Author Archive | Jonathan H. Adler

Congressional Quarterly (aka CQ) has a new blog focusing Congress and the courts, “Legal Beat.” Among its initial posts are one on Senator Specter’s call for “bipartisanship” in judicial nominations and another on Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Senator Leahy and “Blue Slips.”

The LA Times reports on an interview with Energy Secretary Steven Chu, a Nobel-winning physicist, about the threat climate change poses to California. Reporting from Washington — California’s farms and vineyards could vanish by the end of the century, and its major cities could be in jeopardy, if Americans do not act to slow the […]

Farmland is beginning to revert back to tropical forest in many countries. The NYT reports: new

The LA Times has a story today noting a conspicuous absence among the Bush Administration counter-terror policies reversed or limited by the Obama Administration: Extraordinary Rendition. “Obviously you need to preserve some tools — you still have to go after the bad guys,” said an Obama administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity when discussing […]

A reader suggests “Fallen on Hard Times” by Jethro Tull as a Sunday Song Lyric. It seems rather fitting given today’s economic and political climate. The song was originally released on Tull’s 1982 album, The Broadsword and the Beast. Here are two verses: Fallen on hard times

Via the new UC Berkeley-UCLA “Environment & Law” blog comes news that Harvard Law Professor Jody Freeman will join the Obama Administration as counselor to energy empress Carol Browner in the White House Office of Energy and Climate Change. More here. [UPDATE: My initial post simply described the “Environment & Law” blog as a “UCal” […]

In my own remarks at the Case Western Reserve Law Review symposium on “Access to the Courts in the Roberts Era,” I argued that the net effect of the Roberts Court’s decisions on standing has been to liberalize standing rules, thereby increasing access to federal courts. I, of course, noted the problem of reaching definitive […]

The Roberts Court

The Politico reports that Justice Department attorneys are defending John Yoo and other former Bush Administration officials in civil suits filed by Jose Padilla and other former detainees. Next week, Justice Department lawyers are set to ask a San Francisco federal judge to throw out a lawsuit brought against Yoo by Jose Padilla, a New […]

This Friday, the Case Western Reserve Law Review is hosting a symposium on “Access to Justice in the Roberts Era.” Topics to be covered include preemption, standing, and arbitration requirements. Here’s the write-up: The Case Western Reserve Law Review Symposium will explore the access individuals have had to the courts since the appointment of Chief […]

Among the decisions handed down on Monday was United States v. Eurodif, in which the Supreme Court held unanimously that certain contracts for enriched uranium are sales of goods subject to federal anti-dumping laws. The case may seem obscure, it is potentially important for administrative law, as Lewis & Clark’s William Funk explained in a […]

I have an article on NRO today explaining why greenhouse gas controls of some sort are inevitable under current law. As I explain, a practical consequence of the Supreme Court’s Massachusetts v. EPA decision is that the EPA is required to treat greenhouse gases as pollutants and regulate them accordingly. The agency has never made […]

Another legal academic is reportedly signing up with the Obama Administration. According to this report, Georgetown University’s Lisa Heinzerling is joining the Environmental Protection Agency to advise EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson. Heinzerling was the lead author of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts’ merits brief in Massachusetts v. EPA. While I disagreed with much of her argument, […]

Today President Obama instructed the EPA to reconsider the Bush Administration’s denial of California’s request for a waiver of Clean Air Act preemption for the state’s first-in-the-nation regulations limiting greenhouse gas emissions from new motor vehicles. This decision was expected, and is largely symbolic. Allowing California to regulate vehicular GHGs will have little effect on […]

The LA Times reports that some liberal activists are concerned about President Obama’s decision to nominate Harvard law professor (and one-time VC guest blogger) Cass Sunstein to be the administration’s “regulatory czar” as head the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs within the Office of Management and Budget. While Sunstein is quite liberal on some […]