tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-58619481666738297292024-03-18T21:44:29.192-04:00OTHERWISE* Blackstonetoday.blogspot.com
COMMENTARY ON LAWYERING, LANGUAGE, AND POLITICSGeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.comBlogger7011125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-53816288068673583132024-03-18T13:12:00.001-04:002024-03-18T13:12:23.535-04:00Supreme Court tries to stem `judge shopping'<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEioqggciRMR_vcmbLfJS1-Pn62B_kGYK0DSv8JeO1_3YbIXYZNhDLKHDwW1zvN7dNHAsDISSIUFCEIFuvv6Hi52dMjIfBavbXw4dMtbHDIZlQ1um4ZAHJr-y8cMGy1k95JnEZGdkeC4v--c2mKjJSYe_eXqbUgMGHQjHQHw5kXl3rB6ybV-iZ-MxKzhP_uW" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="160" data-original-width="314" height="163" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEioqggciRMR_vcmbLfJS1-Pn62B_kGYK0DSv8JeO1_3YbIXYZNhDLKHDwW1zvN7dNHAsDISSIUFCEIFuvv6Hi52dMjIfBavbXw4dMtbHDIZlQ1um4ZAHJr-y8cMGy1k95JnEZGdkeC4v--c2mKjJSYe_eXqbUgMGHQjHQHw5kXl3rB6ybV-iZ-MxKzhP_uW" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">Every lawyer who has a choice tries to find a favorable venue - usually because the ethnic makeup of the potential jury venire matches the intended appeal of the plaintiff. But sometimes judge-shopping looks like the best bet. Sometimes that is an entire Circuit (think 5th now but not in the 1960's).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">But recently in the Mifepristone case now before the Supreme Court the right wing plaintiffs of the so-called <a href="https://blackstonetoday.blogspot.com/search?q=mifepristone" style="color: #2b00fe;" target="_blank">Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine </a>rang the bell with a single judge U.S. District Court venue. Judge Matthew Kaczmaryk, a dedicated anti-abortion activist, is the only one in the Northern District of Texas courthouse.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;">But now in what <span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2024/03/john-roberts-matthew-kacsmaryk-nationwide-injunctions-judge-shopping.html" target="_blank">Dahlia Lithwick and Mark Joseph Stern</a></span> call a victory against "rogue" judges the Supreme Court, via the 26 member <span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://www.uscourts.gov/about-federal-courts/governance-judicial-conference/about-judicial-conference" target="_blank">Judicial Conference of the United States </a></span>has issued a <b><span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://aboutblaw.com/bdc9?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email" target="_blank">Guidance for Civil Case Assignments in District Courts</a></span></b> to require the <span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://www.uscourts.gov/news/2024/03/12/conference-acts-promote-random-case-assignment?utm_campaign=usc-news&utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery" target="_blank">random assignment of judges</a></span>.</span></p>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-31956251596265180432024-03-18T12:41:00.001-04:002024-03-18T12:41:20.843-04:00The Fani Willis disqualification ruling: Creating an Appearance of Impropriety by Purporting to Dispel One <b>The Atlanta Georgia D.A. Fani Willis disqualification ruling</b><br /><div><b><span style="font-family: georgia;"> </span><a href="https://draft.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/5861948166673829729/7392255459197046#" style="background-color: white; font-family: georgia; font-size: 22px;" target="_blank">Creating an Appearance of Impropriety by Purporting to Dispel One - Dorf on Law</a></b><div><div class="post-share-buttons post-share-buttons-top" style="background-color: white; float: right; font-size: 15px; margin-left: 0px; position: relative;"><div class="byline post-share-buttons goog-inline-block" style="display: inline-block; line-height: 24px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; position: relative; vertical-align: top; width: 23.9987px;"><div aria-owns="sharing-popup-Blog1-byline-4390474614654097093" class="sharing" data-title="Creating an Appearance of Impropriety by Purporting to Dispel One" style="float: right;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><button aria-controls="sharing-popup-Blog1-byline-4390474614654097093" aria-expanded="false" aria-haspopup="true" aria-label="Share" class="sharing-button touch-icon-button" id="sharing-button-Blog1-byline-4390474614654097093" role="button" style="appearance: button; background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: 0px 0px; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border-color: initial; border-style: initial; border-width: 0px; cursor: pointer; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; overflow: visible; padding: 0px;"><div class="flat-icon-button ripple" style="background: 0px 0px; border-radius: 50%; border: 0px; box-sizing: content-box; cursor: pointer; display: inline-block; line-height: 0; margin: -12px; outline: 0px; padding: 12px; position: relative;"><svg class="svg-icon-24"><use xlink:href="/responsive/sprite_v1_6.css.svg#ic_share_black_24dp" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"></use></svg></div></button><div class="share-buttons-container"></div></span></div></div></div><div class="post-header" style="background-color: white; clear: left; font-size: 15px; margin: 0px; width: inherit;"><div class="post-header-line-1"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span class="byline post-author vcard" style="display: inline-block; line-height: 24px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 8px; vertical-align: top;"><span class="post-author-label">By </span><span class="fn"><a class="g-profile" href="https://www.blogger.com/profile/02021009233932690926" rel="author" style="background: transparent; color: #f32c1d; text-decoration-line: none;" title="author profile">Michael C. Dorf</a></span></span> <span class="byline post-timestamp" style="display: inline-block; line-height: 24px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 8px; vertical-align: top;">- <a class="timestamp-link" href="https://www.dorfonlaw.org/2024/03/creating-appearance-of-impropriety-by.html" rel="bookmark" style="background: transparent; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; text-decoration: inherit;" title="permanent link">March 18, 2024</a></span></span></div></div><div class="post-body entry-content float-container" id="post-body-4390474614654097093" style="background-color: white; font-feature-settings: normal; font-kerning: auto; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-size: 15px; font-stretch: normal; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variation-settings: normal; line-height: 1.6em; margin: 1.5em 0px 2em;"><p style="color: #727272;"><br /></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">The key point in </span><a href="https://static01.nyt.com/newsgraphics/documenttools/41940dd55b533f11/20adae2b-full.pdf" style="background: transparent; color: #f32c1d; font-family: georgia; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Judge McAfee's ruling</a><span style="font-family: georgia;"> on the motion to disqualify Fani Willis and Nathan Wade from the Georgia state court case against Donald Trump and his co-defendants is that the defendants were not in any way prejudiced by Willis's romantic relationship with Wade. I'm glad Judge McAfee reached that conclusion, but he nonetheless deserves fairly withering criticism on at least two grounds.</span></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">First, in light of his reasoning, Judge McAfee should not have held the distracting and time-wasting evidentiary hearing at all. Second, his conclusion that the Willis/Wade relationship created the appearance of impropriety was a <i>non sequitur </i>in light of his principal conclusion. Worse, that very conclusion itself creates a substantially greater appearance of impropriety than anything that Willis or Wade did.</span></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">Let's begin with a brief synopsis. Everyone paying the slightest bit of attention understands that the real motive for the defendants' motion to disqualify Willis and Wade was to derail the prosecution. The ostensible legal argument, however, alleged a conflict of interest. Willis hired Wade as a Special Assistant District Attorney, the allegations go, in order that Wade could get paid by the state, and he in turn would use the money he received to pay for vacation travel for himself and Willis; that alleged fact in turn gave Willis a financial stake in Wade continuing in his role, which in turn gave her a financial stake in the prosecution continuing. But a prosecutor ought to decide whether to keep a case going against defendants based on the law and facts, not a financial stake in the case. Thus, the argument concluded, so long as Wade was on the payroll and her boyfriend, Willis had an improper financial incentive.</span></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">Those allegations <i>could in theory </i>establish an improper financial incentive. In <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/481/787/" style="background: transparent; color: #f32c1d; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank"><i>Young v. United States ex rel. Vuitton et fils</i> </a>(1987), SCOTUS held that it was improper to appoint an interested opposing party in ongoing civil litigation as the prosecutor of a criminal contempt arising out of that matter. To be sure, there the conflict was not simply financial, but one can certainly imagine that even a purely financial incentive would distort prosecutorial judgment. And Georgia is entitled to have stricter conflict-avoidance rules than the federal courts or various other states.</span></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">But that's all in theory. What about in fact?</span></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">As Judge McAfee acknowledges, "[w]henever a private attorney -- like Wade -- is paid by the billable hour, a motive exists to extend or prolong the assignment." Judge McAfee quickly dismisses that "tension" as one "that the legal profession has long accepted." If that's so, however, then it's hard to see how any of the defendants' allegations could have arisen to the level of a disqualifying interest.</span></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">The defendants claim that Wade shared the money he received for his services with Willis by paying her portion of vacation expenses along with his. Willis pushed back hard, claiming she reimbursed Willis in cash. Even if that's not true, however, Willis would have received at most the same financial benefit as Wade could (if we assume that Wade would have paid for his portion of the vacation expenses out of separate funds and used all of what he received as a Special ADA to subsidize Willis). But if the size of the financial incentive Wade received was tolerable--indeed, "long accepted"--it's hard to see why shifting that incentive from one prosecutor (Wade) to another (Willis) creates a problematic conflict of interest.</span></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">Moreover, any financial incentive Wade and/or Willis had to prolong Wade's work on the case actually works <i>to the benefit of the defendants </i>because prolonging--i.e., dragging out and delaying--the case is exactly what they want. The closer the trial moves to the November election, the easier it becomes for Trump and all of his co-defendants to find at least one juror to resist voting to convict on the ground that the case is politically motivated.</span></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">In any event, as Judge McAfee acknowledges in his opinion, no improper incentive Willis had to drag the case out to funnel money to Wade influenced Willis. It's worth quoting Judge McAfee nearly in full (minus citations) on this point:</span></p><p style="color: #727272;"></p><blockquote style="font-feature-settings: normal; font-kerning: auto; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-size: 12px; font-stretch: normal; font-style: italic; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variation-settings: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">Defendants argue that the financial arrangement created an incentive to prolong the case, but in fact, there is no indication the District Attorney is interested in delaying anything. Indeed, the record is quite to the contrary. Before the relationship came to light, the State requested that trial begin less than six months after indictment. Soon thereafter, the State opposed severance of the objecting defendants who did not demand their statutory right to a speedy trial. . . . The State amended its proposed timeline in November 2023 to request that the trial commence less than one year after the return of the indictment. And even before indictment, the District Attorney approved a Grand Jury presentment that included fewer defendants than the Special Purpose Grand Jury recommended. In sum, the District Attorney has not in any way acted in conformance with the theory that she arranged a financial scheme to enrich herself (or endear herself to Wade) by extending the duration of this prosecution or engaging in excessive litigation.</span></blockquote><p style="color: #727272;"></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">Crucially, every indication that Willis was unaffected by any financial incentive running through Wade identified in that extremely persuasive paragraph was known <i>before and without </i>holding an evidentiary hearing. Thus, Judge McAfee's reasoning demonstrates that there was no reason to hold the evidentiary hearing. He could and should have simply denied the defendant's motions on the ground that there was no prejudice to them from anything they alleged (and indeed that their allegations, if true, would <i>benefit </i>them) while referring their allegations to the Georgia bar to investigate any impropriety.</span></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">Given the absence of any prejudicial conflict, why did Judge McAfee require either Willis or Wade to leave the case in order for it to proceed? He found an appearance of impropriety largely based on the dubious testimony of various witnesses about when Wade and Willis started dating. Here is how he put the point: "neither side was able to conclusively establish by a preponderance of the evidence when the relationship evolved into a romantic one. However, an odor of mendacity remains."</span></p><p style="color: #727272;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">Okay, so Wade, Willis, and/or other witnesses may have lied under oath. If so, that's bad and another item for possible referral to the Georgia bar. But <i>it has nothing to do with anything that could possibly prejudice the defendants</i>.</span></p><p><span style="color: #2b00fe; font-family: georgia;"><a href="https://www.dorfonlaw.org/2024/03/creating-appearance-of-impropriety-by.html?fbclid=IwAR0uG2PYPVyeIOXeRDrSBpwKC4b1I--t6uQHBpnrkKy_V2ilBGVjw4ysmHY_aem_AfA_t2uPaOgU14e_Z0lEMck3YspcW3tkpH8NJ0QqDdopyQ0NaBzVh2UdSrHrxLsfr2k&m=1&mibextid=Zxz2cZ" target="_blank">KEEP READING</a></span></p></div></div></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-89995108044905434242024-03-18T12:07:00.002-04:002024-03-18T21:43:18.998-04:00Christian Supremacy - book launch - Magda Teter<p> <b><span><a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691242583/christian-supremacy" target="_blank"><span>Christian Supremacy - Reckoning with the Roots of Antisemitism and Racism</span></a> </span>by Magda Teter </b><b>[Princeton University Press] </b></p><p><span>Reconciliation - a Christian sacrament - requires both thea sincere contrition and a sincere desire to reform. But contrition requires understanding. We have seen a recent example of that in the </span><span><a href="https://blackstonetoday.blogspot.com/2015/09/doctrine-of-discovery-scandal-in-plain.html" target="_blank">too long delayed</a></span><span> "architecture of reconciliation" recently undertaken by the Vatican regarding the Church's mistreatment of indigenous peoples in Canada. The penitential visit of Pope Francis was accompanied by </span><span><a href="https://blackstonetoday.blogspot.com/2023/08/joint-statement-of-dicasteries-for.html" target="_blank">formal renunciation of the Doctrine of Discovery</a>. </span></p><p><span>Another aspect of reconciliation is recognition. <span><b><a href="https://blackstonetoday.blogspot.com/2023/08/the-272-david-blight-reviews.html" target="_blank">Rachel Swarns' The 272</a></b></span> is a history and reflection on the 1838 sale of enslaved persons by Maryland's Jesuits to, among other things, shore up the finances of Georgetown college.</span></p><p><span>Magda Teter, a Fordham historian, does a deep dive into the origins of Christian Supremacy and its intertwined history of anti-semitism and racism. </span></p><p><span>The session below is a book launch event at Fordham, New York's Jesuit University, where Teter is <span>T</span><span><span>he Shvidler Chair in Judaic Studies.</span></span></span></p><p><span><span><span>- GWC</span></span></span></p><p></p>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-48706904858981940342024-03-18T10:37:00.002-04:002024-03-18T10:38:10.074-04:00Justice Breyer, in new book, criticizes Court's direction//New York Times Justice Breyer, Off the Bench, Sounds an Alarm Over the Supreme Court’s Direction <div>https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/18/us/breyer-supreme-court-interview.html?smid=nytcore-android-share<div>By<span style="letter-spacing: 0.2px;"> Adam Liptak</span></div><div><span style="color: var(--color-content-secondary,#363636); font-size: 1.125rem; font-style: inherit; font-variant-ligatures: inherit; font-variant-caps: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-family: nyt-imperial, georgia, "times new roman", times, serif; letter-spacing: normal;">There are three large problems with originalism, retired Justice Stephen Breyer wrote in his forthcoming book:</span></div><div><div class="css-k964ob" style="margin: 0px auto; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-alternates: inherit; font-variant-position: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; line-height: inherit; font-family: nyt-imperial, georgia, "times new roman", times, serif; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: calc(100% - 40px); max-width: 600px; color: rgb(18, 18, 18); letter-spacing: normal;"><p class="css-1il0jfh evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.78125rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 1.125rem; line-height: 1.5625rem; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; overflow-wrap: break-word; color: var(--color-content-secondary,#363636);">“First, it requires judges to be historians — a role for which they may not be qualified — constantly searching historical sources for the ‘answer’ where there often isn’t one there,” he wrote. “Second, it leaves no room for judges to consider the practical consequences of the constitutional rules they propound. And third, it does not take into account the ways in which our values as a society evolve over time as we learn from the mistakes of our past.”</p></div><div class="css-k964ob" style="margin: 0px auto; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-alternates: inherit; font-variant-position: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 16px; line-height: inherit; font-family: nyt-imperial, georgia, "times new roman", times, serif; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: calc(100% - 40px); max-width: 600px; color: rgb(18, 18, 18); letter-spacing: normal;"><p class="css-1il0jfh evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.78125rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-size: 1.125rem; line-height: 1.5625rem; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; overflow-wrap: break-word; color: var(--color-content-secondary,#363636);">Justice Breyer did not accuse the justices who use those methods of being political in the partisan sense or of acting in bad faith. But he said their approach represented an abdication of the judicial role, one in which they ought to consider a problem from every angle.</p></div></div></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-71016032442697717112024-03-16T00:17:00.001-04:002024-03-16T00:17:18.922-04:00Georgia D.A. can continue Trump prosecution but special counsel must step down<p></p><blockquote><p><i><b><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">[A]n advocate, in the discharge of his duty, knows but one person in all
the world, and that person is his client. To save that client by all means
and expedients, and at all hazards and costs to other persons, and,
amongst them, to himself, is his first and only duty; and in performing
this duty he must not regard the alarm, the torments, the destruction
which he may bring upon others. Separating the duty of a patriot from
