People hold strong views about regulation, but do they know what “regulation” means? National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) is a landmark in regulation jurisprudence, yet the NFIB Court was divided over the meaning of the term “to regulate.” Long ago, John Stuart Mill observed that “we do not [always] understand the grounds of our opinion. But when we […]

With President Obama’s nomination of Gina McCarthy as the new Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), much attention has turned to her record as the EPA official in charge of air pollution programs, experience as the head of two states’ environmental agencies, and views on specific policies and priorities. And with the President’s nomination […]

Some local communities in the United States, particularly in the Northeast, are scrambling to oppose natural gas production enabled by hydraulic fracturing (or fracing, fracking, or hydrofracking) in shale formations. Local opposition to the impacts of fracking is understandable, but recent proposals for national bans ignore a key, more potent threat. Due to a mismatch […]

In 2011, Congress passed the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (AIA) and reformed the U.S. patent system. Most significantly, the Act replaced the “first-to-invent” patent system with a “first-to-file” system. The law is now the subject of a constitutional challenge. In this short Essay, I will explore two obstacles to this challenge: one that I view […]

I. Introduction Over the past decade, operating costs in the hedge fund industry have ballooned as the rate of new institutional investment in hedge funds has rapidly accelerated. These new institutional investors are demanding greater portfolio and  operational  transparency,  more  conscientious  compliance,  and  tighter internal controls. This correlation—between the institutionalization of hedge funds and their […]