Ideology, Qualifications, And Covert Senate Obstruction Of Federal Court Nominations,
2014
Texas A&M University School of Law
Ideology, Qualifications, And Covert Senate Obstruction Of Federal Court Nominations, Ryan J. Owens, Daniel E. Walters, Ryan C. Black, Anthony Madonna
Faculty Scholarship
Scholars, policymakers, and journalists have bemoaned the emphasis on ideology over qualifications and party over performance in the judicial appointment process. Though, for years, the acrimony between the two parties and between the Senate and President remained limited to appointments to the United States Supreme Court, the modern era of judicial appointments has seen the so-called “appointments rigor mortis” spread throughout all levels of judicial appointments. A host of studies have examined the causes and consequences of the growing acrimony and obstruction of lower federal court appointments, but few rely on archival data and empirical evidence to examine the underlying …
In Search Of Justice: An Examination Of The Appointments Of John G. Roberts And Samuel A. Alito To The U.S. Supreme Court And Their Impact On American Jurisprudence,
2014
William & Mary Law School
In Search Of Justice: An Examination Of The Appointments Of John G. Roberts And Samuel A. Alito To The U.S. Supreme Court And Their Impact On American Jurisprudence, Alberto R. Gonzales
William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal
During 2005, President George W. Bush appointed Federal Circuit Court Judges John G. Roberts and Samuel A. Alito to the U.S. Supreme Court. These appointments were the culmination of years of examination of the work, character, and temperament of both men commencing during the 2000 presidential transition. Our evaluation included face-to-face interviews; an analysis of judicial opinions, speeches, and writings; and conversation with friends, colleagues, and court experts. Based on this work, a select group of Bush Administration officials developed a set of predictors that formed the basis of our recommendation to President Bush that he elevate Circuit Court Judges …
Conflating Politics And Development? Examining Investment Treaty Arbitration Outcomes,
2014
American University Washington College of Law
Conflating Politics And Development? Examining Investment Treaty Arbitration Outcomes, Susan Franck
Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals
International dispute settlement is an area of ongoing evaluation and tension within the international political economy. As states continue their negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), the efficacy of international arbitration as a method of dispute settlement remains controversial. Whereas some sing its praises as a method of protecting private property interests against improper government interference, others decry investment treaty arbitration (ITA) as biased against states. The literature has thus far not disentangled how politics and development contribute to investment dispute outcomes. In an effort to control for the effect of internal …
Pa. Gay Marriage With An Exemption,
2014
Duquesne University
Pa. Gay Marriage With An Exemption, Bruce Ledewitz
Ledewitz Papers
Published scholarship collected from academic journals, law reviews, newspaper publications & online periodicals
Evaluating The Performance And Accountability Of Regulators,
2014
Seattle University School of Law
Evaluating The Performance And Accountability Of Regulators, Colin Scott
Seattle University Law Review
The global financial crisis came in the wake of significant reforms to the structures, processes, powers, and rules of the regulatory regimes for financial markets in many of the countries adversely affected by the crash. The global financial crisis came in the wake of significant reforms to the structures, processes, powers, and rules of the regulatory regimes for financial markets in many of the countries adversely affected by the crash. In this Article, I follow the logic of an argument that regulation necessarily has political dimensions, even where it may appear technical. I am asking questions about how we might …
Enhancing The Transparency Dialogue In The “Santiago Principles” For Sovereign Wealth Funds,
2014
Seattle University School of Law
Enhancing The Transparency Dialogue In The “Santiago Principles” For Sovereign Wealth Funds, Adam D. Dixon
Seattle University Law Review
The financial crisis ultimately caused Western governments to welcome sovereign wealth fund (SWF) investment as a way to put a floor under collapsing markets and to provide a set of voluntary principles that would underwrite SWFs’ claim to legitimacy in the international community. In the autumn of 2007, then U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, in conjunction with the International Monetary Fund, convened the International Working Group of SWFs (IWG) to draft a set of generally accepted principles and practices. These principles are referred to as the “Santiago Principles.” The implicit objective of these twenty-four voluntary principles is to promote greater …