that of an advocate, he must go on reckless of the consequences, though
it should be his unhappy fate to involve his country in confusion. </span></b></i></p><p><i><b><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"> Lord Brougham - in defending Queen Caroline at her trial in the House of Lords, 1821</span></b></i></p></blockquote><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"> Zeal is an accepted element of advocacy for lawyers, an aspect of client loyalty. The late ethicist <a href="https://scholarlycommons.law.hofstra.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1293&context=faculty_scholarship" target="_blank">Monroe Freedman has written</a> that <span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #202124;">Lord Brougham set the standard of lawyerly excellence. But that is the world of private advocacy. We hold public lawyers - particularly prosecutors to a different standard. They are to seek justice, not victory. As the United States Department of Justice </span><span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://www.justice.gov/jm/jm-9-27000-principles-federal-prosecution" target="_blank">Principles of Federal Prosecution</a></span><span style="color: #202124;"> directs its lawyers and Agents to remember </span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><span style="background-color: white;"></span></span></p><blockquote style="color: #444444;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">the basic responsibilities of federal attorneys: making certain that the general purposes of the criminal law—assurance of warranted punishment, deterrence of further criminal conduct, protection of the public from offenders, and rehabilitation of offenders—are adequately met, while making certain also that the rights of individuals are scrupulously protected.</span></blockquote><p style="color: #444444;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The ethic of prosecutors thus understood demands loyalty only to the truth, the public interest and the rectification of errors, as seen in ABA MRPC 3.8 Special Responsibilities of a Prosecutor. In Georgia recently lawyers for Donald j.Trump, a defendant in a criminal case, moved to disqualify the Atlanta, Georgia District Attorney alleging that the elected District Attorney Fani Willis financially benefited from her personal relationship with Nathan Wade - whom she hired.</span></p><p style="color: #444444;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The issue of "appearance of impropriety: is explained this way by Judge McAfee:</span></p><p style="color: #444444;"></p><blockquote><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">reasonable questions about whether the District Attorney and her hand-selected
lead SADA Special Assistant District Attorney testified untruthfully about thet iming of their relationship further underpin the finding
of an appearance of impropriety and the need to make proportional efforts to correct reptational and other damage..</span></blockquote><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><span style="color: #444444;">Judge Scott McAfee, of Superior Court in Atlanta in a </span><span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://static01.nyt.com/newsgraphics/documenttools/41940dd55b533f11/20adae2b-full.pdf" target="_blank">28 page opinion</a></span><span style="color: #444444;"> found that the appearance of impropriety </span><span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://www.americanbar.org/groups/professional_responsibility/publications/model_code_of_judicial_conduct/mcjc_canon_1/rule1_2promotingconfidenceinthejudiciary/commentonrule1_2/" target="_blank">RPC 1.2 Comments </a></span><span style="color: #444444;">compelled one of the lawyers to withdraw. It was Wade who was fulsomely praised by D.A. Willis in a letter accepting his resignation.</span></span></p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #202124;">:</span></span></span><p></p><p><span style="color: #202124; font-family: Google Sans, Roboto, arial, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 20px;"><br /></span></span></p>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-45516937372428606442024-03-15T12:44:00.006-04:002024-03-18T21:43:57.131-04:00New Jersey Certified specialist lawyers may not pay out of state lawyers -ACPE Opinion 745 Referral Fees<a href="https://www.njcourts.gov/sites/default/files/notices/2024/03/ACPEOpinion745Referral%20Fees.pdf">Advisory Committee on Professional Ethics ACPE Opinion 745 Referral Fees</a>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-57279754357606595782024-03-13T01:21:00.009-04:002024-03-13T01:24:09.052-04:00trump-notice-re-advice-of-counsel-defense.pdf<div>In the upcoming New York trial of Donald J. Trump for covering up his payoffs to the stripper known as Stormy Daniels ha apparently intends to say that since lawyers were doing his bidding he had a right The acute legal analyst, experienced prosecutor <a class="css-175oi2r r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs r-1ny4l3l r-1loqt21" href="https://twitter.com/alegalnerd" role="link" style="align-items: stretch; border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 1; font-size: 15px; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; outline-style: none; padding: 0px; position: relative; text-decoration-line: none; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1awozwy r-18u37iz r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs" style="align-items: center; border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: inline !important; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-1rynq56 r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-37j5jr r-a023e6 r-rjixqe r-b88u0q r-1awozwy r-6koalj r-1udh08x r-3s2u2q" dir="ltr" style="align-items: center; border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0f1419; display: inline !important; font-family: TwitterChirp, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", Roboto, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-feature-settings: normal; font-kerning: auto; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-stretch: normal; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variation-settings: normal; font-weight: 700; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset; text-wrap: nowrap;"><span class="css-1qaijid r-dnmrzs r-1udh08x r-3s2u2q r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-poiln3" style="border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit; display: inline !important; font: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset;"><span class="css-1qaijid r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-poiln3" style="border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit; display: inline; font: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset; white-space: inherit;">legalnerd</span></span></div></div></a> has posted this:</div><div class="css-175oi2r r-zl2h9q" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.03); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 0; font-size: 15px; list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 2px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-k4xj1c r-18u37iz r-1wtj0ep" style="align-items: start; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 0; justify-content: space-between; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1d09ksm r-18u37iz r-1wbh5a2" style="align-items: baseline; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs r-1ny4l3l" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; outline-style: none; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs r-1ny4l3l r-1awozwy r-18u37iz" data-testid="User-Name" id="id__dbwhobhlwz5" style="align-items: center; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; outline-style: none; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1awozwy r-18u37iz r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs" style="align-items: center; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><a class="css-175oi2r r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs r-1ny4l3l r-1loqt21" href="https://twitter.com/alegalnerd" role="link" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; outline-style: none; padding: 0px; position: relative; text-decoration-line: none; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1awozwy r-18u37iz r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs" style="align-items: center; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-1rynq56 r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-37j5jr r-a023e6 r-rjixqe r-16dba41 r-xoduu5 r-18u37iz r-1q142lx" dir="ltr" style="background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0f1419; display: inline-flex; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 0; font-family: TwitterChirp, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", Roboto, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-feature-settings: normal; font-kerning: auto; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-stretch: normal; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variation-settings: normal; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><span class="css-1qaijid r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-poiln3 r-1awozwy r-xoduu5" style="align-items: center; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit; display: inline-flex; font: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset; white-space: inherit;"></span></div></div></a></div></div><div class="css-175oi2r r-18u37iz r-1wbh5a2 r-13hce6t" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 4px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1d09ksm r-18u37iz r-1wbh5a2" style="align-items: baseline; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><a class="css-175oi2r r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs r-1ny4l3l r-1loqt21" href="https://twitter.com/alegalnerd" role="link" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; outline-style: none; padding: 0px; position: relative; text-decoration-line: none; z-index: 0;" tabindex="-1"><div class="css-1rynq56 r-dnmrzs r-1udh08x r-3s2u2q r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-37j5jr r-a023e6 r-rjixqe r-16dba41 r-18u37iz r-1wvb978" dir="ltr" style="background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: #536471; display: inline; flex-direction: row; font-family: TwitterChirp, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", Roboto, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-feature-settings: "ss01"; font-kerning: auto; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-stretch: normal; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variation-settings: normal; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset; text-wrap: nowrap;"><span class="css-1qaijid r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-poiln3" style="background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit; display: inline; font: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset; white-space: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div class="css-1rynq56 r-dnmrzs r-1udh08x r-3s2u2q r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-37j5jr r-a023e6 r-rjixqe r-16dba41 r-18u37iz r-1wvb978" dir="ltr" style="background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: #536471; display: inline; flex-direction: row; font-family: TwitterChirp, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", Roboto, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-feature-settings: "ss01"; font-kerning: auto; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-stretch: normal; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variation-settings: normal; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset; text-wrap: nowrap;"><span class="css-1qaijid r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-poiln3" style="background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit; display: inline; font: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset; white-space: inherit;"></span></div></a></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><blockquote><div class="css-175oi2r r-zl2h9q" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.03); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 0; font-size: 15px; list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 2px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-k4xj1c r-18u37iz r-1wtj0ep" style="align-items: start; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 0; justify-content: space-between; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1d09ksm r-18u37iz r-1wbh5a2" style="align-items: baseline; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs r-1ny4l3l" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; outline-style: none; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs r-1ny4l3l r-1awozwy r-18u37iz" data-testid="User-Name" id="id__dbwhobhlwz5" style="align-items: center; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; outline-style: none; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-18u37iz r-1wbh5a2 r-13hce6t" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 4px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1d09ksm r-18u37iz r-1wbh5a2" style="align-items: baseline; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><a class="css-175oi2r r-1wbh5a2 r-dnmrzs r-1ny4l3l r-1loqt21" href="https://twitter.com/alegalnerd" role="link" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 1; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; outline-style: none; padding: 0px; position: relative; text-decoration-line: none; z-index: 0;" tabindex="-1"><div class="css-1rynq56 r-dnmrzs r-1udh08x r-3s2u2q r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-37j5jr r-a023e6 r-rjixqe r-16dba41 r-18u37iz r-1wvb978" dir="ltr" style="background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: #536471; display: inline; flex-direction: row; font-family: TwitterChirp, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", Roboto, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-feature-settings: "ss01"; font-kerning: auto; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-stretch: normal; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variation-settings: normal; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset; text-wrap: nowrap;"><span class="css-1qaijid r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-poiln3" style="background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit; display: inline; font: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset; white-space: inherit;">@alegalnerd</span></div></a></div><div aria-hidden="true" class="css-1rynq56 r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-37j5jr r-a023e6 r-rjixqe r-16dba41 r-1q142lx r-s1qlax" dir="ltr" style="background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: #536471; display: inline; flex-shrink: 0; font-family: TwitterChirp, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", Roboto, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-feature-settings: normal; font-kerning: auto; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-stretch: normal; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variation-settings: normal; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px 4px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><span class="css-1qaijid r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-poiln3" style="background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit; display: inline; font: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset; white-space: inherit;">·</span></div><div class="css-175oi2r r-18u37iz r-1q142lx" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 0; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><a aria-label="8 hours ago" class="css-1rynq56 r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-37j5jr r-a023e6 r-rjixqe r-16dba41 r-xoduu5 r-1q142lx r-1w6e6rj r-9aw3ui r-3s2u2q r-1loqt21" dir="ltr" href="https://twitter.com/alegalnerd/status/1767651537684480207" role="link" style="background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: #536471; cursor: pointer; display: inline-flex; flex-shrink: 0; flex-wrap: wrap; font-family: TwitterChirp, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", Roboto, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-feature-settings: normal; font-kerning: auto; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-stretch: normal; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variation-settings: normal; gap: 4px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-decoration-line: none; text-overflow: unset; text-wrap: nowrap;"><time datetime="2024-03-12T20:39:02.000Z">8h</time></a></div></div></div></div></div></div><div class="css-175oi2r r-1jkjb" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 0; list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 8px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1awozwy r-18u37iz r-1cmwbt1 r-1wtj0ep" style="align-items: center; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 0; gap: 8px; justify-content: space-between; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-1awozwy r-6koalj r-18u37iz" style="align-items: center; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 0; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 0; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-18u37iz r-1h0z5md" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: row; flex-shrink: 0; justify-content: flex-start; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div aria-expanded="false" aria-haspopup="menu" aria-label="More" class="css-175oi2r r-1777fci r-bt1l66 r-bztko3 r-lrvibr r-1loqt21 r-1ny4l3l" data-testid="caret" role="button" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer; display: flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 0; justify-content: center; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-height: 20px; min-width: 0px; outline-style: none; overflow: visible; padding: 0px; position: relative; user-select: none; z-index: 0;" tabindex="0"><div class="css-1rynq56 r-bcqeeo r-qvutc0 r-37j5jr r-a023e6 r-rjixqe r-16dba41 r-1awozwy r-6koalj r-1h0z5md r-o7ynqc r-clp7b1 r-3s2u2q" dir="ltr" style="align-items: center; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; color: #536471; display: flex; font-family: TwitterChirp, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", Roboto, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-feature-settings: normal; font-kerning: auto; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-stretch: normal; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variation-settings: normal; justify-content: flex-start; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-overflow: unset; text-wrap: nowrap; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: color;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-xoduu5" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: inline-flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 0; list-style: none; margin: 0px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="css-175oi2r r-xoduu5 r-1p0dtai r-1d2f490 r-u8s1d r-zchlnj r-ipm5af r-1niwhzg r-sdzlij r-xf4iuw r-o7ynqc r-6416eg r-1ny4l3l" style="align-items: stretch; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); border-radius: 9999px; border: 0px solid black; box-sizing: border-box; display: inline-flex; flex-basis: auto; flex-direction: column; flex-shrink: 0; inset: 0px; list-style: none; margin: -8px; min-height: 0px; min-width: 0px; outline-style: none; padding: 0px; position: absolute; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, box-shadow; z-index: 0;"></div><svg aria-hidden="true" class="r-4qtqp9 r-yyyyoo r-dnmrzs r-bnwqim r-1plcrui r-lrvibr r-1xvli5t r-1hdv0qi" viewbox="0 0 24 24"><g><path d="M3 12c0-1.1.9-2 2-2s2 .9 2 2-.9 2-2 2-2-.9-2-2zm9 2c1.1 0 2-.9 2-2s-.9-2-2-2-2 .9-2 2 .9 2 2 2zm7 0c1.1 0 2-.9 2-2s-.9-2-2-2-2 .9-2 2 .9 2 2 2z"></path></g></svg></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><div><span style="color: inherit; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant-caps: inherit; font-variant-ligatures: inherit; font-weight: inherit; text-align: inherit; white-space: inherit;">At some point, if Trump wants to present evidence in an attempt to negate the intent to defraud or intent to commit/conceal another crime element of the 175.10 felony counts, he must divulge that evidence so that Judge Merchan can decide if it is admissible.</span>to assume the conduct was lawful, given lawyers' professional duty to adhere to the law. </div><div></div></blockquote><div><br /></div><div>- GWC</div><a href="https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/24478394/trump-notice-re-advice-of-counsel-defense.pdf"><b>trump-notice-re-advice-of-counsel-defense.pdf</b></a><div><br /></div><div>SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK
COUNTY OF NEW YORK
THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK,
- against -
DONALD J. TRUMP,
Defendant.
