San Francisco Seeks To Hire An Entry Level Or Lateral Tax Prof

San Francisco Faculty Posting:

The University of San Francisco School of Law is located in one of the world’s most dynamic and progressive cities, which affords our community a global perspective and access to premiere arts, culture, and centers of innovation. ...

The Law School is seeking entry-level and lateral applicants for two or more positions on our full-time faculty to begin in the fall of 2023. USF Law welcomes outstanding candidates in all areas, but is especially interested in property, torts, intellectual property, international human rights, and race and the law. We also have interest in criminal procedure, criminal law, evidence, contracts, tax, and commercial law. ...

Continue reading

Carter: That Online Test Just May Be Unconstitutional

Following up on my previous post, New York Times: Federal Judge Rules University's Scan Of Student's Room During Remote Exam Violates The Fourth Amendment:  Stephen Carter (Yale), That Online Test Just May Be Unconstitutional:

Since the start of the pandemic, online learning has become far more common — and so have online examinations. Typically, the examination software also proctors the test, observing with the student’s own camera. Does this process violate the Constitution?

A federal judge in Ohio decided last week that at least in some circumstances, the answer is yes [Ogletree v. Cleveland State University, No. 1:21-cv-00500 (N.D. Ohio Aug. 22, 2022]. The court’s impeccable reasoning should give us pause about the project of online proctoring.

Continue reading

ABA Tax Section Accepting Nominations for 2023-2025 Public Service Fellowships

The ABA Tax Section is accepting applications for Christine A. Brunswick Public Service Fellowships for 2023-2025:

The Section of Taxation is pleased to announce that it is now accepting applications for its Christine A. Brunswick Public Service Fellowship program class of 2023-2025. Applications are due November 10, 2022.

The fellowship program was developed in 2008 to address the need for tax legal assistance and to foster an interest in tax-related public service among new attorneys. Through the fellowship, recent J.D. and LL.M. graduates or law clerks practice public service tax law at a host organization for two years.

You can register for an upcoming information to learn more the fellowship. We will take questions during the sessions and share the recordings on the fellowship page.

Continue reading

Not White Enough, Not Black Enough: Reimagining Affirmative Action Jurisprudence In Law School Admissions Through A Filipino-American Paradigm

Joseph D. G. Castro (J.D. Pepperdine, 2022), Comment, Not White Enough, Not Black Enough: Reimagining Affirmative Action Jurisprudence in Law School Admissions Through a Filipino-American Paradigm, 49 Pepp. L. Rev. 195 (2022):

Writing the majority opinion upholding the use of racial preferences in law school admissions in 2003, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor anticipated that racial preferences would no longer be necessary in twenty-five years. On the contrary, 2021 has seen the astronomic rise of critical race theory, the popularity of race-driven “diversity” initiatives in higher education, and the continued surge of identity politics in the mainstream. So much has been written on affirmative action—what else could this Comment add to the conversation?

Analyzing the Court’s application of strict scrutiny through a Filipino-American paradigm, this Comment ultimately concludes that affirmative action in law school admissions is unconstitutional under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. However, this Comment also concludes that affirmative action is not only necessary to, but also consistent with, the repeatedly upheld anti-subordination aspect and redistributive rubric of the Reconstruction Amendments.

Continue reading

Borden: Fixed-Price Put Options Undermine Section 1031 Treatment Of Tenant-in-Common Interests

Bradley T. Borden (Brooklyn; Google Scholar), Fixed-Price Put Options Undermine Section 1031 Treatment of Tenant-in-Common Interests, 175 Tax Notes Fed. 1989 (June 27, 2022):

This article provides a detailed analysis of tenancy-in-common arrangements and shows how fixed-price put options to sell such interests undermine the classification of such arrangements as tenancies-in-common for federal income tax purposes. The article is reminder that there are limits to the types of terms that co-owners can adopt when they structure tenancies-in-common.

Continue reading

Tenured Law Professor Sues University Of Michigan Alleging Racial- And Gender-Based Discrimination

Michigan Daily, U-M Law Professor Sues UMich, Claims Racial- and Gender-Based Discrimination:

Laura Beny, University of Michigan Law School professor, filed a lawsuit in the U.S District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan against the University and Law School Dean Mark West on Friday, claiming race, gender, familial and marital status discrimination [Beny v. University of Michigan].

The lawsuit, which names the University, the Law School and West as defendants, asserts that Beny experienced a hostile work environment created by her co-workers and employers throughout her time at the University.

