U.S. Supreme Court (Brandon Bourdages/Shutterstock.com).The Federalist Society’s Chevron Deference Dilemma
Should Federal Courts Defer to Jeff Sessions in Deportation Case?
Immigration and Customs Enforcement building, Washington, D.C. (Mark van Scyoc / Shutterstock.com)Enabling Congress to Control the Administrative State
View of Washington, DC from Washington Monument. Shutterstock.comAdministrative Law, in Full View and Flux
The questions surrounding the administrative state and its law are really big. They are institutional and constitutional, and they demand rigorous thought and engagement outside the Chevron box.
Adrian’s Abnegation
Adrian Vermeule, John H. Watson Professor of Law at Harvard University, is a bold, original, and often brilliant thinker—and at times his own worst enemy. Along with a cornucopia of trenchant insights on (administrative) law, his copious output contains cheap polemics; intemperate attacks on scholars and judges who peddle “libertarian” law; reckless flirtation with proto-fascist legal tropes; and wild theorizing backed by little more than ipse dixit. That latter tendency in particular is on display in Law’s Abnegation: From Law’s Empire to the Administrative State. The book’s principal theme is the perennial tension between the lawful government of “classical” constitutionalism and…
Ten Ways for the Next President to Promote the Rule of Law
After eight years of President Obama’s administration, conservatives are much more likely to see executive power as a threat to the rule of law than a tool in service of it. Indeed, after 16 years of Presidents Bush and Obama, we are all well accustomed to hearing critics comparing modern Presidents to King George III. (They don’t mean it as a compliment.) But it is a mistake to believe that presidential power is inherently and categorically a threat to the rule of law—quite the contrary. While it is true that presidential power unchecked by Congress, the courts, or the states can…
Responses
Adam White’s Liberty Forum essay offers 10 ways for our 45th President to promote the rule of law, many of which I find appealing. But I fear he could offer a thousand such ideas without much effect, and in the end he concedes that he, too, doubts that Presidents will restrain themselves or their governments…
It is very difficult to take issue with the pessimistic tone of Adam White’s sensible advice to the next President on 10 ways to promote the rule of law. All of the topics that he mentions are understood as serious, systemic weaknesses. When it comes to administrative law, President Obama has a penchant for excessive…
I can only applaud the excellent “to do list” in Adam White’s Liberty Forum essay, even as I scan the absentee ballot that I received in September wondering whether any of the leading candidates would have the good sense to give the list the attention it deserves. But we are giving advice here, not forecasting…
When Law and Liberty invited me to write on 10 things that a new president could do to promote the rule of law, I was struck by how counterintuitive the question was. After years upon years of debate over presidents pushing the boundaries of the constitutional powers (and not just during the most recent administration,…
Dear Colleague’s Letter of the Law
Societal attitudes and mores can and do change dramatically over time, but (aside from Humpty Dumpty) the meaning of commonly understood words does not.
Regulatory Dark Matter: A Conversation with Wayne Crews
This interview with Wayne Crews explores the growing lawlessness in the administrative state's exercise of its powers. This regulatory "dark matter" ignores the formal rule-making requirements of the Administrative Procedure Act that mandates publishing a notice of proposed rule-making and allowing public comment. Crews outlines how the agencies of the regulatory state are resorting to the exceptions of using “interpretative rules, general statements of policy, or rules of agency organization, procedure, or practice” to exert authority informally and without accountability.
Net Loss: D.C. Circuit Upholds FCC “Net Neutrality” Rule
In a momentous decision, a panel of the D.C. Circuit (Judges Srinivasan, Tatel, and Williams; opinion by Srinivasan, partial dissent by Williams) has upheld the FCC’s “net neutrality” rule. Henceforth broadband providers will be regulated not as information providers but as a “telecommunications service” under Title II of the Communications Act. Among other things this entails “must carry” obligations and a command that the providers may not charge different rates to different content providers (in regulatory parlance, “paid prioritization”).
- 1
- 2
- 3
- …
- 5
- Next Page »