Index No. 71543-23
<b>PRESIDENT DONALD J.
TRUMP’S NOTICE
CONCERNING HIS INTENT
TO RELY ON AN ADVICE-OFCOUNSEL DEFENSE</b><br /><div>President Donald J. Trump respectfully submits notice concerning his intent to rely on the
defense of advice-of-counsel at trial (this “Notice”), as ordered by the Court on February 7, 2024.1
At the outset, we emphasize that there is a marked difference between the commonly
referred to “advice-of-counsel” defense and the defense that President Trump expects to raise at
trial—part of which will be that President Trump lacked the requisite intent to commit the conduct
charged in the Indictment because of his awareness that various lawyers were involved in the
underlying conduct giving rise to the charges. </div><div><br /></div><div>As Judge Kaplan recently stated, “evidence
concerning the presence, involvement and even advice of lawyers in relevant events is viewed best
as evidence probative of the defendant’s intent to defraud or lack thereof.” United States v.
Bankman-Fried, 2023 WL 6392718, at *1 (S.D.N.Y. Oct. 1, 2023); see also United States v. Scully,
877 F.3d 464, 476 (2d Cir. 2017) (“[T]he claimed advice of counsel is evidence that, if believed,
1 </div><div><br /></div><div>The Court’s February 7, 2024 decision ordered President Trump to provide “notice and disclosure
of his intent to rely on the defense of advice-of-counsel by March 11, 2024, and to produce all
discoverable statements and communications within his possession or control by the same date.”
2/7/2024 Decision at 6.
-2-
can raise a reasonable doubt in the minds of the jurors about whether the government has proved
the required element of the offense that the defendant had an ‘unlawful intent.’”). </div><div><br /></div><div>President Trump
intends to elicit these facts from witnesses, including former AMI executives and Michael Cohen,
whom we expect will testify about <b>President Trump’s awareness of counsel’s involvement in the
charged conduct</b>.2
<b>This is not a formal advice-of-counsel defense.</b></div></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-18205999888071828552024-03-12T00:14:00.001-04:002024-03-12T00:14:31.599-04:00Competing Paternalisms: Robert George v. Adrian Vermeule and the Post-Dobbs Battle for Guiding Anti-Abortion Jurisprudence: Journal of Women, Politics & Policy: Vol 0, No 0<a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1554477X.2024.2300521">Competing Paternalisms: Robert George v. Adrian Vermeule and the Post-Dobbs Battle for Guiding Anti-Abortion Jurisprudence: Journal of Women, Politics & Policy: Vol 0, No 0</a>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-88192563239924168162024-03-11T11:12:00.000-04:002024-03-11T11:12:27.869-04:00Deeds, once denying Black people homes, now help validate reparations<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg-3pZs8DM-t7hpfUI4YAAN6vLTsjQGwVNFiLkOi7HRbNRDmws83WKFGB6PM1QrAIyEnWA24f1pm8ZMaM7aYRJz4USMWTg-vvqMr2-KA4KN86gBvnhgkTg9Ep5uHJ2wm312i23yQEqEQhoB5DY9MtaFrUjwFZztolF7Xm_U-Or4x3ILGydafgz2orjlVrpq" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="960" data-original-width="1440" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg-3pZs8DM-t7hpfUI4YAAN6vLTsjQGwVNFiLkOi7HRbNRDmws83WKFGB6PM1QrAIyEnWA24f1pm8ZMaM7aYRJz4USMWTg-vvqMr2-KA4KN86gBvnhgkTg9Ep5uHJ2wm312i23yQEqEQhoB5DY9MtaFrUjwFZztolF7Xm_U-Or4x3ILGydafgz2orjlVrpq" width="320" /></a></div><br /><br /></div><a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/2024/03/11/metro/restrictive-covenants-in-deeds-could-validate-reparations-programs/?s_campaign=breakingnews:newsletter">Deeds, once denying Black people homes, now help validate reparations</a><div>By Milton J. Valencia</div><div><p class="paragraph | width_max_1080 railless gutter_20_0" style="font-family: Georgia, Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: 1.8; margin: 20px auto; max-width: 50%;"><span class="dropcap | font_secondary margin_top padding_right_16 float_left uppercase" style="float: left; font-family: Miller, Georgia, Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 5em; line-height: 0.9em; margin-top: 8px; padding-right: 16px; text-transform: uppercase;"><span class="html-render">T</span></span><span class="html-render">he modest Cape-style homes on<b> </b>a side street in Beverly are the kind of starter homes with manicured lawns that could accommodate young families looking to settle down in a seaside community rich with New England history. But deep in their foundation, there remains a chilling vestige of America’s racist past that, if not legal today, still lives on in government property records.</span></p><p class="paragraph | gutter_20_0 railless margin_horizontal_10 width_max_1080" style="font-family: Georgia, Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: 1.8; margin: 20px auto; max-width: 50%;"><span class="html-render">They are deed restrictions, racial covenants that for decades were used to keep Black and Hispanic households, sometimes Jewish or other ethnicities such as Armenians, from living there. A recent research project found hundreds of examples of them in the Southern Essex Registry of Deeds in Salem. They contain language that, for example, prohibited the properties from being sold or conveyed to, or even occupied by, “no person of other than the Caucasian race.”</span></p><p class="paragraph | gutter_20_0 railless margin_horizontal_10 width_max_1080" style="font-family: Georgia, Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: 1.8; margin: 20px auto; max-width: 50%;"><span class="html-render">Such covenants were discontinued in the 1960s, and the language that remains in deeds today is legally void. Nonetheless, the racist practice has left a lasting imprint, playing a large part in why so much of the state is segregated along racial lines, with economic disparities that still resonate.</span></p><p class="paragraph | gutter_20_0 railless margin_horizontal_10 width_max_1080" style="font-family: Georgia, Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: 1.8; margin: 20px auto; max-width: 50%;"><span class="html-render">Now, housing and civil rights advocates say, the covenants and similar policies that historically discriminated against certain groups of people can be turned on their ear, and used as a tool to close a wealth gap drawn along those same racial lines. Advocates are increasingly citing the existence of these covenants, for instance, as <a class="" href="https://spcptoolkit.com/" style="border-bottom: 2px solid; color: #005dc7; font-size: inherit; letter-spacing: 0.5px; text-decoration-line: none; z-index: 1;" target="_blank">legal and political justification</a> as they push banks to create more specialized loans with better interest rates specifically for people of color to buy their first home, or for start-up grants solely for Black and Latino entrepreneurs<a class="" href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/2023/03/09/business/new-eastern-bank-program-aims-boost-underrepresented-business-owners/?p1=Article_Inline_Text_Link" style="border-bottom: 2px solid; color: #005dc7; font-size: inherit; letter-spacing: 0.5px; text-decoration-line: none; z-index: 1;" target="_blank"> looking to open a business</a>.</span></p><p class="paragraph | gutter_20_0 railless margin_horizontal_10 width_max_1080" style="font-family: Georgia, Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: 1.8; margin: 20px auto; max-width: 50%;"><span class="html-render">Racial groups or geographic areas that could show they have suffered from a pattern of racist policies, such as the use of covenants, would qualify under what are known as special purpose credit programs.</span></p></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-70311502867577289232024-03-09T23:36:00.004-05:002024-03-09T23:36:47.413-05:00The Meaning of Corruption: What White Collar Defense Attorneys Can Take Away from January 6 Capitol Riot Cases (and Potentially from the Prosecution of Donald Trump) | Zuckerman Spaeder LLP - JDSupra<a href="https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/the-meaning-of-corruption-what-white-4412452/"><b><span style="font-size: large;">The Meaning of Corruption: What White Collar Defense Attorneys Can Take Away from January 6 Capitol Riot Cases (and Potentially from the Prosecution of Donald Trump) | Zuckerman Spaeder LLP - JDSupra</span></b></a><div><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #292929; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; letter-spacing: 0.2px; line-height: 1.618em !important; margin-bottom: 1em !important; margin-top: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word;">Many of the rioters have been charged with (and convicted of) violating 18 U.S.C. § 1512(c)(2): “[w]hoever corruptly . . . obstructs influences, or impedes any official proceeding, or attempts to do so, shall be fined . . . or imprisoned . . . .” The theory is that the January 6 rioters sought to obstruct Congress’s certification of the 2020 election results. The federal courts in D.C. have spent the last two years adjudicating defendants’ challenges to various elements of this statute. Among the issues courts have had to face are defendant arguments that they did not act with the requisite “corrupt” <em>mens rea</em> and that “corruptly” is unconstitutionally vague. And litigation around the meaning of “corruptly” shows no signs of letting up: in Count Three of his January 6-related federal indictment, Donald Trump stands charged with corruptly obstructing the electoral vote certification in violation of § 1512(c)(2). Indictment, <em>United States v. Donald J. Trump</em>, No. 23-cr-00257 (D.D.C. Aug.1, 2023).</p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #292929; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; letter-spacing: 0.2px; line-height: 1.618em !important; margin-bottom: 1em !important; margin-top: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word;">As discussed below, January 6 cases have exposed a significant lack of clarity around the meaning of “corruptly.” Why should white collar defense lawyers care? For one thing, they might find themselves in the position of representing a defendant charged with acting “corruptly” under § 1512(c)(2). Before its time in the spotlight for its use in January 6 cases (including Mr. Trump’s), § 1512(c)(2) figured prominently in white collar cases, such as the prosecution of a lobbyist involved in the Jack Abramoff scandal for allegedly causing the submission of misleading information to a Senate committee and a grand jury. <em>United States v. Ring</em>, 628 F. Supp. 2d 195, 204 (D.D.C. 2009). For another, the statutory language of a “corrupt[]” <em>mens rea</em> is not limited to § 1512(c)(2). Far from it: “there are around 50 other references to ‘corruptly’ in Title 18 of the U.S. Code.” <em>United States v. Fischer</em>, 64 F.4th 329, 341 (D.C. Cir. 2023) (opinion of Pan, J.). Many of these “corruptly” statutes might well ground the sorts of charges even more likely to cause a client to turn to a white collar attorney. These include corruptly obstructing a regulatory examination of a financial institution, 18 U.S.C. § 1517; bribery involving public officials, 18 U.S.C. § 201(b); offering gifts in connection with procuring loans or influencing other business of financial institutions, 18 U.S.C. § 215(a); and impeding the FDIC when acting as conservator/receiver, 18 U.S.C. § 1032(2), (3).</p></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-51730309045040809352024-03-09T18:19:00.001-05:002024-03-09T18:19:19.798-05:00Charging Abortion by Milan Markovic :: SSRN<b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4554739">Charging Abortion by Milan Markovic :: SSRN</a>: </span></b><div><div class="authors authors-full-width" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #505050; font-family: NexusSansWebPro; font-size: 16px; max-width: 100%;"><h2 style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #222222; font-size: 18px; font-weight: 500; line-height: 24px; margin: 14px 0px 0px;"><a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=1650166" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #0076d4; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank" title="View other papers by this author">Milan Markovic</a></h2><p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;">Texas A&M University School of Law</p></div><p style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #505050; font-family: NexusSansWebPro; font-size: 16px; line-height: 22px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;">Date Written: August 28, 2023</p><div class="abstract-text" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #505050; font-family: NexusSansWebPro; font-size: 16px;"><h3 style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #222222; font-size: 20px; line-height: 30px; margin-bottom: 5px; margin-top: 20px;">Abstract</h3><p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; line-height: 22px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;">As long as Roe v. Wade remained good law, prosecutors could largely avoid the question of abortion. The Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health has now placed prosecutors at the forefront of the abortion wars. Some chief prosecutors in anti-abortion states have pledged to not enforce anti-abortion laws whereas others are targeting even out-of-state providers. This post-Dobbs reality wherein the ability to obtain an abortion depends not only on the politics of one’s state but also the policies of one’s local district attorney has received minimal scrutiny from legal scholars.<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Prosecutors have broad charging discretion, but prevailing ethical rules and standards do not allow them to disregard laws that they regard as unjust. Nevertheless, since prosecutors do not have unlimited resources, and abortion cases are complex and sensitive, they should use their discretion to focus only on cases where abortion care endangers women and in instances of coercion, as they did pre-Roe. Extraterritorial applications of anti-abortion law are constitutionally suspect and are unlikely to further the public interest.<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Abortion is one of the most contentious issues in American life. In a morally pluralistic society, prosecutors must strive for neutrality in the abortion wars by relying on professional standards to guide their charging discretion rather than following public opinion and the dictates of individual conscience.</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; line-height: 22px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;"></p></div><center style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #505050; font-family: NexusSansWebPro; font-size: 16px;"></center><p style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #505050; font-family: NexusSansWebPro; font-size: 16px; line-height: 22px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;"><b> </b></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #505050; font-family: NexusSansWebPro; font-size: 16px; line-height: 22px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;"><span class="hidden-xs hidden-sm" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 700;">Suggested Citation:</span></p><div class="suggested-citation" id="selectable" style="border: 1px solid rgb(80, 80, 80); box-sizing: border-box; color: #505050; font-family: NexusSansWebPro; font-size: 16px; line-height: 19px; margin: 15px 0px 25px; padding: 18px 54px 22px 20px; position: relative;">Markovic, Milan, Charging Abortion (August 28, 2023). Fordham Law Review, Forthcoming, Texas A&M University School of Law Legal Studies Research Paper No. 23-54, Available at SSRN: <a href="https://ssrn.com/abstract=4554739" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #505050;" target="_blank">https://ssrn.com/abstract=4554739</a></div><div><br /></div><a aria-label="Show contact information" class="show-contact-btn btn-link" href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4554739#" role="button" style="border-color: transparent; border-radius: 0px; box-shadow: none; box-sizing: border-box; color: #505050; cursor: pointer; font-family: NexusSansWebPro; font-size: 16px;"><span aria-hidden="true" style="box-sizing: border-box;"></span><span aria-hidden="true" class="icon icon-gizmo-navigate-right" style="box-sizing: border-box; display: inline-block; left: 5px; position: relative; top: 3px;"></span></a></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-66392809082709568612024-03-07T12:48:00.003-05:002024-03-07T12:48:41.712-05:00Trump seeks administrative stay while post-trial motions are pending. <b>If U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan grants a stay of the $83 million in compensatory and punitive damages awarded for Donald J. Trump's slandering of E. Jean Carroll, who he raped at Bergdorf Goodman it should be conditioned on an order barring any transfers of assets out of the ordinary course of business.