The suit claims that she encountered multiple instances of gender and race discrimination in her classroom and, upon reporting, the situations were not remediated by the University. The lawsuit references the Law School’s “lock step” payroll policy in which employees hired at the same pay rate are expected to receive equivalent raises, and the lawsuit claims that Beny was not given pay raises in lock step with a white male [John Pottow] and white female [Jill Horwitz] professor who were hired at the same salary as her. ...

Continue reading

Rutgers Seeks To Hire An Entry Level Or Lateral Tax Prof

Rutgers Faculty Posting:

Rutgers Law School invites applications from entry-level and lateral candidates for multiple tenure-track or tenured positions at the law school’s campuses in Camden and Newark. ...

The Newark location seeks qualified candidates across a broad curricular spectrum, with particular emphasis on candidates who can teach the Community and Transactional Lawyering Clinic, the Housing Justice & Tenants’ Rights Clinic, Tax Law, Trusts & Estates, and core first-year classes, including Constitutional Law and Property. ...

Continue reading

Inazu: Confident Pluralism In Law School

John Inazu (Washington University; Google Scholar), Confident Pluralism in Law School:

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to address the entering class of students at WashU Law. ...

Confident pluralism begins by recognizing two definitions of pluralism: (1) the fact of deep differences; and (2) the way we respond to those differences. We are deeply divided over things that matter a great deal. And we aren’t going to be able to resolve these differences. Given these facts of the world, we need to learn to find common ground even when we can’t agree on the common good. Confident pluralism proposes the civic aspirations of humility, patience, and tolerance to help us in this pursuit.

Like any workable political theory, confident pluralism encounters limits. No argument for pluralism welcomes all viewpoints and beliefs. Every society imposes limits. A pluralism rooted in mutual tolerance and respect will not appeal to those among us who deny the humanity of our neighbors. A pluralism committed to dialogue and persuasion cannot accommodate violent disagreement. The challenge is to keep these fringe viewpoints at bay without assuming that everyone who disagrees with us on important matters is among them. In an earlier post, I suggested this means distinguishing between people who are “wrong” and people who are “evil.”

Two trends have complicated our ability to make these distinctions and find common ground across deep differences. The first is that we are too quick to dismiss those who disagree with us without actually listening to their arguments. Too many of us fail to examine the strongest and most charitable arguments of our ideological opponents. One of the benefits of law school is learning how to identify and explain the best possible arguments for the other side, sometimes in order to strengthen our own viewpoints.

The second and related trend is that we too easily agree with our own team. We uncritically adopt or affirm the viewpoints of people we like or whom we know agree with us on a few key issues. This is particularly true on social media, where our interactions routinely cause us to overestimate the strength and salience of our own arguments and beliefs. Twenty people liking something you’ve written on Twitter doesn’t mean you’ve made a good argument or that most people agree with you.

What Does this Have to Do With Law School?

Continue reading

Free Webinar Today On Federal Tax Careers

Free webinar today on Federal Tax Careers at 1:00 p.m. ET (register here): 

Are you interested in tax law? Even if you haven’t thought about a career in tax, maybe you want to be in a courtroom litigating or at a table strategizing business deals? Have you dreamed about working in criminal law or being a federal prosecutor? Are you interested in legislation and policy? Do you want a work/life balance after you graduate? 

Consider a career with the federal government! A position on the Hill, with the U.S. Tax Court, the Department of Justice Tax Division, or IRS Office of Chief Counsel might be the right place for you. Working for the federal government, you can gain valuable experience right from the start of your career that might take years to get in private sector jobs, if ever! Join us to learn more about our programs and the application process. Our panelists will be speaking about their experiences and careers and will be available for questions.

Panelists:

Continue reading

University Of Arizona Seeks ABA Approval To Be The First Law School To Offer A JD In A Foreign Country (Australia)

Reuters, An American J.D. in Australia? One U.S Law School Wants to Go International:

The University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law is seeking to become the first U.S. law school to open a branch campus internationally, offering students a dual degree with an Australian university that will allow them to be licensed in both countries.

The Tucson school has asked the American Bar Association for permission to partner with the University of Technology Sydney for the three-year joint degree.

No U.S. school currently offers an ABA-accredited J.D. in a foreign country, according to William Adams, the ABA’s managing director for accreditation and legal education. The last school to try was denied by the ABA.