The Communication Decency Act Gone Wild: A Case For Renewing The Presumption Against Preemption,
2014
Seattle University School of Law
The Communication Decency Act Gone Wild: A Case For Renewing The Presumption Against Preemption, Ryan J.P. Dyer
Seattle University Law Review
Since its inception, the Internet has disseminated the most vital commodity known to man—information. But not all information is societally desirable. In fact, much of what the Internet serves to disseminate is demonstrably criminal. Nevertheless, in the effort to unbind the “vibrant and competitive free market” of ideas on the Internet, Congress enacted section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which essentially grants immunity to interactive computer service providers from liability for information provided by a third party. This Comment suggests that, in certain contexts, courts applying section 230 immunity should reexamine the preemptive effect Congress intended section 230 to …
Transgender Inpportunity And Inequality: Evaluating The Crossroads Between Immigration And Transgender Individuals,
2014
Seattle University School of Law
Transgender Inpportunity And Inequality: Evaluating The Crossroads Between Immigration And Transgender Individuals, Alexandra Caggiano
Seattle University Law Review
Despite being married to a U.S. citizen, non-citizen transgender individuals and non-citizen spouses married to transgender U.S. citizens still face deportation today due to current immigration policies. When forced to return to their home countries, transgender individuals are likely to encounter violence from those who perpetuate hate towards transgender and gender non-conforming individuals. Instead of protecting these individuals, the United States continues to send people back to their native countries solely because those individuals do not fall within the narrowly constructed definition of marriage some states use that is legally recognized by federal courts. Transgender individuals receive disparate treatment as …
Property's Ends: The Publicness Of Private Law Values,
2014
Cornell Law School
Property's Ends: The Publicness Of Private Law Values, Gregory S. Alexander
Cornell Law Faculty Publications
Property theorists commonly suppose that property has as its ends certain private values, such as individual autonomy and personal security. This Essay contends that property’s real end is human flourishing, that is, living a life that is as fulfilling as possible. Human flourishing, although property’s ultimate end, is neither monistic nor simple. Rather, it is inclusive and comprises multiple values. Those values, the content of human flourishing, derives, at least in part, from an understanding of the sorts of beings we are―social and political. A consequence of this conception of the human condition is that the values that constitute human …
What's It Worth? Jury Damage Awards As Community Judgments,
2014
Cornell Law School
What's It Worth? Jury Damage Awards As Community Judgments, Valerie P. Hans
Cornell Law Faculty Publications
No abstract provided.
Outside Influence,
2014
Alexander Blewett III School of Law at the University of Montana
Outside Influence, Anthony Johnstone
Faculty Law Review Articles
This article considers how much outside influence matters to the constitutional analysis of state politics. It defends the political community principle applied in Bluman v. Federal Election Comm’n as an exception to the otherwise universal speaker-neutrality rule of Citizens United v. Federal Election Comm’n. It draws parallels between efforts to police national and state boundaries in politics, and the competing rights claims of outsiders to cross those boundaries and participate fully in domestic politics. The article suggests that the structural constitutional principle of political community supports certain state regulations of outside influence across a range of political activities. Part I …
The Politics Of Statutory Interpretation,
2014
Duke University School of Law
The Politics Of Statutory Interpretation, Margaret H. Lemos
Notre Dame Law Review
In a new book, Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts, Justice Antonin Scalia and Bryan Garner describe and defend the textualist methodology for which Justice Scalia is famous. For Scalia and Garner, the normative appeal of textualism lies in its objectivity: by focusing on text, context, and canons of construction, textualism offers protection against ideological judging—a way to separate law from politics. Yet, as Scalia and Garner well know, textualism is widely regarded as a politically conservative methodology. The charge of conservative bias is more common than it is concrete, but it reflects the notion that textualism narrows the …
Banking And The Social Contract,
2014
University of Georgia Law School
Banking And The Social Contract, Mehrsa Baradaran
Notre Dame Law Review