</b><div><b>- GWC</b><br /><div><br /><div>Carroll v. Trump, No. 1:20-cv-7311-LAK-JLC – <span style="color: #2b00fe;"><b><a href="https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.543790/gov.uscourts.nysd.543790.313.0_1.pdf" target="_blank">Request for TemporaryAdministrative Stay of Execution Until Three Business Days After The Court’sRuling on the Motion to Stay Execution of Judgment Pending Disposition of PostTrial Motions</a></b></span></div></div></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-64948161401285868452024-03-06T20:49:00.003-05:002024-03-06T20:49:58.168-05:00The Supreme Court just delivered a rare self-own for John Roberts.- Rick Hasen - SLATE<a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2024/03/supreme-court-john-roberts-trump-ballot-fail.html"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: large;"><b>The Supreme Court just delivered a rare self-own for John Roberts.</b></span></a> SLATE<div><span style="font-family: georgia;">By Rick Hasen (UCLA Law School)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 17px;">The Supreme Court’s unsigned majority opinion in </span><a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-719_19m2.pdf" style="background-color: white; border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 2px; border-color: var(--theme-color,#ff0e50); box-sizing: inherit; cursor: pointer; font-size: 17px; outline-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.12s ease 0s, fill 0.12s ease 0s, border-color 0.12s ease 0s, outline-color 0.12s ease 0s, outline-style 0.12s ease 0s;"><em style="box-sizing: inherit;">Trump v. Anderson</em></a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 17px;">, ending Colorado’s attempt to disqualify Donald Trump from appearing on the ballot as an insurrectionist, is a remarkable self-own. It simultaneously turned what could have been a short, sweet (</span><a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/03/supreme-court-colorado-opinion-trump-disqualify/677646/" style="background-color: white; border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 2px; border-color: var(--theme-color,#ff0e50); box-sizing: inherit; cursor: pointer; font-size: 17px; outline-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.12s ease 0s, fill 0.12s ease 0s, border-color 0.12s ease 0s, outline-color 0.12s ease 0s, outline-style 0.12s ease 0s;">if weakly reasoned</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 17px;">) unanimous holding about </span><em style="background-color: white; box-sizing: inherit; color: #222222; font-size: 17px;">states </em><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 17px;">not having the individual power to disqualify presidential candidates from their ballots into a bitter 5–4 dispute over the scope of </span><em style="background-color: white; box-sizing: inherit; color: #222222; font-size: 17px;">Congress</em><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 17px;">’ power to disqualify candidates. And if the majority felt that it needed to take the heat from the court’s liberals and from Justice Amy Coney Barrett because it wanted to provide clarity that Congress cannot try to disqualify Trump if he appears to be reelected when Congress counts Electoral College votes on Jan. 6, 2025, it made a mess. Leading scholars and lawyers reading the opinion already disagree over what Congress can do and how, keeping the door open to potential chaos. It’s a rare miss by a usually strategic and savvy Chief Justice John Roberts.***</span></span></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-37388406203151109522024-03-06T11:06:00.000-05:002024-03-06T11:06:28.599-05:00D.C. Circuit vacates enhanced sentence of Jan.6 rioter Larry Brock<p> </p><p><b>18 USC 1512 Tampering with a witness, victim, or informant</b></p><p></p><blockquote><p></p><blockquote><p><b><i>(c) Whoever corruptly—</i></b></p><p><b><i>(1) alters, destroys, mutilates, or conceals a record, document, or other object, </i></b><b><i>or attempts to do so, with the intent to impair the object’s integrity or</i></b></p><p><b><i>availability for use in an official proceeding; or</i></b></p><p><b><i>(2) </i></b><b><i><u>otherwise obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding</u>, or</i></b></p><p><b><i>attempts to do so, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.</i></b></p><p><b><i>(d) </i></b><b><i>Whoever intentionally harasses another person and thereby hinders, delays, </i></b><b><i>prevents, or dissuades any person from—</i></b></p><p><b><i>(1) attending or testifying in an official proceeding;</i></b></p></blockquote></blockquote><p><b><span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24454697-usa-v-brock-ruling-23-3045-2043021?s=03" target="_blank">United States v. Larry Rendell Brock</a></span></b></p><p><span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24454697-usa-v-brock-ruling-23-3045-2043021?s=03" target="_blank"><b>CADC 23-3045</b> </a></span></p><p>MILLETT, Circuit Judge: Larry Brock participated in the violent January 6th riot at the United States Capitol that forced the evacuation of members of Congress and their staff and prevented Congress’s certification of the 2020 presidential election until the next day. After a bench trial, the court convicted Brock of six crimes, including corruptly obstructing Congress’s certification of the electoral count under 18 U.S.C. § 1512(c)(2). At sentencing, the district court applied a three-level sentencing enhancement to Brock’s Section 1512(c)(2) conviction on the ground that Brock’s conduct resulted in “substantial interference with the administration of justice[.]” U.S.S.G. § 2J1.2(b)(2).</p><p>Brock challenges both the district court’s interpretation of Section 1512(c)(2)’s elements and the sufficiency of the evidence to support that conviction. He also challenges the district court’s application of the three-level sentencing enhancement for interfering with the “administration of justice.” Because the law and the record in this case foreclose Brock’s legal and sufficiency challenges, we affirm Brock’s Section 1512(c)(2) conviction. As for Brock’s sentence, we hold that the “administration of justice” enhancement does not apply to interference with the legislative process of certifying electoral votes. For that reason, we vacate Brock’s sentence for his Section 1512(c)(2) conviction and remand to the district court for resentencing.</p><p>I *****</p><p>At sentencing, the parties agreed that Section 2J1.2 of the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines applied to Brock’s Section 1512(c)(2) conviction.1 Over Brock’s objection, however, the district court added a three-level enhancement under Section 2J1.2(b)(2) for “substantial interference with the administration of justice[.]” U.S.S.G. § 2J1.2(b)(2) (2021).2 The district court noted that the application comments to Section 2J1.2 define “substantial interference with the administration of justice” to include “the unnecessary expenditure of substantial government resources.” J.A. 666; see U.S.S.G. § 2J1.2 cmt. n.1. The court concluded that “only a general causal tie is necessary between the defendant’s actions and the unnecessary expenditures by the government[,]” and so “the government only has to show a causal line from the [January 6th] mob * * * [to the] unnecessary expenditure of substantial government resources.” J.A. 667. The district court then applied the enhancement on the basis that Brock was both “convicted of obstructing an official proceeding” and “was part of the mob that caused substantial damage at the Capitol and large expenditure of government resources[.]” J.A. 668.</p><p>***</p><p>Brock challenges both the district court’s interpretation of Section 1512(c)(2)’s actus reus and “corruptly” elements, and the sufficiency of the evidence supporting his conviction under that statute. <b>He separately argues that the district court improperly applied a three-level enhancement to his Section 1512(c)(2) conviction under Section 2J1.2(b)(2) of the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines.</b></p><p>While the law and the record in this case foreclose Brock’s legal and sufficiency challenges to his Section 1512(c)(2) conviction, <b>the district court erred in treating Brock’s obstruction of the electoral certification process as interfering with the “administration of justice.”</b></p><p><b>&&&</b></p><p><b>After oral argument in this case, the Supreme Court granted certiorari in Fischer to determine whether Section 1512(c)(2) prohibits obstructive acts unrelated to investigations and evidence. See Fischer v. United States, No. 23-5572, 2023 WL 8605748 (Dec. 13, 2023) (mem.).</b></p><p></p>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-23463500796953554912024-03-06T10:18:00.001-05:002024-03-06T10:18:20.587-05:00Dissecting the Chinese Legislature’s First Annual Report on Constitutional Enforcement - NPC Observer<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgxY2Uo_gBuSQOZOejxS9umetD_r3OOPmR0PazGzQNRcrdbF2qNS39mghdgjhhPxx3NrnU0L-OJQa-Ovy_-qCYMlMAy0NRHHMNZB4VC6dcBDrBccasWDaa1dovUGOrIy10epr2keJSQfbGfkGbz6AIEN6ZNa6EvFCGRIvj-G0JPAnSOzByW3WpDr6eDTl6e" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="181" data-original-width="278" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgxY2Uo_gBuSQOZOejxS9umetD_r3OOPmR0PazGzQNRcrdbF2qNS39mghdgjhhPxx3NrnU0L-OJQa-Ovy_-qCYMlMAy0NRHHMNZB4VC6dcBDrBccasWDaa1dovUGOrIy10epr2keJSQfbGfkGbz6AIEN6ZNa6EvFCGRIvj-G0JPAnSOzByW3WpDr6eDTl6e" width="320" /></a></div><br /><br /></div><a href="https://mail.google.com/mail/u/1/#inbox/FMfcgzGxRxKLmBqWzklWKQdFKBFfDQSC"><b>Dissecting the Chinese Legislature’s First Annual Report on Constitutional Enforcement - </b></a> <div>NPC Observer<br /><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">By Changhao Wei<br /></span><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div><p style="background-color: white; color: #101517; line-height: 1.7; margin: 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">China’s national legislature, the National People’s Congress (NPC) and its Standing Committee (NPCSC), has the constitutional power and duty to “oversee the enforcement of the Constitution.” Yet for decades this task had remained a low priority for the legislature. Since Xi Jinping took power in late 2012, he has “<a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u%3Dhttp-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3Db8dc3f03e1aa0a31bb9adbbaa5bb4d460fa0e8f4ad67e3a7b08fe847f11283d9-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3D2532de1f3d13db1b5c41084f6e60479c-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9wYXBlcnMuc3Nybi5jb20vc29sMy9wYXBlcnMuY2ZtP2Fic3RyYWN0X2lkPTM0MzEyOTM%26d%3DDwMFaQ%26c%3DaqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM%26r%3D_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4%26m%3DnP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ%26s%3DfiMLJvFqLNrI20mz1gcv0cSxAUslWAxu_G4Swpt5QYA%26e%3D&source=gmail&ust=1709816541347000&usg=AOvVaw2HnEuMLVc1GIHTmOQcFp5a" href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3Db8dc3f03e1aa0a31bb9adbbaa5bb4d460fa0e8f4ad67e3a7b08fe847f11283d9-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3D2532de1f3d13db1b5c41084f6e60479c-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9wYXBlcnMuc3Nybi5jb20vc29sMy9wYXBlcnMuY2ZtP2Fic3RyYWN0X2lkPTM0MzEyOTM&d=DwMFaQ&c=aqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM&r=_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4&m=nP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ&s=fiMLJvFqLNrI20mz1gcv0cSxAUslWAxu_G4Swpt5QYA&e=" style="color: #0675c4;" target="_blank">elevated the Party’s rhetorical commitment to the Constitution</a>” on numerous occasions. For instance, in writing to commemorate the current Constitution’s 40<sup>th</sup> anniversary in December 2022, Xi <a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u%3Dhttp-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3D639437f3ef15526607d0559c1aac72fe628b7d860402972fd5468ce3af8d0553-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3Db7f879bf56e5d8144388ac38d504ac29-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9wZXJtYS5jYy9OTjdELUhXRTQ%26d%3DDwMFaQ%26c%3DaqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM%26r%3D_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4%26m%3DnP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ%26s%3D6VVIiMIArZ9_mVuRxml74rK0k_f3j_z_ynxPaxowOjY%26e%3D&source=gmail&ust=1709816541347000&usg=AOvVaw103hUGo6IltCn9Xnez-Bsi" href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3D639437f3ef15526607d0559c1aac72fe628b7d860402972fd5468ce3af8d0553-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3Db7f879bf56e5d8144388ac38d504ac29-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9wZXJtYS5jYy9OTjdELUhXRTQ&d=DwMFaQ&c=aqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM&r=_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4&m=nP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ&s=6VVIiMIArZ9_mVuRxml74rK0k_f3j_z_ynxPaxowOjY&e=" style="color: #0675c4;" target="_blank">stressed</a> the need to “continuously enhance constitutional enforcement and supervision”—and to, of course, do so under the Party’s leadership. Against this backdrop, the NPCSC has made constitutional enforcement a more significant and visible part of its work; its annual <a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u%3Dhttp-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3D0af78bc2abbeed587f97bc14b0be7eb3a4959627d3217023e857ff0a27707e32-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3D7080ef80ae02aa76c28918d760599e8b-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9ucGNvYnNlcnZlci5jb20vY2hpbmEtbnBjLXN0YW5kaW5nLWNvbW1pdHRlZS13b3JrLXJlcG9ydC8%26d%3DDwMFaQ%26c%3DaqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM%26r%3D_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4%26m%3DnP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ%26s%3DjgtpDtIpzE5N6WVu2ohFe9FS2w3mgVjVIkAPDVLjQZY%26e%3D&source=gmail&ust=1709816541347000&usg=AOvVaw0iOiVfPCqV5bleUSnuqdER" href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3D0af78bc2abbeed587f97bc14b0be7eb3a4959627d3217023e857ff0a27707e32-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3D7080ef80ae02aa76c28918d760599e8b-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9ucGNvYnNlcnZlci5jb20vY2hpbmEtbnBjLXN0YW5kaW5nLWNvbW1pdHRlZS13b3JrLXJlcG9ydC8&d=DwMFaQ&c=aqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM&r=_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4&m=nP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ&s=jgtpDtIpzE5N6WVu2ohFe9FS2w3mgVjVIkAPDVLjQZY&e=" style="color: #0675c4;" target="_blank">work reports to the NPC</a> have included dedicated sections on “constitutional enforcement” [宪法实施]<sup><a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u%3Dhttp-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3D16c0977b47868744507225cfc924b42b4ed120e35f8b520467a5af687e49c8f0-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3D8b1c6737ec61bea54dd79744d6e210ff-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9ucGNvYnNlcnZlci5jb20vMjAyNC8wMy9jaGluYS1ucGMtMjAyMy1jb25zdGl0dXRpb25hbC1lbmZvcmNlbWVudC1yZXBvcnQvI2MzYjgyNzAyLTBhNDktNDM4Ny04NDViLWE3ODkyMzI2MjY3ZA-3D%26d%3DDwMFaQ%26c%3DaqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM%26r%3D_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4%26m%3DnP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ%26s%3DOkKU7QyJlxRXGm8HEo4TVWQs9FKHZZCcndkcLeD5_uw%26e%3D&source=gmail&ust=1709816541347000&usg=AOvVaw3oF7XCnWlLQZccFs9CA5uv" href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3D16c0977b47868744507225cfc924b42b4ed120e35f8b520467a5af687e49c8f0-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3D8b1c6737ec61bea54dd79744d6e210ff-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9ucGNvYnNlcnZlci5jb20vMjAyNC8wMy9jaGluYS1ucGMtMjAyMy1jb25zdGl0dXRpb25hbC1lbmZvcmNlbWVudC1yZXBvcnQvI2MzYjgyNzAyLTBhNDktNDM4Ny04NDViLWE3ODkyMzI2MjY3ZA-3D&d=DwMFaQ&c=aqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM&r=_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4&m=nP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ&s=OkKU7QyJlxRXGm8HEo4TVWQs9FKHZZCcndkcLeD5_uw&e=" id="m_-6706291419970989756c3b82702-0a49-4387-845b-a7892326267d-link" style="color: #0675c4;" target="_blank">1</a></sup> since 2020.