Continue reading

Supervisory Approval Of Penalties: The Opening of A Graev Pandora's Box

Monica Gianni (CSUN), Supervisory Approval of Penalties: The Opening of a Graev Pandora's Box, 75 Tax Law. __ (2022):

Section 6751(b) of the Internal Revenue Code requires supervisory approval in writing prior to assessment of certain penalties. Enacted in 1998 as part of the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) Restructuring and Reform Act, the statute’s purpose was to prevent IRS agents from using penalties as bargaining chips. The section remained essentially dormant for over 20 years, with both the IRS and taxpayers accepting the position that approval needed to be obtained only prior to assessment. The trilogy of Graev cases and a decision of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in Chai v. Commissioner changed the § 6751(b) landscape completely, opening a Pandora’s box of taxpayers using § 6751(b) to avoid penalties on the technicality of no-written-supervisory approval. Hundreds of court cases have followed, resulting in cases inconsistently interpreting § 6751(b) and well-counseled taxpayers avoiding tax penalties.

This article examines the enactment of § 6751(b) and explores in detail the Graev and Chai decisions. 

Continue reading

Legal Ed News Roundup

• ABA Journal, ABA Project Aims To Help Afghan Legal Professionals Establish Themselves In The United States
• ABA Journal, Changes Are Proposed to Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program as Part of Student Loan Debt Relief
• ABA Journal, Fewer People Are Interested In Becoming Law Professors, New Data Shows
• ABA Journal, Law School Achievement Gap By Gender For Faculty And Deans Examined In New Paper
• ABA Journal, Median Lawyer Income Is Dropping, When Adjusted For Inflation, Study Finds
• Campus Reform, Law School Orientation Makes Students Learn About Pronouns
• College Fix, Law Students Nationwide Learn From Top Conservative Legal Experts in D.C. With New Fellowship
• Cornell Chronicle, Sherry Colb, Legal Scholar and Beloved Mentor, Dies at 56

Continue reading

Roger Williams Seeks To Hire An Entry Level Or Lateral Tax Prof

AALS Placement Bulletin:

Roger Williams University School of Law expects to make at least two entry level or lateral tenured or tenure-track appointments this year. RWU Law is the only law school in Rhode Island and is part of a well-connected teaching and scholarly community that is strongly supported by the bench and bar of the state and region.

This year we are excited to have the opportunity to significantly increase the size of our faculty. We welcome applications from candidates across all areas of law, although we are particularly interested in the following fields: Business Organizations, Commercial and Business Law, Contracts, Tax, Torts, and Wills and Trusts. RWU Law, along with the university leadership, is also launching interdisciplinary Centers of Excellence in Marine & Maritime Affairs and in Property Law, and our new faculty members will have the opportunity to participate in center programming that supports their scholarship, teaching, and service.

Continue reading

Deaning While Stuttering

As a life-long stutterer, I found this New York Times video, I Stutter. But This Is What You’re Not Hearing. with writer John Hendrickson (What Joe Biden Can't Bring Himself to Say), particularly compelling:

As my fellow stutterers will understand, I have endured the daily terror of fearing the next time I will be required to speak. As far as I know, I was the only student in my elementary school, high school, college, and law school, and the only lawyer in my law firm and professor in my law schools, with this speech disorder. I am forever grateful for the teachers, professors, lawyers, and faculty who saw something in me that I never saw in myself and gave me the opportunity and unspoken encouragement to succeed as a student, lawyer, and law professor.

As you can imagine, deaning has made the daily terror particularly acute, with meetings and speeches filling my calendar. But for the first time in my life, I have begun talking about it with others, first in my presentation to the Pepperdine Caruso Law faculty when I ran for dean. I closed my remarks by saying:

There are many reasons why you may decide that I shouldn’t be dean.
But one of them shouldn’t be how I talk.
Because how I talk has made me the man that I am.

I have since shared my story with old and new friends, usually over dinner. Their reactions encouraged me to talk about my struggle at our Baccalaureate Service for our Christian students and their families the night before graduation in May. We give a Pepperdine Caruso Law-branded Bible to each of the graduates, inscribed with their name and the five Bible verses from my message on Purpose, Perseverance, and Psalm 139 Post-Pepperdine. I explain how these verses have equipped me to not only survive but thrive in my dean role despite the difficulties I face. I encourage the graduates to lean on these verses when they face the inevitable challenges that will come their way. Among those in attendance at the service this year was Frank Biden, the brother of the President. One of the most unexpected twists in my dean journey was becoming friends with Frank, due to our shared faith and shared struggle with our speech.

