity as a variety of formality. Inspired by recent executive actions for improving participation and incorporating social science insights into the regulatory process, this Article sets a research agenda that spans the fields of risk perception, procedural justice, and administrative law.

Black-Box Immigration Federalism, David S. Rubenstein

Michigan Law Review

In Immigration Outside the Law, Hiroshi Motomura confronts the three hardest questions in immigration today: what to do about our undocumented population, who should decide, and by what legal process. Motomura’s treatment is characteristically visionary, analytically rich, and eminently fair to competing views. The book’s intellectual arc begins with its title: “Immigration Outside the Law.” As the narrative unfolds, however, Motomura explains that undocumented immigrants are “Americans in waiting,” with moral and legal claims to societal integration.

Chipping Away At The Rock: Perez V. Mortgage Bankers Association And The Seminole Rock Deference Doctrine, Kevin O. Leske

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Notion And Practice Of Reputation And Professional Identity In Social Networking: From K-12 Through Law School, Roberta Bobbie Studwell

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Astroturf Campaigns: Transparency In Telecom Merger Review, Victoria Peng

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Large telecommunications companies looking to merge spend millions of dollars in their lobbying efforts to clear regulatory hurdles and obtain approval for their proposed mergers. Corporations such as AT&T, Comcast, and Time Warner use public participation processes as vehicles to influence regulatory decision-making. In the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) merger review context, the notice- and-comment process and public hearings have become fertile breeding grounds for hidden corporate influence. Corporations spend millions on corporate social responsibility programs and call upon nonprofit organizations that receive their largesse to represent their corporate interests as grassroots interests when the FCC seeks public comment. This …

Legal Adaptive Capacity : How Program Goals And Processes Shape Federal Land Adaption To Climate Change, Alejandro E. Camacho, Robert L. Glicksman

University of Colorado Law Review

The degree to which statutory goals are pliable is likely to significantly affect the ability of an agency with regulatory or management responsibilities to achieve those objectives in the face of novel challenges or changing circumstances. This Article explores this dynamic by comparing the degree of 'ive" provided by the goals of the regimes governing management of the five types of federal public lands in responding to the challenges posed by climate change. A comparative analysis of federal land adaptation to climate change demonstrates that a management regime's legal adaptive capacity is influenced not only by procedural flexibility, but also …

Interpretation Of The Supreme People's Court On Several Issues Concerning The Application Of "Administrative Ligitation Law Of The People's Republic Of China", Benjamin Minhao Chen, Zhiyu Li

Washington International Law Journal

For the proper application of the “Administrative Litigation Law of the People’s Republic of China” amended at the 11th session of the Standing Committee of the Twelfth National People's Congress, in consideration of the actual circumstances of the people’s courts, the interpretation on the application of the relevant provisions is hereby issued as follows:

Who’S Exercising What Power: Toward A Judicially-Manageable Nondelegation Doctrine, Martin Edwards

Journal Articles

This Article argues that the traditional, "intelligible principle" nondelegation analysis is incomplete and that an examination of the delegate, rather than just the delegation, more effectively animates the doctrine. This is true not only as a practical matter; early Supreme Court cases, as well as later ones, have taken a keen interest in the recipient of the alleged delegation. In other words, a realistic and judicially enforceable nondelegation doctrine must include more than a mere tip of the juridical cap.

The Forgotten Core Of The Telecommunications Act Of 1996, Philip J. Weiser

Publications

No abstract provided.

Classing Up The Agency, Sergio J. Campos

Articles

No abstract provided.

Welcome To The Space Jam: How United States Regulators Should Govern Google And Facebook's New Internet Providing High Altitude Platforms, George V. John

American University Business Law Review

No abstract provided.