</span></p><p style="background-color: white; color: #101517; line-height: 1.7; margin: 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">On February 23, possibly starting a new yearly practice, the legislature posted on its official website a report on its efforts to “strengthen and innovate constitutional enforcement” in 2023, written by the <a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u%3Dhttp-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3Df4373e05b9e844015ec5f8fb42bcd9d8e816d8c5f0686538d6ef5ae40e79b3b5-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3D61dcff95305e909a2c087af6b62efbf3-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9ucGNvYnNlcnZlci5jb20vMjAxOC8wNi9zY2hvbGFyc2hpcC1oaWdobGlnaHQtdGhlLW5wY3NjLWxlZ2lzbGF0aXZlLWFmZmFpcnMtY29tbWlzc2lvbi1hbmQtaXRzLWludmlzaWJsZS1sZWdpc2xhdG9ycy8%26d%3DDwMFaQ%26c%3DaqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM%26r%3D_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4%26m%3DnP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ%26s%3DN1SYkAtxWfHjAJsxnF1LCTawUhP5_q4VUVjIBlQqOmQ%26e%3D&source=gmail&ust=1709816541347000&usg=AOvVaw2WR7RttFj4o9E1AmEoIG2Q" href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3Df4373e05b9e844015ec5f8fb42bcd9d8e816d8c5f0686538d6ef5ae40e79b3b5-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3D61dcff95305e909a2c087af6b62efbf3-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9ucGNvYnNlcnZlci5jb20vMjAxOC8wNi9zY2hvbGFyc2hpcC1oaWdobGlnaHQtdGhlLW5wY3NjLWxlZ2lzbGF0aXZlLWFmZmFpcnMtY29tbWlzc2lvbi1hbmQtaXRzLWludmlzaWJsZS1sZWdpc2xhdG9ycy8&d=DwMFaQ&c=aqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM&r=_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4&m=nP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ&s=N1SYkAtxWfHjAJsxnF1LCTawUhP5_q4VUVjIBlQqOmQ&e=" style="color: #0675c4;" target="_blank">NPCSC Legislative Affairs Commission</a>’s Office for Constitution.<sup><a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u%3Dhttp-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3D33dd155248caf780f6a0dbb67391c4349bb98ab84717fb13a80a291945cb879b-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3D4e315d07e2e0057974dc55f353878037-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9ucGNvYnNlcnZlci5jb20vMjAyNC8wMy9jaGluYS1ucGMtMjAyMy1jb25zdGl0dXRpb25hbC1lbmZvcmNlbWVudC1yZXBvcnQvI2MwNjE0NTNmLWMxYmYtNGJhNC05ZjFmLWQ3ZDhlMmQ4YmIxMw-3D%26d%3DDwMFaQ%26c%3DaqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM%26r%3D_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4%26m%3DnP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ%26s%3DOPhw77qd9gSCCOy8IW21HyCh6I6Uvo9auwde07pwOQ8%26e%3D&source=gmail&ust=1709816541347000&usg=AOvVaw2Cqk2n3r3CJnoruXIORf2v" href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3D33dd155248caf780f6a0dbb67391c4349bb98ab84717fb13a80a291945cb879b-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3D4e315d07e2e0057974dc55f353878037-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9ucGNvYnNlcnZlci5jb20vMjAyNC8wMy9jaGluYS1ucGMtMjAyMy1jb25zdGl0dXRpb25hbC1lbmZvcmNlbWVudC1yZXBvcnQvI2MwNjE0NTNmLWMxYmYtNGJhNC05ZjFmLWQ3ZDhlMmQ4YmIxMw-3D&d=DwMFaQ&c=aqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM&r=_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4&m=nP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ&s=OPhw77qd9gSCCOy8IW21HyCh6I6Uvo9auwde07pwOQ8&e=" id="m_-6706291419970989756c061453f-c1bf-4ba4-9f1f-d7d8e2d8bb13-link" style="color: #0675c4;" target="_blank">2</a></sup> The report is worth reading for it not only discloses new constitutional practices from the past year that may have escaped most people’s attention, but also catalogs the kinds of activities that officially constitute “constitutional enforcement.” The report also likely serves as the basis for the section in the NPCSC’s forthcoming 2024 work report on constitutional enforcement. Below, we will discuss the report through a mix of summary and translation: parts that we found particularly noteworthy will be translated and annotated, whereas the rest will be summarized to varying extents. We added some paragraph breaks and text formatting in blockquotes to improve readability.</span></p><div style="background-color: white; color: #101517; margin-bottom: 24px;"><ul style="line-height: 1.7; margin: 0px 0px 24px 40px; padding: 0px;"><li style="line-height: 1.7; margin-left: 8px; padding: 0px;"><a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u%3Dhttp-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3De9c469589317f0f3eb922f18127c518f44b7856d79dc923e27bca10eceb0f186-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3D6edb50f76dc323ee57f659c1d37e9f76-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9ucGNvYnNlcnZlci5jb20vMjAyNC8wMy9jaGluYS1ucGMtMjAyMy1jb25zdGl0dXRpb25hbC1lbmZvcmNlbWVudC1yZXBvcnQvI2djODUzMTRmNDk5NWM%26d%3DDwMFaQ%26c%3DaqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM%26r%3D_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4%26m%3DnP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ%26s%3DgBd8F9Mdp1dMiybArTPcGcvRmi3iKWU0TCAIk2_3r1I%26e%3D&source=gmail&ust=1709816541347000&usg=AOvVaw2V9CP2QjeWAun4VeL8un8O" href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__npcobserver.com-3Faction-3Duser-5Fcontent-5Fredirect-26uuid-3De9c469589317f0f3eb922f18127c518f44b7856d79dc923e27bca10eceb0f186-26blog-5Fid-3D118562334-26post-5Fid-3D25659-26user-5Fid-3D39633229-26subs-5Fid-3D43441308-26signature-3D6edb50f76dc323ee57f659c1d37e9f76-26email-5Fname-3Dnew-2Dpost-26user-5Femail-3Dgconk-40law.fordham.edu-26encoded-5Furl-3DaHR0cHM6Ly9ucGNvYnNlcnZlci5jb20vMjAyNC8wMy9jaGluYS1ucGMtMjAyMy1jb25zdGl0dXRpb25hbC1lbmZvcmNlbWVudC1yZXBvcnQvI2djODUzMTRmNDk5NWM&d=DwMFaQ&c=aqMfXOEvEJQh2iQMCb7Wy8l0sPnURkcqADc2guUW8IM&r=_Va583FARHOYwZQIwz1AMhgQx-YEehDlavS_vvkFsj4&m=nP7yqd0QXWbbIjd-Tffh1N4F_1wf4lNhtaQDwnRA2S5HDf0f1dcT7IULY9CRBgpJ&s=gBd8F9Mdp1dMiybArTPcGcvRmi3iKWU0TCAIk2_3r1I&e=" style="color: #0675c4;" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">I. Constitutional Enforcement Through Legislation</span></a></li></ul></div></div></div></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-49468154733602425252024-03-06T09:26:00.002-05:002024-03-06T09:26:20.673-05:00Housing discrimination - the legacy of bias<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEghO175SBkub8VXOtdybYIqTZoH8QYRWvv-lwmqtxdVBARuU8PFVKnCSX0W3ucPBHf8oiuI_197JtNhfi6whOkiiCzotihp6fADs5sB5P0Tn0ATFkFpqTIFhgAoTrlrD8T98MMYlxsMB70jmbKhJtHpqFC7iX9Pz2YRjpks5eO7YD_zDiQ2UtNvZXNm98FN" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="2500" data-original-width="1800" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEghO175SBkub8VXOtdybYIqTZoH8QYRWvv-lwmqtxdVBARuU8PFVKnCSX0W3ucPBHf8oiuI_197JtNhfi6whOkiiCzotihp6fADs5sB5P0Tn0ATFkFpqTIFhgAoTrlrD8T98MMYlxsMB70jmbKhJtHpqFC7iX9Pz2YRjpks5eO7YD_zDiQ2UtNvZXNm98FN" width="173" /></a></div><br /> <p></p><p><b style="color: #222222; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: small;">It is a cardinal error to be inexact in referring to a statute. In yesterday's class I should have been precise regarding the Enforcement Acts, The first - the Civil Rights Act of 1866, passed under the authority of the the 13th Amendment, provides:</b></p><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="background-color: white; border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; margin: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><b>42 U.S.C. §1982. Property Rights of Citizens</b></blockquote><div class="gmail_default" style="background-color: white; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: small;"><b style="color: #222222;"><br /></b><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); color: #222222; margin: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><b>All citizens of the United States shall have the same right, in every State and<br /></b><b>Territory, as is enjoyed by white citizens thereof to inherit, purchase, lease,<br /></b><b>sell, hold, and convey real and personal property.</b></blockquote><div style="color: #222222;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="color: #222222;"><b>It stayed on the books, unenforceable due to the <span style="color: blue;"><a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.oyez.org/cases/1850-1900/109us3&source=gmail&ust=1709774824992000&usg=AOvVaw0FPVtEjaRIlcKbQAW_Oirm" href="https://www.oyez.org/cases/1850-1900/109us3" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">Civil Rights Cases of 1883</a></span> which declared that neither the 13th nor the 14th Amendments reached </b></div><div style="color: #222222;"><b>racially discriminatory private contracts. And so for another century racial discrimination in a wide range of matters was unimpeded.</b></div><div style="color: #222222;"><b>Black people could be excluded from stores, theatres, trains and buses. And of course schools.</b></div><div style="color: #222222;"><b>It was not until 1968 in <a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.oyez.org/cases/1967/645&source=gmail&ust=1709774824992000&usg=AOvVaw2Ou1MR_0apmLuc_yyM642o" href="https://www.oyez.org/cases/1967/645" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">Jones v. Alfred Mayer Co. </a>that the Supreme Court declared that the 13th Amendment provides the necessary support to make</b></div><div style="color: #222222;"><b>racial discrimination in real estate unlawful. Race discrimination is a "badge and indicia" of the servitude outlawed by the 13th Amendment - rights won on the battlefield.</b></div><div style="color: #222222;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="color: #222222;"><b>It is the legacy of such societal discrimination that the Supreme Court still refuses to recognize as worthy of recompense.</b></div><div><b><span style="color: #222222;">If the </span><span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://oag.ca.gov/ab3121/report" target="_blank">California Reparations Report</a></span><span style="color: #222222;"> yields legislation it will be interesting to see if the Supreme Court strikes it down.</span></b></div><div style="color: #222222;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="color: #222222;"><b>- GWC</b></div><div style="color: #222222;"><br /></div><div style="color: #222222;"> </div></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-92084995074777323952024-03-05T12:32:00.000-05:002024-03-05T12:32:42.556-05:00"‘They didn’t do it clearly enough’: SCOTUS ruling prompts worries of another Jan. 6 crisis" - Election Law Blog<a href="https://electionlawblog.org/?p=141805"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>"‘They didn’t do it clearly enough’: SCOTUS ruling prompts worries of another Jan. 6 crisis" - Election Law Blog</b></span></a><div><header class="entry-header" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #141412; font-family: "Source Sans Pro", Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin: 0px auto 15px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 878px;"><div class="entry-meta" style="box-sizing: border-box; clear: both; display: flex; flex-wrap: wrap; font-size: 0.95em; margin: 0px auto 15px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px 0px 15px; width: 878px;"><span class="author vcard" style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-right: 0px; order: 1;"><a class="url fn n" href="https://electionlawblog.org/?author=3" rel="author" style="border-bottom: 1px solid; box-sizing: border-box; color: #555555; font-weight: bold; text-decoration-line: none; text-transform: uppercase;" title="View all posts by Rick Hasen">RICK HASEN</a></span></div></header><div class="entry-content" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #141412; font-family: "Source Serif Pro", serif; font-size: 1.2em; hyphens: none; margin: 0px auto 15px; max-width: 100%; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px; width: 878px;"><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;"><a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2024/03/04/supreme-court-ballot-ruling-january-6-worries-00144834?nname=playbook&nid=0000014f-1646-d88f-a1cf-5f46b7bd0000&nrid=0000014e-f109-dd93-ad7f-f90d0def0000&nlid=630318" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted; box-sizing: border-box; color: #007bc7; text-decoration-line: none;">Politico</a>:</p><blockquote class="wp-block-quote" style="border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #444444; font-size: 0.95em; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding-bottom: 0px !important; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px !important; quotes: none;"><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">The Supreme Court said Monday it was avoiding “chaos” by <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2024/03/04/states-cant-remove-trump-from-ballot-supreme-court-says-00144673" rel="noreferrer noopener" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted; box-sizing: border-box; color: #007bc7; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">squashing state-level efforts</a> to throw Donald Trump off the ballot.</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">Instead, the high court may have just shifted that chaos to Congress.</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">The decision ignited an intense debate among election experts and constitutional scholars about whether the court has opened a path to another Jan. 6 crisis four years after the attack on the Capitol.</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">That’s because the justices <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-719_19m2.pdf" rel="noreferrer noopener" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted; box-sizing: border-box; color: #007bc7; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">explicitly ruled</a> that the power to determine whether Trump is eligible for another term as president — or is disqualified as an “oathbreaking insurrectionist” — lies with the House and Senate.</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">The five justices who fully endorsed the court’s lead opinion envisioned Congress passing “enforcement legislation” to make this call. But scholars say the 13-page opinion left room for Trump’s detractors to pursue another path if he receives a majority of electoral votes this November: They could try to throw out his electoral votes on Jan. 6, 2025, when Congress will meet to certify the winner of the 2024 election.</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">Such a scenario would be an extraordinary turnabout. On Jan. 6, 2021, Trump promoted bogus claims of voter fraud to lobby congressional Republicans to block the certification of Joe Biden’s victory — a push that inspired a mob to storm the Capitol and lash out violently when the effort failed. His allies relied on fringe interpretations of the 12th Amendment to push their last-ditch gambit….</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">“They were trying to avoid all of this. They were trying to foreclose an effort to disqualify Trump after he wins,” said Ned Foley, a constitutional law expert from Ohio State University. “But they didn’t do it clearly enough.”</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">The lack of clarity, he continued, has sparked a debate: “Is there power in Congress to consider the [disqualification] issue in January?”</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">The court’s opinion did not explicitly address that scenario. The opinion did stress that, for federal lawmakers to enforce the insurrection clause, they would have to set out criteria for who is disqualified. Congress, the court added, has not passed any legislation enforcing the provision since 1870.</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">Some experts say formal legislation is crucial. It would strain credulity, they said, for Trump’s opponents in Congress to attempt to unravel an Electoral College victory by the ex-president, at least without forcing them to embrace some untested theories of their own.</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">“I think today’s opinion will at least close the door on some of that discourse,” said Derek Muller, a constitutional scholar at the University of Notre Dame….</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">So far, Democrats in Congress — including two who served on the Jan. 6 select committee and concluded that Trump indeed joined an insurrection in 2021 — have expressed caution and restraint.</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">“It does not at first read appear that the Court indicated a viable path to implement Section 3 of the 14th Amendment absent enactment of a law outlining procedures to do so,” said Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) in a statement on the court’s ruling. But she added that she is continuing to review the ruling and hopes to hear from legal experts on Congress’ role.</p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; hyphens: none; margin: 0px 0px 24px;">Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) echoed that sentiment, telling POLITICO “my initial reading of it suggests that they are saying that Congress must act … to pass a statute, but I am not certain of that and we want to explore it. So I don’t want to pronounce on that.”