In July, I was invited to be one of six "experienced" deans to lead the annual workshop hosted by the ABA for all new law school deans. My assigned topic was Leadership and Management, and I spoke on the ten things I wish I had known when I had become a dean five years earlier. My last item was Leading Through Weakness, and I shared the challenges I have faced deaning with my stutter. I closed by telling the new and experienced deans about what I had said to the faculty when I ran for dean, and what I have learned since then. I talked about an expression that originated in the computer industry in the 1970s: programmers found what they thought was a “bug” in some software, but when they dug deeper, they realized that it was a “feature” intentionally added by the developer to serve an important purpose that was not apparent on the surface. I said that if I could go back in time, I would change my message to the faculty to:

Continue reading

Lesson From The Tax Court: The Law Of Unintended Consequences

To say the Internal Revenue Code is complex is like saying a virus is hard to see.  It understates the obvious. NSS.  Today the Tax Court teaches us one consequence of that complexity: the meaning and scope of one statute (§6103) can be altered by the later addition of another statute (§7623(b)).  The former is the statute that requires the IRS to keep taxpayer information confidential.  The latter is the statute that allows whistleblowers to obtain Tax Court review of a denial of a whistleblower award.

In Whistleblower 972-17W v. Commissioner, 159 T.C. No. 1 (July 13, 2022) (Judge Toro), the Court said the IRS had to give a whistleblower the unredacted returns and return information of three taxpayers that the whistleblower informed on.  Folks, this is a reviewed opinion and all 15 of the reviewing judges agreed with Judge Toro’s decision (one judge did not participate).  While the decision is rational, its conclusion is certainly not a slam dunk.  IMHO it misses the forest for the trees, resting on a curious presumption about the statutory text in 6103.  Whether or not readers agree with that, we can all agree this case illustrates how a later statute may give new meaning to the words in an older statute.  That is an inherent difficulty in interpreting statutory language that is part of such a wickedly complex Code.

Trigger warning: today’s post runs a bit longer than normal.  So the refresh rate will likely bother those who click through.  I am so sorry for that!  But this lesson is really just so cool that I hope you will persevere.

Continue reading

NY Times: How Jones Day Led A Political Revolution

New York Times Magazine:  How a Corporate Law Firm Led a Political Revolution, by David Enrich (Author, Servants of the Damned: Giant Law Firms, Donald Trump and the Corruption of Justice (2022)):

The untold story of Jones Day’s push to move the American government and courts to the right. ...

For much of its history, Jones Day was a juggernaut in the field of corporate litigation. A global goliath with more than 40 offices and about 2,500 lawyers, it raked in billions a year in fees from tobacco, opioid, gun and oil companies, among many other giant corporations in need of a state-of-the-art defense. More than most of its competitors, the firm had an army of litigators who had perfected the art of exploiting tiny legal wrinkles, of burying outmatched opponents in paperwork and venue changes and procedural minutiae. But over the past two decades, Jones Day has been building a different kind of legal practice, one dedicated not just to helping Republicans win elections but to helping them achieve their political aims once in office. Chief among those aims was dismantling what Don McGahn — the Jones Day partner who helped run Trump’s campaign and then became his White House counsel — disparagingly referred to as the “administrative state.” To do that, the firm was bringing all the ruthless energy and creativity of corporate law to the political realm.

Jones Day lured dozens of young Supreme Court clerks, mostly from conservative justices, with six-figure signing bonuses and the opportunity to work on favored causes, including legal challenges to gun control and Obamacare. The firm allotted countless pro bono hours to aiding the needy — and also to assisting deep-pocketed right-wing groups as they fought against early voting and a federal corporate-oversight body.

Continue reading

TaxProf Blog Weekend Roundup

Saturday:

• This Week's Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts
• More On The ABA's Proposal To Make Law School Admission Tests Optional
• Peking University Seeks To Hire An Entry Level Or Lateral Tax Prof
• NY Times: Federal Judge Rules University's Scan Of Student's Room During Remote Exam Violates The Fourth Amendment

Sunday:

• God, The Bible, And Hamilton
• French: Christian Political Ethics Are Upside Down
• Inazu: Interfaith Doesn't Mean Compromise
• The Top Five New Tax Papers

God, The Bible, And Hamilton

Longtime readers know of my obsession with interest in Hamilton, especially the faith aspects of the play (see C.S. Lewis & Lin-Manuel Miranda: How I Found My Faith In Mere Christianity And Deepened It In Hamilton and the links below). I just came across these great books and article:

Kevin Cloud, God and Hamilton: Spiritual Themes from the Life of Alexander Hamilton and the Broadway Musical He Inspired:

Discover Spiritual Truths from the Smash Broadway Hit Hamilton that Will Transform Your Life

Hamilton―the hip-hop musical about a forgotten Founding Father―is the most compelling musical of our time. But if you watch it without understanding the spiritual themes of Alexander Hamilton’s life, you only get half the story. Discover how Hamilton is a modern-day parable that will:

• Lead you into a deeper experience of God’s grace
• Help you battle guilt and shame
• Challenge you to forgive
• Inspire your faith
• Engage you in the struggle for human equality

God and Hamilton impressively weaves together insights from the musical itself, the lives of Alexander and Eliza Hamilton, and the story of Scripture into a tapestry that challenges people of faith to reexamine their lives.