Give Them A Reason They Can Understand: An Examination Of Rhode Island's Medicaid Ineligibility Notices To The State's Most Vulnerable Populations, Laura Pickering

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Crafting Comment Letters: Teach Policy, Develop Skills, And Shape Pending Regulation, Nicole G. Iannarone, Benjamin P. Edwards

Faculty Publications By Year

This essay unpacks the regulatory comment letter process and how to incorporate it into the law school curriculum. Participating in live rulemaking offers unique opportunities for students, from mastering the substantive area of law, developing critical thinking skills, and developing their professional identities and expertise. We describe our own experiences in incorporating students into the regulatory rulemaking process. Because of our focus on securities law, our students review and comment on proposed actions by securities regulators — the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) and Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). After providing an overview of the pedagogical and practical rationale for …

Resetting The Baseline Of Ownership: Takings And Investor Expectations After The Bailouts, Nestor M. Davidson

Faculty Scholarship

During the economic crisis that began in 2008, the federal government nationalized several of the nation’s most significant private companies as part of a broad effort to forestall a global depression. Shareholders in those companies later filed suit, alleging that the federal government in so doing—and in subsequent actions while in control of the firms—took their property without compensation in violation of the Fifth Amendment. To date, those claims have not succeeded. If these cases continue on their current trajectory, with courts rejecting arguments that the rescue of systematically important firms on the brink of collapse requires compensation for shareholders, …

Expanding Territorial Bounds: The Recognition Doctrine After Zivotofsky V. Kerry, Nicole Kirkilevich

Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review

No abstract provided.

Revisiting Congresssional Delegation Of Interpretative Primacy As The Foundation For Chevron Defense, Mark Seidenfeld

Scholarly Publications

Although congressional delegation is the rationale used most often to justify the Chevron doctrine, most scholars who have written about this justification have recognized that it is a fiction, albeit, they claim, a useful one. In “Chevron’s Foundation,” I proposed an alternative foundation for the Chevron doctrine—a judicial self-limitation justification for Chevron deference—based on an implicit understanding of Article III that courts should not resolve cases by making policy choices where alternative means for deciding these cases exists. In this essay, I first revisit my original critique of the delegation rationale and explicitly respond to the arguments …

Regulating Healthcare Robots: Maximizing Opportunities While Minimizing Risks, Drew Simshaw, Nicolas Terry, Kris Hauser, M.L. Cummings

Richmond Journal of Law & Technology

Some of the most dynamic areas of robotics research and development today are healthcare applications. Robot-assisted surgery, robotic nurses, in-home rehabilitation, and eldercare robots' are all demonstrating rapidly iterating innovation. Rising healthcare labor costs and an aging population will increase demand for these human surrogates and enhancements. However, like many emerging technologies, robots are difficult to place within existing regulatory frameworks. For example, the federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C Act) seeks to ensure that medical devices (few of which are consumer devices) are safe, the HIPAA Privacy and Security Rules apply to data collected by health care providers …

Public Engagement And Decision-Making: Moving Minnesota Forward To Dialogue And Deliberation, Lisa Blomgren Amsler, Tina Nabatchi

Mitchell Hamline Law Review

No abstract provided.

Crafting Comment Letters: Teach Policy, Develop Skills, And Shape Pending Regulation, Benjamin P. Edwards, Nicole G. Iannarone

Scholarly Works

Professor Benjamin Edwards joins his colleague, Professor Nicole Iannarone, in this essay, unpacking the regulatory comment letter process and how to incorporate it into the law school curriculum. Participating in live rulemaking offers unique opportunities for students including mastering the substantive area of law, developing critical thinking skills, and developing their professional identities. The authors describe their own experiences in incorporating students into the regulatory rulemaking process. Because of the focus on securities law, their students review and comment on proposed actions by securities regulators - the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) and Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). After providing …

Complying With The Hipaa Privacy Rule: Problems And Perspectives, Stacey A. Tovino

Scholarly Works

Twenty years ago, President Clinton signed the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) into law. Over the past two decades, the federal Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has published several sets of rules implementing the Administrative Simplification provisions within HIPAA as well as the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical (HITECH) Act within the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). These rules include a final rule governing the use and disclosure of protected health information by covered entities and their business associates (Privacy Rule).