This Article asserts that there are three major tenets of the social contract: (1) safety and soundness, (2) consumer protection, and (3) access to credit. Regulators can and should require banks to meet standards in these areas to benefit society even if these measures reasonably reduce bank profits. Implicit in the social contract is the idea that each party must give up something in the exchange. This Article provides policymakers not only the appropriate narrative and justifications needed to frame their regulatory philosophy, but it also provides important textual support from the most prominent acts of banking legislation to give …
The Implausibility Of Secrecy,
2014
University of Florida Levin College of Law
The Implausibility Of Secrecy, Mark Fenster
UF Law Faculty Publications
Government secrecy frequently fails. Despite the executive branch’s obsessive hoarding of certain kinds of documents and its constitutional authority to do so, recent high-profile events — among them the WikiLeaks episode, the Obama administration’s infamous leak prosecutions, and the widespread disclosure by high-level officials of flattering confidential information to sympathetic reporters — undercut the image of a state that can classify and control its information. The effort to control government information requires human, bureaucratic, technological, and textual mechanisms that regularly founder or collapse in an administrative state, sometimes immediately and sometimes after an interval. Leaks, mistakes, and open sources all …
Plausible Absurdities And Practical Formalities: The Recess Appointments Clause In Theory And Practice,
2014
University of Michigan Law School
Plausible Absurdities And Practical Formalities: The Recess Appointments Clause In Theory And Practice, David Frisof
Michigan Law Review
The recent controversy surrounding President Obama’s recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau while the Senate was holding pro forma sessions illustrates the need to reach a new understanding of the Recess Appointments Clause of the Constitution. For the Recess Appointments Clause to be functional, it must fulfill two essential constitutional purposes: it must act as a fulcrum in the separation of powers, and it must ensure the continued exercise of the executive power. Achieving this functionality depends not only on the formal constructions of the Clause but also on the ways in …
Taking Stock: Insider And Outsider Trading By Congress,
2014
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law
Taking Stock: Insider And Outsider Trading By Congress, Jeanne L. Schroeder
Articles
Spring 2012 saw the enactment of the "Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act of 2012" or "STOCK Act." It supposedly repealed an exemption from the federal securities laws that made insider trading by members of Congress "totally legal." As every securities lawyer knows, however, there never was such an exemption. Representatives and Senators have always been subject to the same rules as the rest of us. It is just that insider-trading law is so incoherent that legal scholars sharply disagreed as to when, or even if trading by government officials on the basis of material nonpublic information gleaned from their …
Us Ambassador To Honduras Offers Tacit Support Of Brutal Crackdown,
2014
Western New England University School of Law
Us Ambassador To Honduras Offers Tacit Support Of Brutal Crackdown, Lauren Carasik
Media Presence
No abstract provided.
Germany Vs. Europe: The Principle Of Democracy In German Constitutional Law And The Troubled Future Of European Integration,
2014
Washington and Lee University School of Law
Germany Vs. Europe: The Principle Of Democracy In German Constitutional Law And The Troubled Future Of European Integration, Russell A. Miller
Scholarly Articles
This Article introduces the Demokratieprinzip. In Part II, I begin by more fully documenting the Euro-skeptical turn in Germany's relationship with Europe, paying particular attention to the central role played by the Constitutional Court's interpretation of the Demokratieprinzip. Part III, in four subparts, provides a doctrinal introduction to the principle of democracy. First, I map the principle's bases in the text of the German Grundgesetz (Basic Law or Constitution). Second, I present the gloss the Constitutional Court has given the principle, making special reference to the Court's recent decisions involving challenges to Germany's participation in measures seeking to advance European …
Experimenting With Religious Liberty: The Quasi-Constitutional Status Of Religious Exemptions,
2014
Duquesne University
Experimenting With Religious Liberty: The Quasi-Constitutional Status Of Religious Exemptions, Bruce Ledewitz
Ledewitz Papers
Published scholarship collected from academic journals, law reviews, newspaper publications & online periodicals.
The Vietnam Draft Cases And The Pro-Religion Equality Project,
2014
Duquesne University
The Vietnam Draft Cases And The Pro-Religion Equality Project, Bruce Ledewitz
Ledewitz Papers
Published scholarship collected from academic journals, law reviews, newspaper publications & online periodicals.
