GOP Presidential candidate has been roundly criticized for putting forward a budget plan that doesn’t add up. His proposal to cut income tax rates by 20 percent across the board, when combined with other tax pledges (such as reducing the corporate tax rate and eliminating the AMT) would total an estimated $5 trillion, and there’s […]
Author Archive | Jonathan H. Adler
Morriss on Tamanaha
Many commentators have praised Brian Tamanaha’s Failing Law Schools for its unflinching (and much needed) look at the state of legal education. Without question, Tamanaha was among the first to sound the alarm about legal education, and Failing Law Schools is an important book. But does Tamanaha go far enough? My former colleague Andrew Morriss […]
Ohio’s Voting Wars
The Washington Post reports on the state of Ohio’s emergency application for a stay of a lower court injunction against recent changes in early voting rules, pending its petition for certiorari in this case. The issue is whether Ohio may allow only military voters to take advantage of in-person early voting in the three days […]
On Hobsbawm
Eric Hobsbawm (1917-2012) may well have been a great historian, but we should also not forget that he was a moral midget or, in Jeff Jacoby’s words, a “dogmatic leftist creep.” A lifelong member of the Communist Party and apologist for Soviet oppression, Hobsbawm maintained that a Communist revolution would be worth the sacrifice of […]
Repeating “That Is a Fact” Does Not Make It So
Near the end of Thursday night’s vice-presidential debate, Vice President Joe Biden said the following: With regard to the assault on the Catholic Church, let me make it absolutely clear. No religious institution, Catholic or otherwise, including Catholic Social Services, Georgetown Hospital, Mercy — any hospital — none has to either refer contraception. None has […]
The Fact-Checkers’ Conceit
Ramesh Ponnuru on media “fact-checkers”: The conceit of the fact-checkers is that their claims are objectively true: A politician has said X, the truth is Y, and the size of the difference is the magnitude of the lie. Every stage of the fact-checking process, however, involves the exercise of judgment. The fact-checker must decide which […]
Court Preclears South Carolina Voter ID Requirement
A three-judge panel precleared South Carolina’s new voter identification requirement under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act. Judge Kavanaugh wrote the opinion for the court, and summarized the case as follows: This case concerns South Carolina’s new voter ID law, Act R54. The question presented is whether that new state law is lawful under […]
Where Is the Unified Agenda?
The federal government is supposed to publish the Unified Agenda of Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions twice a year. This document provides a rundown of all the various regulatory (and deregulatory) actions that are in various stages of the regulatory pipeline. In this way, the agenda provides an overview of the federal government’s regulatory activities, and […]
Case Symposium on Executive Compensation and Upcoming Talks
This Friday, the Center for Business Law and Regulation at the Case Western Reserve University School of Law is hosting a symposium on “Executive Compensation: New Developments & Emerging Trends” from 9am-3pm. Speakers include Professors Jesse Fried (Harvard), Jill Fisch (UPenn), Todd Henderson (Chicago), and David Walker (BU), as well as Stephen Brown of TIAA-CREF […]
Supreme Court to Consider Chevron Deference for Agency Jurisdiction
Among the Supreme Court’s seven cert grants today were the potentially important takings case Ilya notes below and another potentially important administrative law case: City of Arlington v. FCC. In City of Arlington (consolidated with another case), the Court limited the grant to the question whether Chevron deference should extend to agency interpretations of ambiguous […]
Ninth Circuit Upholds Sex-Offender Registration as “Necessary and Proper” Under NFIB v. Sebelius
Today the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit rejected a constitutional challenge to federal sex offender registration requirements under SORNA. Specifically,in United States v. Elk Shoulder, the court rejected a claim that the registration requirement was beyond the scope of Congress’s enumerated powers because so long as Congress had the authority to enact […]
Did Elizabeth Warren Engage in the Unauthorized Practice of Law?
Legal Insurrection’s William Jacobson has a series of posts alleging that Harvard law professor and Massachusetts Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren engaged in the unauthorized practice of law. At Legal Ethics Forum, John Steele is not convinced. Given the sorts of legal work that many law professors perform in their “spare” time, the underlying legal issues […]
Insane Clown Posse Sues FBI
The noted “horror core” hip hop duo, Insane Clown Posse, has filed suit against the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The FBI apparently labeled ICP fans, known as “Juggalos,” as a “loosely-organized hybrid gang,” to which ICP has taken offense. ICP tried to get the FBI to explain itself, and filed a FOIA request for information […]
Dispatches from the Duke Conference on “Conservative Visions of Our Environmental Future”
Today I am at Duke to participate in a conference on “Conservative Visions of Our Environmental Future,” sponsored by the Duke Environmental Law and Policy Forum, Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions, Nicholas School for the Environment, Duke Federalist Society, Duke College Republicans and the Energy & Enterprise Initiative. The conference is being live streamed […]
Three States Join Lawsuit Against Title II of Dodd-Frank
By Jonathan H. Adler on September 20, 2012 6:39 pm in Administrative Law, Financial Crisis, Separation of Powers
A news release from the Competitive Enterprise Institute notes that the attorneys general of Michigan, Oklahoma, and South Carolina have joined their lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of portions of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. The original suit challenged several Dodd-Frank provisions, including creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Board. The states’ […]