This Article addresses the question of what it means for …

Why Bias Challenges To Administrative Adjudication Should Succeed, Kent H. Barnett

Scholarly Works

How much confidence would you have in a judge whom your opponent hired, can pay bonuses to, and can seek to discipline or remove? I recently argued that numerous administrative adjudicators very likely suffer from an unconstitutional appearance of partiality because the agencies that are often parties in administrative hearings can hire, pay bonuses to, discipline, and remove these adjudicators.

In this Article for the Missouri Law Review’s Symposium on A Future Without the Administrative State?, I contend that challenges to adjudicators’ appearance of partiality are well positioned to be part of the new wave of structural challenges to the …

Chapter 11 Shapeshifters, Lindsey Simon

Scholarly Works

Logic and equity would seem to demand that when administrative agencies are creditors to a bankrupt debtor, they should have the same status as other creditors. But a creditor agency retains its regulatory authority over the debtor, permitting it to continue with agency business such as conducting enforcement proceedings and awarding licenses. As a result, though bankruptcy law and policy both strongly support equal distribution of the estate, administrative agencies have been able to circumvent these goals through the use of “shapeshifting” behaviors. This Article evaluates two dangerous shapeshifting scenarios:

(1) where the agency avoids the limitations of creditor status …

Uncertainty, Complexity, And Regulatory Design, Adam I. Muchmore

Faculty Scholarship

This Article develops an analytic framework for understanding the role of uncertainty in regulatory design. It begins by differentiating between three types of uncertainty: legal uncertainty, factual uncertainty, and uncertainty about the application of law to fact. This framework highlights the pervasiveness of factual uncertainty and law-fact uncertainty in daily affairs. Viewed through this framework, legal uncertainty is less problematic than it is typically thought to be.

The Article then focuses on legal uncertainty, examining it from two perspectives: the relationship between rules and standards, and the relationship between simplicity and complexity. It suggests that there are fundamental limits on …

Unappealing: An Assessment Of The Limits On Appeal Rights In Canada's New Refugee Determination System, Angus Gavin Grant, Sean Rehaag

Articles & Book Chapters

Canada’s refugee determination system was revised in 2012. One key feature of the new process is a quasi-judicial administrative appeal, on matters of both fact and law, at the Refugee Appeal Division (RAD) of the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB). Under the new process, however, many claimants are denied access to the RAD.

This article assesses these limits on access to the RAD, drawing mostly on quantitative data obtained from the IRB and Citizenship and Immigration Canada through access to information requests. Our aim is to provide evidence-based analysis and recommendations for reform. Essentially, our conclusions are that the bars …

Accidents Of Federalism: Ratemaking And Policy Innovation In Public Utility Law, William Boyd, Ann E. Carlson

Publications

Decarbonizing the electric power sector will be central to any serious effort to fight climate change. Many observers have suggested that the congressional failure to enact a uniform system of electricity regulation could stifle the transition to a low-carbon electricity grid. This Article contends that the critique is overstated. In fact, innovation is occurring across different aspects of the electricity system and across different types of states in ways one would not expect to see under a single, national approach. As the Article demonstrates, this innovation stems in part from Congress’s failure to enact a single, national approach to electricity …

Tax Planning And Policy Drift, Sloan G. Speck

Publications

This Article proposes a framework for analyzing how private-sector legal interpretations influence public policy. Political scientists and legal scholars use the terms “bureaucratic drift” and “legislative drift” to describe how administrative agencies and future legislative coalitions affect public policy enacted by Congress. This Article identifies a third category of policy drift: “planning drift.” Planning drift describes deviations from an enacting legislature’s policy preferences that result from private experts’ interpretations of existing law. After Congress enacts a statute, the first people to interpret and apply the new legislation generally are not regulators or judges, but instead are private experts, such as …

Trademark Laundering, Useless Patents, And Other Ip Challenges For The Marijuana Industry, Sam Kamin, Viva R. Moffat University Of Denver College Of Law

Washington and Lee Law Review

No abstract provided.