Hello, Conspiracy! I have been a fan of the Volokh Conspiracy since its inception, and I am honored to join you as the newest Conspirator. Some of you may recall my guest posts from September of 2011, or Randy Barnett’s extremely generous review of my recent work. For those who don’t know me, I am […]
Archive | November, 2012
Public Opinion on the Role of Government
Commentators such as liberal E.J. Dionne and even libertarian David Harsanyi are claiming that the election results prove that Obama won a great referendum on the role of government in American society, achieving a mandate for expanded government intervention. The CNN exit polls tell a very different story. 51 percent of voters said that government […]
The Republican Liberty Caucus
In my Wall Street Journal op-ed, I mentioned the Republican Liberty Caucus, which works within the Republican Party, as an alternative to the Libertarian Party. (Years ago, I advocated an alternative strategy for the Libertarian Party: field libertarian candidates to run as Republican or Democrats in uncontested congressional districts, where they would be assured something […]
Institute for Justice and Licensing Laws
A nifty little tv spot on the Institute for Justice’s efforts to challenge irrational licensing laws. Remarkably the reporter here seems to have gotten the absurdity of how these things actually work. And my sometimes co-author Anthony Sanders makes an appearance. A nice little teaching tool for those trying to understand the reality of how […]
God Sure Goes for Killing Innocent People
MEMRI reports that “Saudi Cleric Muhammad Al-Munajid” is claiming that “Hurricane Sandy is Allah’s punishment for Afghanistan and Iraq.” Meantime, Rabbi Noson Leiter [UPDATE: starting around 2:45] is claiming that Hurricane Sandy is God’s message about the “same-gender-marriage recognition movement.” A few years ago, “Rev. Bill Shanks, pastor of New Covenant Fellowship of New Orleans” […]
Reason’s Nick Gillespie Responds to my WSJ Op-Ed on the Libertarian Party
Nick Gillespie has a very thoughtful reply to my WSJ Op-ed, The Mistake That Is the Libertarian Party, that ran on election day. I highly recommend his reply, which you can read here. I still believe that the 40 year experiment with the Libertarian Party has only served to make both parties less libertarian. And […]
No Constitutional Right to Smoke in City Parks
So holds Gallagher v. City of Clayton (8th Cir. Nov. 8, 2012), quite correctly.
Welcome to Two New Co-Conspirators, Eugene Kontorovich and Nick Rosenkranz
I’m delighted to report that Prof. Eugene Kontorovich (Northwestern) and Prof. Nick Rosenkranz (Georgetown) have agreed to join our merry band. Many of you might recall both from their guest-blogging stints a while ago. Eugene K. specializes mostly in international law, law and economics, and constitutional law. He is the author of, among many other […]
Presidential Preferences of George Mason Law Students
As co-blogger David Bernstein notes, the two of us conducted anonymous online presidential polls of our Constitutional Law I classes. Here are my results, for a poll conducted over the weekend just before election day: Barack Obama (Democrat): 29 Mitt Romney (Republican): 18 Gary Johnson (Libertarian Party): 2 Jill Stein (Green Party): 1 Other: 0 […]
Those Right-Wing George Mason Law Students … Support Obama
It’s well-known that George Mason Law School has a libertarian and conservative-leaning faculty, unique among non-religiously affiliated law schools in the United States. What’s odd, though, is that law school guides consistently state that George Mason has a very conservative student body. Princeton Review, for example, ranks George Mason number 4 for have the “most […]
The Moment of Victory in Minnesota
For an example of a pure, spontaneous eruption of joy it’s hard to beat the moment we learned that the anti-gay marriage amendment had been defeated in Minnesota. At 1:45 the staff and board of Minnesotans United For All Families, was gathered in a conference room just across from the hall from where thousands had gathered […]
Heresy in the Legal Academy
Former VC guest blogger and UCLA law professor Richard Sander is a political liberal who has done some pioneering work on affirmative action mismatch: essentially, if law schools (and other educational institutions) dip too far into the applicant pool to fill their diversity goals, many of the purported beneficiaries of preference policies wind up being […]
Winning Minnesota
By Dale Carpenter on November 8, 2012 3:06 am in Democracy, Gay Rights, Same-Sex Marriage, Sexual Orientation
Most of the post-election attention to the gay-marriage ballot fights has focused on the inspiring wins in Maine, Maryland, and Washington state, where same-sex marriages will now be legal. But equally important in the long-term is what happened in Minnesota on Tuesday. Eighteen months ago, when the state legislature voted to place a ban on same-sex marriages on […]
Is it Unjust to Require Children to Pass a Knowledge Test to Vote, but Not Adults?
By Ilya Somin on November 8, 2012 12:27 am in Election Law, Elections, Political Ignorance, Voting Rights for Children
Canadian legal blogger Leonid Sirota has posted an interesting response to my post advocating extension of the franchise to politically knowledgeable children. He argues that it is unjust to require children to pass a knowledge test for voting, but not adults. He would therefore prefer to lower the voting age to 16 instead: Pour ma […]
First item of new post-election “flexibility”: U.N. gun control
As reported by the Second Amendment Foundation, this morning the Obama administration joined a U.N. majority which called for convening a new conference to create a global Arms Trade Treaty.