</p></blockquote></div></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-29210118920987835372024-03-04T23:50:00.002-05:002024-03-04T23:50:20.628-05:00Balkinization: “Liberal Originalism,” Rest in Peace - Samuel Moyn<a href="https://balkin.blogspot.com/2024/02/liberal-originalism-rest-in-peace.html"><b><span style="font-size: large;">Balkinization: “Liberal Originalism,” Rest in Peace</span></b></a><div><div><div style="background-color: white;"><i><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Samuel Moyn is Chancellor Kent Professor of Law and History at Yale University. </span></i></div></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div><div style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The Section 3 episode will be forgotten, a footnote to the 2024 election. But for all its brevity, there is a lot to ponder in it. “The nation is talking about little else,” I read on Amar’s <a href="https://akhilamar.com/podcast-2/" style="color: #0069c3;">website</a> a couple of weeks ago, amid the wall-to-wall legal coverage of Section 3. Soon people will talk about other things. But in doing so, they might miss the chance to learn about the limits of liberal originalism as a strategy. For better or worse, I am sure we will have many other occasions to ask ourselves whether the entire project of pursuing our best political future through the constitutional politics of asking high court judges to take our side — as opposed to democratic political struggle to achieve our goals — is either credible or practical.<br /></span></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></div></div></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-24235343007162099362024-03-04T13:31:00.007-05:002024-03-05T00:11:51.035-05:00Does “Textualism” Really Prevent “Judicial Activism”? A Response to Prof. John McGinnis, by David Doniger - Yale Journal on Regulation<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiU7XUNeCeCrMIhnH_So1rEqu9FlVF1AaBsNQaZPMJ73BYIkxYlxLb4sZ9ZitS7Jff90YQUI2xKbUgGfC6CdZDSMzHPdds5UPbsDlL-pgyjfPC3Ir8NATXewAds1g433Xx9aeOz33IUzsL5K5ThG_uqaD6FEgIt7QyiY0o-pXbOXi3qfcNJokmMHa5ilbE7" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="690" data-original-width="550" height="278" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiU7XUNeCeCrMIhnH_So1rEqu9FlVF1AaBsNQaZPMJ73BYIkxYlxLb4sZ9ZitS7Jff90YQUI2xKbUgGfC6CdZDSMzHPdds5UPbsDlL-pgyjfPC3Ir8NATXewAds1g433Xx9aeOz33IUzsL5K5ThG_uqaD6FEgIt7QyiY0o-pXbOXi3qfcNJokmMHa5ilbE7=w221-h278" width="221" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">NRDC Amicus brief</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Loper Bright v. Raimondo, Sec'y Dept..of Commerce</div><br /><span style="font-family: georgia;">David Doniger "lost" the Chevron case - which he argued for the Natural Resources Defense Council. NRDC was attacking the conservative "<span style="background-color: white; font-size: 17.008px;"> strategy</span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 17.008px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"></span></span><blockquote><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 17.008px;">...</span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 17.008px;">called the “bubble” concept, for big new industrial projects to evade those standards. The trick was to redefine “stationary source” to mean a “combination” of buildings, structures, facilities, or installations – in other words, as a </span><em style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 17.008px;">whole industrial plant. </em><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 17.008px;">If a company paired building a large new furnace or boiler with retirement of some old equipment so that the whole plant’s pollution didn’t increase, then the new project would escape the stringent pollution controls the statute intended new industrial development to install.</span></span></blockquote><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">EPA's attention to an entire power production complex, commanding , as challenged in West Virginia, a net reduction in pollution was rejected. The whole complex strategy worked: the plant was a bubble, so one could make changes that increased air pollution so long as the total plant's output of greenhouse gases did not increase. In <i>Chevron</i> that ploy worked. Defer to the agency's reasonable plant to hold pollutants to current levels, not be compelled to reduce pollutants as the Clean Air Act contemplated.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But last year the Court employed its new sword - the "major questions doctrine" when the EPA proposed that the statutory mandate to find </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Retina, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 17px;">“best system of emission reduction” would best be served by "</span>a shift in generation from existing coal-fired power plants, which would make less power, to natural-gas-fired
plants, which would make more.<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Retina, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 17px;">" As </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Retina, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 17px;"><span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/06/west-virginia-environmental-protection-agency-climate-change-clean-air.html" target="_blank">Blake Emerson explains</a></span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Retina, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 17px;"> in Slate - the court has a new tool - the "anti-novelty principle". It now demands that Congress, presciently, speak "clearly" about what may be needed in the future to acheive its broadly stated goals. So its back to the drawing boards - a judicially mandated legislative rewrite of epochal legilsation like the Clean Air Act.</span></p><blockquote><span style="font-family: georgia;"> </span></blockquote><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 17.008px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 17.008px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"></span></span></div><a href="https://www.yalejreg.com/nc/does-textualism-really-prevent-judicial-activism-a-response-to-prof-john-mcginnis-by-david-doniger/"><span style="font-family: georgia;">Does “Textualism” Really Prevent “Judicial Activism”? A Response to Prof. John McGinnis, by David Doniger - Yale Journal on Regulation</span></a><div><span style="font-family: georgia;">By David Doniger</span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia;">Natural Resources Defense Council</span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span></div><div><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 17.008px; margin: 0.625em 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">An essay by John McGinnis, “<a href="https://lawliberty.org/the-rise-and-fall-of-chevron/" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #286dc0; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s;">The Rise and Fall of <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Chevron</em></a>,” recently caught my eye. McGinnis, now a professor at Northwestern, writes that as a summer legal intern he assisted Deputy Solicitor General Paul Bator in writing the government’s brief in <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/467/837/" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #286dc0; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s;"><em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Chevron U.S.A. v. Natural Resources Defense Council</em></a><em style="box-sizing: border-box;"> </em>back in 1983. Though we’ve never met, I felt a certain kinship, since I briefed and argued the case for NRDC opposite Bator 40 years ago tomorrow. </span></p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 17.008px; margin: 0.625em 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">It turns out, however, that as the Supreme Court weighs reversing or changing <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Chevron</em>, McGinnis and I disagree as much now as we did then. </span></p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 17.008px; margin: 0.625em 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">McGinnis’s essay implies that <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Chevron </em>deference<em style="box-sizing: border-box;"> </em>was a corrective to <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">liberal </em>judicial activism in the 1970s. Actually, as I’ll show, the proximate cause of the <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Chevron </em>case was <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">conservative </em>judicial activism. </span></p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 17.008px; margin: 0.625em 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">McGinnis says it is safe to reverse <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Chevron </em>now because a judiciary committed to “textualism” and “originalism” can be trusted to demonstrate modesty and eschew activism. Given the aggressive recent behavior of purportedly textualist judges and justices, that’s rather hard to accept. </span></p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 17.008px; margin: 0.625em 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">Initially, there was broad agreement from conservative judges, scholars, and advocates – including <a href="https://openyls.law.yale.edu/handle/20.500.13051/8169" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #286dc0; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s;">Kenneth Starr</a>, <a href="https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/gwlr58&div=37&id=&page=" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #286dc0; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s;">Lawrence Silberman</a>, and <a href="https://scholarship.law.duke.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3075&context=dlj" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #286dc0; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s;">Antonin Scalia</a> – that <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Chevron </em>represented a salutary neutral principle for judicial review of regulatory decisions. But today the Federalist Society and the many legal foundations backed by funders hostile to almost all forms of government regulation have reshaped their judicial philosophy. Now they see reversing <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Chevron</em> as key weapon in their battle to enfeeble “the administrative state.”</span></p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 17.008px; margin: 0.625em 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">Let me elaborate these points.</span></p><h2 class="wp-block-heading" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #00356b; font-size: 2.15rem; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.25; margin: 1.875em 0px 0.625em;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">A Look Back at <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Chevron’s </em>Origins</span></h2><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 17.008px; margin: 0.625em 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">McGinnis is correct that the 1970s were a period of judicial activism and inventiveness in the rapidly evolving field of administrative law, especially on the D.C. Circuit. But I disagree with his implication that ‘70s-era activism was generally tilted in a <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">liberal</em> direction. In the cases that led to <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Chevron</em>,<em style="box-sizing: border-box;"> </em>it was <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">conservative </em>activism that got the D.C. Circuit into trouble.</span></p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 17.008px; margin: 0.625em 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">To see that, we need to review the three D.C. Circuit cases leading up to <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Chevron. </em>All three interpreted the same statutory term, “stationary source,” which was used in three different parts of the Clean Air Act. The first decision would pass any textualist’s test today. The <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">second</em> one is where the activist turn was taken – but by a conservative judge. The third one – the case actually reviewed in <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Chevron </em>– sought merely to apply a policy-driven distinction already drawn by the second decision.</span></p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 17.008px; margin: 0.625em 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">“Stationary source” is the thing to which the Clean Air Act’s pollution control requirements apply. The 1970 Act defined that term as “<a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42/7411" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #286dc0; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s;">any building, structure, facility, or installation</a>” that emits air pollution. For members of the public and Members of Congress alike, the plain meaning – you might now say the “original public meaning” in 1970 – of those terms was clear: they meant the discrete items of industrial equipment, large or small, that emit pollution – things like boilers, blast furnaces, petroleum refining equipment, storage tanks, etc.</span></p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 17.008px; margin: 0.625em 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">It was only later that clever lawyers came up with a strategy, called the “bubble” concept, for big new industrial projects to evade those standards. The trick was to redefine “stationary source” to mean a “combination” of buildings, structures, facilities, or installations – in other words, as a <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">whole industrial plant. </em>If a company paired building a large new furnace or boiler with retirement of some old equipment so that the whole plant’s pollution didn’t increase, then the new project would escape the stringent pollution controls the statute intended new industrial development to install.</span></p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 17.008px; margin: 0.625em 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">In <a href="https://case-law.vlex.com/vid/asarco-inc-v-p-888550357" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #286dc0; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s;"><em style="box-sizing: border-box;">ASARCO v. EPA</em></a>, a D.C. Circuit panel led by Judge J. Skelly Wright (a liberal) made short but “textualist” work of this argument. “The regulations plainly indicate that EPA has attempted to change the basic unit to which the [New Source Performance Standards] apply from a single building, structure, facility, or installation—the unit prescribed in the statute—to a combination of such units. The agency has no authority to rewrite the statute in this fashion.” </span></p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 17.008px; margin: 0.625em 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">The wrong turn came in the next case, <a href="https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F2/636/323/26474/" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #286dc0; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s;"><em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Alabama Power Co. v. Costle</em></a><em style="box-sizing: border-box;">. </em>Judge Malcolm Wilkey (a conservative) addressed the source definition in the permitting program Congress adopted in 1977 amendments to protect the still-clean areas of the country, called “prevention of significant deterioration” (PSD). </span></p></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-47594294377752432002024-03-04T13:30:00.003-05:002024-03-04T19:37:07.574-05:00 DOJ's fatal error? Colorado disqualification case rejected - Trump v. Anderson (03/04/2024)<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiCBZbnpd5y0Z5BTF9AXRGh4XEDzdeCEzDRmq89T-Wf1wCmB5OkKAWiDpVgHfZw5uChZ5s2sZrTFeMuacKVx8kcC9YQI7rvdXPECp70H46tQZxqJJGK7zxvzHxzoZYjb68vts7TiL9CWK-iRmKvQ5aOKRoc6pD4gJRFu3iFwJphxobqBYRPDFKRKt1G9iDp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="194" data-original-width="259" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiCBZbnpd5y0Z5BTF9AXRGh4XEDzdeCEzDRmq89T-Wf1wCmB5OkKAWiDpVgHfZw5uChZ5s2sZrTFeMuacKVx8kcC9YQI7rvdXPECp70H46tQZxqJJGK7zxvzHxzoZYjb68vts7TiL9CWK-iRmKvQ5aOKRoc6pD4gJRFu3iFwJphxobqBYRPDFKRKt1G9iDp" width="320" /></a></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><b>Judiciousness is a virtue little heeded at today's Supreme Court. The nine agreed that barring Donald J. Trump from a state primary ballot was a bridge too far for a state court. Striking a former President - especially one leading in the opinion polls - is too much. I agree even though the text of the 14th Amendment's Section 3 is entirely sufficient to bar Trump from resuming the office of President:</b></span></div></div></div></div><div><h2 style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; clear: both; color: #333333; line-height: 1.1; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 20px;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: small;"></span></h2><blockquote><h2 style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; clear: both; color: #333333; line-height: 1.1; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 20px;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: small;">Section 3.</span></h2><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; margin: 0px 0px 10px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b><u>No person shall </u>be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or <u>hold any office</u>, civil or military, <u>under the United States</u>, or under any state, <u>who, having previously taken an oath</u>, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any state legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any state, <u>to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same</u>, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. </b></span></p></blockquote><blockquote><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; margin: 0px 0px 10px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><u><b>But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.</b></u></span></p></blockquote><h2 style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; clear: both; color: #333333; font-size: 18px; line-height: 1.1; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 20px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"></span></h2><blockquote><h2 style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; clear: both; color: #333333; font-size: 18px; line-height: 1.1; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 20px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">Section 5.</span></h2><p><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-size: 16px;">The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.</span> </b></span></p></blockquote><p><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b></b></span></p><p><b>In <span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-719_19m2.pdf" target="_blank">Trump v. Anderson</a></span> the Colorado case labeling Donald J. Trump an insurrectionist, five Justices - including the `institutionalist' Chief - wanted to and did go far beyond deciding the case before them. Demands for broad new legislation followed. The ancient adage that equitable decrees should be tailored precisely to the matter <i>sub judice</i> evaporated. The "least dangerous branch", as conservative icon of yesteryear <span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="the judiciary, from the nature of its functions, will always be the least dangerous to the political rights of the Constitution; because it will be least in a capacity to annoy or injure them." target="_blank">Alexander Hamilton described it in Federalist 78</a></span>, has rejected such calls to caution. In <i>Dobbs</i> (no constitutional right to abortion), <i>Bruen</i> (unfettered right to possess high powered rifles) the high court has broad brush erased long standing personal rights, and statutes designed to protect the public health. That imprudent pattern continues - as, consenting only in the judgment, declare Justices Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson:</b></p><p></p><blockquote><p><b>Although only an individual State’s
action is at issue here, the majority opines on which federal
actors can enforce Section 3, and how they must do so. The
majority announces that a disqualification for insurrection
can occur only when Congress enacts a particular kind of
legislation pursuant to Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment. In doing so, the majority shuts the door on other potential means of federal enforcement. We cannot join an
opinion that decides momentous and difficult issues unnecessarily, and we therefore concur only in the judgment. </b></p></blockquote><p><b>Agreeing that </b><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b>"States lack the power to enforce Section 3 against Presidential candidates"</b></span><b>Amy Coney Barrett joins the three Democratic Party appointed women by rejecting the demands for new legislation in part II A of the majority opinion. </b> <span style="font-family: georgia;"><b>She laments </b></span><b><span style="font-family: georgia;"> </span>"stridency" in the face of a "volatile" election period. It is alarming to hear a conservative jurist warn of volatility in our Republic. We are a long way from the "<span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/01/is-america-still-the-shining-city-on-a-hill/617474/" target="_blank">shining city on a hill</a></span>" evoked most famously by the conservative icon Ronald Reagan in his 1989 farewell address.</b></p><p><b>The majority opinion barring states from interfering with federal elections marches relentlessly and elegantly to its broad commands for Congressional action, laying out a road map for the new Enforcement Act it demands, which was, they seem to think, neglected by those who actually restored the national government after the dreadful suffering of the war to save chattel slavery of African Americans.</b></p><p><b>Perhaps the fatal error will prove to be Jack Smith's failure to charge Donald J. Trump with insurrection under <span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=granuleid:USC-prelim-title18-section2383&num=0&edition=prelim">18 U.S.C. 2383</a>. </span>It provides:</b></p><p><span style="color: #32434f; font-family: Arial; text-indent: -2em;"></span></p><blockquote><p><span style="color: #32434f; text-indent: -2em;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b>§2383. Rebellion or insurrection</b></span></span></p><p class="statutory-body" style="margin: 0em; padding: 0em; text-indent: 1em;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b>Whoever incites, sets on foot, assists, or engages in any rebellion or insurrection against the authority of the United States or the laws thereof, or gives aid or comfort thereto, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States.</b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b><a name="sourcecredit"></a></b></span></p><p class="source-credit" style="margin: 5px 0em 0em; padding: 0em;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b>(<a href="https://uscode.house.gov/statviewer.htm?volume=62&page=808" style="color: #0f0d61; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">June 25, 1948, ch. 645, <statuteatlarge page="808" volume="62">62 Stat. 808</statuteatlarge> </a>; <a href="https://uscode.house.gov/statviewer.htm?volume=108&page=2147" style="color: #0f0d61; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank"><plaw congress="103" isprivate="false" number="322">Pub. L. 103–322,</plaw> title XXXIII, §330016(1)(L), Sept. 13, 1994, <statuteatlarge page="2147" volume="108">108 Stat. 2147</statuteatlarge></a></b></span></p></blockquote><p class="source-credit" style="margin: 5px 0em 0em; padding: 0em;"><a href="https://uscode.house.gov/statviewer.htm?volume=108&page=2147" style="color: #0f0d61; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank"><statuteatlarge page="2147" volume="108"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b></b></span></statuteatlarge></a></p><p><b>- GWC 3/4/2024</b></p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; margin: 0px 0px 10px;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b></b></span></p><div><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-719_19m2.pdf">23-719 Trump v. Anderson (03/04/2024)</a> - <i>per curiam, Barrett concurring, Sotomayor, Kagan, Jackson concurring only in the judgment</i></span></b><div><b><br /></b><div><b>JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR, JUSTICE KAGAN, and JUSTICE
JACKSON, concurring in the judgment. </b></div><div><b>“If it is not necessary to decide more to dispose of a case,
then it is necessary not to decide more.” Dobbs v. Jackson
Women’s Health Organization, 597 U. S. 215, 348 (2022)
(ROBERTS, C. J., concurring in judgment). That fundamental principle of judicial restraint is practically as old as our
Republic. This Court is authorized “to say what the law is”
only because “[t]hose who apply [a] rule to particular cases
. . . must of necessity expound and interpret that rule.”
Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137, 177 (1803) (emphasis
added).
Today, the Court departs from that vital principle, deciding not just this case, but challenges that might arise in the
future.</b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b> In this case, the Court must decide whether Colorado may keep a Presidential candidate off the ballot on the
ground that he is an oathbreaking insurrectionist and thus
disqualified from holding federal office under Section 3 of
the Fourteenth Amendment. Allowing Colorado to do so
would, we agree, create a chaotic state-by-state patchwork,
at odds with our Nation’s federalism principles. That is
enough to resolve this case. Yet the majority goes further.
Even though “[a]ll nine Members of the Court” agree that
this independent and sufficient rationale resolves this case, five Justices go on. They decide novel constitutional questions to insulate this Court and petitioner from future controversy. Ante, at 13. </b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b>Although only an individual State’s
action is at issue here, the majority opines on which federal
actors can enforce Section 3, and how they must do so. The
majority announces that a disqualification for insurrection
can occur only when Congress enacts a particular kind of
legislation pursuant to Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment. In doing so, the majority shuts the door on other potential means of federal enforcement. We cannot join an
opinion that decides momentous and difficult issues unnecessarily, and we therefore concur only in the judgment. </b></div></div></div></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-22410386144035764172024-03-01T19:40:00.001-05:002024-03-03T10:42:07.587-05:00After Dobbs is any unenumerated right safe?<p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhRDHO-G0j8vgG8tqgzD3cBzmzUw2M7aDgABrTNvuxEDotSCwVygo5A0KFiKsxMfbU10QI2TH7DtaZOqqzX-SQ-jlAXeIoinapQlF4kRWDL9laTA_O54hPJxM6UiCMsPSsFtuqUexbLMqNBH3qcCXqbMMfpHn-bw0AsCIxzSIgpXlI2DOrMht02QCVC910d" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="170" data-original-width="296" height="184" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhRDHO-G0j8vgG8tqgzD3cBzmzUw2M7aDgABrTNvuxEDotSCwVygo5A0KFiKsxMfbU10QI2TH7DtaZOqqzX-SQ-jlAXeIoinapQlF4kRWDL9laTA_O54hPJxM6UiCMsPSsFtuqUexbLMqNBH3qcCXqbMMfpHn-bw0AsCIxzSIgpXlI2DOrMht02QCVC910d" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b><span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://journalofethics.ama-assn.org/article/history-oral-contraception/2000-06#:~:text=The%20Food%20and%20Drug%20Administration,as%20it%20is%20popularly%20known." target="_blank">In 1960</a></span></b> oral contraceptives "the pill" became available to women. Estelle Griswold in 1965 successfully challenged the Connecticut law that banned contraceptives. Married couples have a privacy right to control their choices in parenthood - or not. In <a href="https://www.oyez.org/cases/1964/496" target="_blank">Griswold v.Connecticut</a> Justice William O. Douglas wrote for a 7-2 majority, that held that the 1st, 3rd, 91th and 14th Amendments created a "penumbra" that established a married couple's privacy rights to use birth control. Many other such moments followed.</div><br />It is bizarre that a conservative movement largely characterized by extreme individualism, and a "racialised anti-statism" [in Jefferson Cowrie's phrase] should yield decisions like <span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/dobbs_v._jackson_women%27s_health_organization_%282022%29" target="_blank">Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health</a></span>. Not only does the Opinion of the Court renounce the idea that a woman has the personal, private right to terminate a pregnancy but it casts doubt on a slew of other "unenumerated rights:<p></p><p>Nor does the right to obtain an abortion have a sound basis in precedent. Casey relied on cases involving the right to marry a person of a different race, Loving v. Virginia, 388 U. S. 1 (1967); the right to marry while in prison, Turner v. Safley, 482 U. S. 78 (1987); the right to obtain contraceptives, Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U. S. 479 (1965), Eisenstadt v. Baird, 405 U. S. 438 (1972), Carey v. Population Services Int’l, 431 U. S. 678 (1977); the right to reside with relatives, Moore v. East Cleveland, 431 U. S. 494 (1977); the right to make decisions about the education of one’s children, Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U. S. 510 (1925), Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U. S. 390 (1923); the right not to be sterilized without consent, Skinner v. Oklahoma ex rel. Williamson, 316 U. S. 535 (1942); and the right in certain circumstances not to undergo involuntary surgery, forced administration of drugs, or other substantially similar procedures, Winston v. Lee, 470 U. S. 753 (1985), Washington v. Harper, 494 U. S. 210 (1990), Rochin v. California, 342 U.S. 165 (1952). Respondents and the Solicitor General also rely on post-Casey decisions like Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U. S. 558 (2003) (right to engage in private, consensual sexual acts), and Obergefell v. Hodges, 576 U. S. 644 (2015) (right to marry a person of the same sex). See Brief for Respondents 18; Brief for United States 23–24.</p><p>These attempts to justify abortion through appeals to a broader right to autonomy and to define one’s “concept of existence” prove too much. Casey, 505 U. S., at 851. Those criteria, at a high level of generality, could license fundamental rights to illicit drug use, prostitution, and the like. See Compassion in Dying v. Washington, 85 F. 3d 1440, 1444 (CA9 1996) (O’Scannlain, J., dissenting from denial of rehearing en banc). None of these rights has any claim to being deeply rooted in history. Id., at 1440, 1445.</p><p>What sharply distinguishes the abortion right from the rights recognized in the cases on which Roe and Casey rely is something that both those decisions acknowledged: Abortion destroys what those decisions call “potential life” and what the law at issue in this case regards as the life of an “unborn human being.” See Roe, 410 U. S., at 159 (abortion is “inherently different”); Casey, 505 U. S., at 852 (abortion is “a unique act”). <b>None of the other decisions cited by Roe and Casey involved the critical moral question posed by abortion. They are therefore inapposite. They do not support the right to obtain an abortion, and by the same token, our conclusion that the Constitution does not confer such a right does not undermine them in any way. (</b>emphasis added - GWC<b>)</b></p>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-61702299137886437252024-02-29T11:53:00.004-05:002024-02-29T11:53:55.189-05:00Alabama, religious freedom and frozen embryos - James McHugh The Fulcrum<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg9Riq0tmKNTfMvdi3ev6TseI7OS25Py6QdJiZROtW2AolzWP5BeKPhNLDnwxEukdmAI_dnG0Z8RJJtTzu6fTlfIg9g99mcKVJdOxHLbd06yRZLxuuG0zBQWq_pI-OrjCO2sMMhm0yN9wSWXkWj7Jl49sc4XCkYy587VRUw40aNXqItK1Yxej8OUVzx-7jQ" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="1200" height="160" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg9Riq0tmKNTfMvdi3ev6TseI7OS25Py6QdJiZROtW2AolzWP5BeKPhNLDnwxEukdmAI_dnG0Z8RJJtTzu6fTlfIg9g99mcKVJdOxHLbd06yRZLxuuG0zBQWq_pI-OrjCO2sMMhm0yN9wSWXkWj7Jl49sc4XCkYy587VRUw40aNXqItK1Yxej8OUVzx-7jQ" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i>Preparing embryo cultivation plates</i></div><br /><br /></div><a href="https://thefulcrum.us/governance-legislation/alabama-supreme-court"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: large;"><b>Alabama, religious freedom and frozen embryos - The Fulcrum</b></span></a><div><span style="color: #0f1419; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><span style="background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.03); white-space-collapse: preserve;">By James McHugh </span></span></div><div><p style="background-color: white; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><em>McHugh</em><em> is a board member of </em><a class="rm-stats-tracked" href="https://ldad.org/" style="color: #1a73b7; overflow-wrap: break-word; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank"><em>Lawyers Defending American Democracy</em></a> <em></em><em>and a former Massachusetts Appeals Court <a class="rm-stats-tracked" href="https://thefulcrum.us/tag/justice-system" style="color: #1a73b7; overflow-wrap: break-word; text-decoration-line: none;">justice</a>.</em><br /></span></p><p style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The Alabama Constitution provides that "no religion shall be established by law" and that "the civil rights, privileges, and capacities of any citizen shall not be in any manner affected by his religious principles." Those prohibitions were forcefully reinforced in a 1998 Religious Freedom Amendment. Like similar provisions of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, those prohibitions are designed to ensure a democratic form of government in Alabama, instead of the theocratic form that roiled the European societies from which early American settlers fled.</span></p><p style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Against the historical and textual backdrop of those provisions, it is, to put it mildly, surprising to read the concurring opinion of Alabama Chief Justice Tom Parker in <a class="rm-stats-tracked" href="https://law.justia.com/cases/alabama/supreme-court/2024/sc-2022-0579.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="color: #1a73b7; overflow-wrap: break-word; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">LePage v. The Center for Reproductive Medicine, P.C<em>.</em></a> That now well-known case involved application of Alabama's Wrongful Death of a Minor Act to the accidental destruction of embryos created through in vitro fertilization and stored in what the court described as a "cryogenic nursery.”</span></p><p style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The court ruled that the law applied to the embryos and provided a pathway to financial recovery for their destruction. All members of the court agreed that “an unborn child is a genetically unique human being whose life begins at fertilization and ends at death.” Consequently, five of the six justices agreed that a fertilized human egg is a "minor child" covered by the act, regardless of the child’s viability or stage of development.</span></p><p style="background-color: white;"></p><p style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Parker’s concurring opinion reveals that he viewed the court’s decision as a launching pad for exploration of the Sanctity of Unborn Life Amendment, which was adopted in 2018. “Sanctity,” the chief justice said, meant "godliness." While some "advocates of the sanctity of life have attempted to articulate the principle on purely secular philosophical grounds,” he observed, "[t]he common usage of this phrase [refers] to the view that all human beings bear God's image from the moment of conception."</span></p><p style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">But the chief justice made it clear that "common usage" was not a fundamental key to proper interpretation and application of the phrase. Instead, and after quoting extensively from the 17th century theologian Petrus van Mastricht, the 17th century Geneva Bible, Thomas Aquinas, the Book of Genesis, John Calvin and the Sixth Commandment, he asserted that the Bible and other religious texts supplied that key.</span></p><p style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">As a result, Parker explained, the cited texts incorporated into Alabama law the proposition that “(1) God made every person in His image; (2) each person therefore has a value that far exceeds the ability of human beings to calculate; and (3) human life cannot be wrongfully destroyed without incurring the wrath of a holy God, who views destruction of his image as an affront to Himself." Consequently, he continued, the word “sanctity” in the Sanctity of Life Amendment means that "even before birth, all human beings bear the image of God, and their lives cannot be destroyed without defacing His glory."</span></p><p style="background-color: white;"></p><div class="x12" style="background-color: white;"><div class="htlad-Desktop_Content_Banner"><div class="htl-ad" data-lazy-pixels="300" data-lock-refresh-size="true" data-prebid="0x0:|768x0:|1140x0:" data-refresh-max="20" data-refresh-secs="30" data-refresh="viewable" data-sizes="0x0:|768x0:300x250|1140x0:728x90" data-unit="Desktop_Content_Banner" id="htlad-2" name="htlunit-Desktop_Content_Banner"><div class="htl-ad-gpt htl-size-728x90" data-google-query-id="CKGDrtWA0YQDFUXhKAUd_RIGdQ" id="htlad-2-gpt"><div id="google_ads_iframe_/22052593477/Desktop_Content_Banner_0__container__" style="border: 0pt none; margin: auto; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Summing up those observations, the chief justice concluded his opinion by saying that “[t]he People of Alabama have declared the public policy of this State to be that unborn human life is sacred. We believe that each human being, from the moment of conception, is made in the image of God, created by Him to reflect His likeness. It is as if the People of Alabama took what was spoken of the prophet Jeremiah and applied it to every unborn person in this state: ‘Before I formed you in the womb I knew you. Before you were born I sanctified you.’ Jeremiah 1:5 (NKJV 1982). All three branches of Government are subject to a constitutional mandate to treat each unborn human life with reverence. Carving out an exception for the people in this case, small as they were, would be unacceptable to the People of this State, who have required us to treat every human being in accordance with the fear of a holy God who made them in His image."</span></span></div></div></div></div></div><p style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">That conclusion, of course, is fertilizer for a theocracy. It is difficult enough for the government to deal in democratic fashion with the often-difficult issues that lie at the intersection of individual autonomy, constitutional rights and public policy. But the democratic process and the tugs and pulls of and between citizens with interests in the outcome have, with a few notable exceptions, made it work for more than 200 years. Injecting religion into that process dramatically reduces the likelihood that the process will continue to produce useful results.</span></p></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-64640374092257780142024-02-28T22:37:00.002-05:002024-02-28T22:57:09.508-05:00Supreme Court will hear Trump immunity claim in week of April 22.<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiTP_wPJe848pa5uNggKp_XZSISAp_ROni6IByVd33X37Q7IGQbXbV03vDpxu1H16A84TdRRFUlPf5bcfbbLlrfIEC4DgaSTKmvg-iya4TGZ2abrQU3pFapuybcHk_OnBvzzmi-jHZ5Oh4tcuCkL9EzwmfB6rXnjI3cQHeICLFSEWed31O_Ub72yiIswJlf" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiTP_wPJe848pa5uNggKp_XZSISAp_ROni6IByVd33X37Q7IGQbXbV03vDpxu1H16A84TdRRFUlPf5bcfbbLlrfIEC4DgaSTKmvg-iya4TGZ2abrQU3pFapuybcHk_OnBvzzmi-jHZ5Oh4tcuCkL9EzwmfB6rXnjI3cQHeICLFSEWed31O_Ub72yiIswJlf" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhCw6gD8ikrosUZfQWmeYMGPfJKqRUMc71jXmGUzWery4ZD2d9Hdm6_-30aVI9hRzbGoi0dl6GCkhTdHsuEwfkDDhxF1foqayud0UbmldYEk7KGlOE379KXMS1kwEkQqOlFgBZBvu1ySE6g7pwUI1nDmh8MQ7-s3z1YS76Hx7mVzLUYXyxByuOZjyZKwtTY" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="299" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhCw6gD8ikrosUZfQWmeYMGPfJKqRUMc71jXmGUzWery4ZD2d9Hdm6_-30aVI9hRzbGoi0dl6GCkhTdHsuEwfkDDhxF1foqayud0UbmldYEk7KGlOE379KXMS1kwEkQqOlFgBZBvu1ySE6g7pwUI1nDmh8MQ7-s3z1YS76Hx7mVzLUYXyxByuOZjyZKwtTY" width="320" /></a></div><br /><img alt="" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="299" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiTP_wPJe848pa5uNggKp_XZSISAp_ROni6IByVd33X37Q7IGQbXbV03vDpxu1H16A84TdRRFUlPf5bcfbbLlrfIEC4DgaSTKmvg-iya4TGZ2abrQU3pFapuybcHk_OnBvzzmi-jHZ5Oh4tcuCkL9EzwmfB6rXnjI3cQHeICLFSEWed31O_Ub72yiIswJlf" width="320" /></div><br /> <p></p><p>Jack Smith asked the Supreme Court to hear the issue of Trump's claimed immunity from prosecution BEFORE the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals heard and <span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cadc.40415/gov.uscourts.cadc.40415.1208593677.0.pdf" target="_blank">ruled on the issue</a></span>. The Court declined, the Circuit ruled against Trump. Now the high court has treated as a petition for certiorari Trump's motion for a stay of the trial for obstruction of the counting of electoral votes. </p><p>Is the Court slow walking the case to protect Trump? They surely could have moved faster - like they did in the Colorado ballot case. On the equities - isn't it most desirable to try the case so that the voters have the benefit of the public trial and verdict.</p><p>The Justices are likely divided but it's not possible to know now. Someday there'll be a Bob Woodward type inside story book. Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito are the likeliest bad guys. But Brett Kavanaugh has Bush v. Gore and Clinton-Lewinsky scandal service to his dishonor. - GWC</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgQ2GkaOtdPbxMNDINgppw-iFmVEH7v9cMYE3IwMYMbWqyZqi-vUuQbqTqLoBHyccF6mEq78fkilxXPyBrBZ0UdBeGCo_W3WmgZxiqwIb4LypAlRUvyFAPkEHfT-eG1wSZhZMX3HRBoTWL0rv2dQQ09IGCLLR0BukfrgtpoGD-EhoUDGTHrXKLPgjpXyWHA" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1250" data-original-width="1085" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgQ2GkaOtdPbxMNDINgppw-iFmVEH7v9cMYE3IwMYMbWqyZqi-vUuQbqTqLoBHyccF6mEq78fkilxXPyBrBZ0UdBeGCo_W3WmgZxiqwIb4LypAlRUvyFAPkEHfT-eG1wSZhZMX3HRBoTWL0rv2dQQ09IGCLLR0BukfrgtpoGD-EhoUDGTHrXKLPgjpXyWHA=w628-h640" width="628" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-33679273101829473962024-02-27T23:14:00.001-05:002024-02-27T23:14:27.846-05:00Chief justice's Christian reasoning in IVF opinion sparks alarm over church-state separation | National Catholic Reporter<div><br /></div><a href="https://www.ncronline.org/news/chief-justices-christian-reasoning-ivf-opinion-sparks-alarm-over-church-state-separation"><b>Chief justice's Christian reasoning in IVF opinion sparks alarm over church-state separation | National Catholic Reporter</b></a><div><div class="paragraph--type--rich-text-field dropcap" style="background-color: white; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;"><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><i>When the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos are considered children under state law, its chief justice had a higher authority in mind.</i></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em;">By citing verses from the Bible and Christian theologians in his concurring opinion, Chief Justice Tom Parker alarmed advocates for church-state separation, while delighting religious conservatives who oppose abortion.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em;">Human life, Parker wrote, "cannot be wrongfully destroyed without incurring the wrath of a holy God, who views the destruction of His image as an affront to Himself."</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em;">The Alabama court's Feb. 16 <a href="https://www.ncronline.org/news/alabama-supreme-court-rules-frozen-embryos-are-children-under-wrongful-death-law" style="background-color: transparent; color: #2969ae;" target="_blank">ruling</a> stemmed from wrongful death lawsuits brought by couples whose frozen embryos were accidentally destroyed.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em;">The most immediate impact of the ruling was to leave in vitro fertilization clinics in Alabama potentially vulnerable to more lawsuits and reluctant to administer treatment. But not far behind were mounting worries about Parker's explicit references to Christian theology.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em;">While Parker's concurring opinion does not carry the force of precedent, advocates for church-state separation fear he could inspire judges in other states to push the envelope.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em;">"Now we're in a place where government officials feel emboldened to say the quiet part out loud, and directly challenge the separation of church and state, a foundational part of our democracy," said Rachel Laser, CEO of Americans United for Separation of Church and State.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em;">She said Parker's opinion was just the latest example – and a brazen one at that – of government officials advocating for <a href="https://www.ncronline.org/news/christian-nationalisms-opponents-are-getting-organized" style="background-color: transparent; color: #2969ae;" target="_blank">Christian nationalism</a>, a movement that seeks to privilege Christianity and fuse Christian and American identity.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em;">Other instances she cited include Missouri lawmakers citing Catholic and biblical teachings for restricting abortion and U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson saying the notion of church-state separation in the U.S. was a "misnomer." </p><div><br /></div></div><div class="paragraph paragraph--type--full-width-image paragraph--view-mode--default" style="background-color: white; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif; margin-left: -229.96px; width: 926.831px;"><div class="field field--name-field-media-image field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__item"><article class="media media--type-image media--view-mode-default"></article></div></div></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5861948166673829729.post-34200440006200129742024-02-27T12:35:00.003-05:002024-02-27T12:44:14.922-05:00Trump seeks stay of execution in E. Jean Carroll case<div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgNQQQgqljlDu_aJh0geHQQkQsyFPWI22DfdbCUJovD2KXXeL2Lqfi8-FA4265PEqrqO7M8A6Cx37fRZgZAeiy0rmmMytVbwT4rTsyjqGsjzvL0Pk5Jxx8iAnk8vDiuihi0D6ga-4_S4wovkClfoYxKMiFb4IQfVdA5gvgCojN-cM0rNWDsmX1jVhqk_VN5" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="161" data-original-width="312" height="165" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgNQQQgqljlDu_aJh0geHQQkQsyFPWI22DfdbCUJovD2KXXeL2Lqfi8-FA4265PEqrqO7M8A6Cx37fRZgZAeiy0rmmMytVbwT4rTsyjqGsjzvL0Pk5Jxx8iAnk8vDiuihi0D6ga-4_S4wovkClfoYxKMiFb4IQfVdA5gvgCojN-cM0rNWDsmX1jVhqk_VN5" width="320" /></a></div><br /><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Donald J. Trump has described himself as "the king of debt". Inferably that means he is often short of cash as his assets are burdened by mortgages and other security agreements. So we shouldn't be surprised that Trump is having difficulty doing what other appellants must do: post an appeal bond or other assets as security for payment of a judgment in the event that it survives appeal.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Trump was found liable for defamation of E. Jean Carroll, whom he had been found by a federal civil jury to have raped in an earlier case. Carroll alleged that she was assaulted in the dressing room of a Fifth Avenue clothing store Bergdorf Goodman. Trump, after that verdict, continued to defame her.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The New York jury awarded $7.3 million for emotional distress, $11 million for a reputation repair program, and $65 million in punitive damages. <span style="color: #2b00fe;"><a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/rules/frcp/rule_62#:~:text=The%20court%20must%20not%20require,department%20of%20the%20federal%20government." target="_blank">Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 62</a></span> provides</span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; text-indent: 16px;"><blockquote style="color: #333333;"><blockquote><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">(b) Stay by Bond or Other Security. At any time after judgment is entered, a party may obtain a stay by providing a bond or other security. The stay takes effect when the court approves the bond or other security and remains in effect for the time specified in the bond or other security.</span></blockquote></blockquote><p><b><span style="color: #2b00fe; font-family: georgia; font-size: large;"><a href="https://draft.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/5861948166673829729/3420044000620012974#" target="_blank">Trump seeks stay of execution in E. Jean Carroll case </a></span></b></p></span></div> <br /><div>But in his memorandum of law (above) seeking a stay of execution pending review of his post-trial motions Trump seeks to exempt himself from the usual rule which permits a judgment creditor to move to execute on the judgment thi8rty days after its entry on the docket. The former President's lawyers claim the verdicts are so excessive that there is such a likelihood of his success on post-trial motions that he should be exempt from the usual requirements for a stay of execution.</div><div>Below is their claim for relief:</div><div><br /></div><div><blockquote>Pursuant to Rule 62 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and this Court’s equitable
authority, Defendant President Donald J. Trump respectfully requests that this Court grant an
<b>unsecured stay of the execution of the Court’s February 8, 2024, judgment</b>, ECF No. 285, until 30
days after the resolution of President Trump’s post-trial motions under Rules 50 and 59 of the
Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which will be filed no later than March 7, 2024. In the
alternative, President Trump requests that this Court grant a partially secured stay of execution
until 30 days after the resolution of post-trial motions and authorize President Trump to post a
bond in an appropriate fraction of the amount of the judgment. In addition, President Trump
requests that this Court enter a temporary administrative stay of the judgment pending its
resolution of this motion, or in the alternative, issue a ruling on this motion by March 4, 2024. (emphasis supplied)</blockquote></div>GeorgeConkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00232093284837291838noreply@blogger.com0