God and Hamilton turned me inside out and revealed a side of Hamilton I had never thought to explore.―Lauren Boyd, Hamilton Broadway Cast

A wonderful example of drawing from contemporary culture to understand how God works…I cannot recommend it more highly!―Mike Breen, Founder, 3DM; Author, Building a Disciplining Culture 

A bold and creative exploration of the themes in life that matter most. In this beautiful book, Kevin Cloud helps us see, listen, and open to the all-consuming love God pours out to us.―Phileen Heurtz, Founding Partner, Gravity, a Center for Contemplative Activism

For all who struggle with doubt, depression, and despair, God and Hamilton offers an inspiring way forward. Kevin Cloud’s book made my heart sing!―Craig Detweiler, President, Seattle School of Theology and Sociology

Christianity Today, Here’s Every Biblical Reference in ‘Hamilton’:

Continue reading

French: Christian Political Ethics Are Upside Down

David French (The Dispatch), Christian Political Ethics Are Upside Down:

Three things are true at once. First, the United States is the most Christian advanced democracy in the world. Even with declining rates of religious belief and declining rates of church attendance, a solid supermajority (65 percent) of Americans identify as Christian. ...

Second, both the Republican and Democratic parties are utterly dependent upon their most devout members for their electoral success. As I’ve noted before, nonwhite Democrats (and especially black Democrats) are among the most God-fearing, churchgoing members of American society. At the same time, the Republican Party would be irrelevant without its own white Evangelical base. ...

Third, American political culture is a toxic, hyperpartisan, corrupt, and increasingly violent mess. Given the first two factors mentioned above, this should not be. After all, Jesus could not have been more clear. In John 13, he declared, “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” That’s the dream. Here’s the reality: 

Again, remember that both of these coalitions are chock-full of Christians. It is not the case (at least not yet) that America has one religious party and one secular party. The mutual loathing you see comes from people who could recite every syllable of the Apostles’ Creed side-by-side and believe wholeheartedly in the divine inspiration of scripture.

How does this happen? The longer I live the more convinced I am that our Christian political ethic is upside down. On a bipartisan basis, the church has formed its members to be adamant about policies that are difficult and contingent and flexible about virtues that are clear and mandatory.

Continue reading

Inazu: Interfaith Doesn't Mean Compromise

John Inazu (Washington University; Google Scholar), Interfaith Doesn't Mean Compromise:

One of the things I most appreciate about my friend Eboo Patel and his colleagues at Interfaith America (where I serve as a Senior Fellow) is that they take seriously the religious differences that divide us. I remember interfaith efforts when I was in college in the 1990s. Their general vibe suggested that religious differences didn’t really matter, all roads pointed to the same God, and we could do great things together if we stuck to the lowest common denominator.

That’s not how religion works for most people. It’s not how it works for Eboo or me. A genuine interfaith effort takes seriously our differences and works on relationships across those differences. ...

The reality of an interfaith America provides an opportunity for Christians like me to engage with confidence and compassion in a world of difference. This opportunity is captured in the verse that Tim Keller and I selected as the epigraph for our book, Uncommon Ground: Living Faithfully in a World of Difference. In Ephesians 4:1-2, the Apostle Paul exhorts Christians to: “Walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love.”

Paul’s charge to Christians applies to anyone seeking greater empathy and understanding without minimizing significant differences. As I wrote in Uncommon Ground:

Continue reading

The Top Five New Tax Papers

For the second week in a row, there is quite a bit of movement in this week's list of the Top 5 Recent Tax Paper Downloads, with a new #1 paper and new papers debuting on the list at #3, #4, and #5:

1. [157 Downloads]  Blockchain and Tax Administration: A Critical Assessment, by Eliza Mik (Chinese University of Hong Kong; Google Scholar) & Noam Noked (Chinese University of Hong Kong; Google Scholar)
2. [129 Downloads]  'Moralist' Versus 'Scientist': Stanley Surrey and the Public Intellectual Practice of Tax Policy, by Daniel Shaviro (NYU; Google Scholar)
3. [106 Downloads]  A Brief History of U.S. Approaches to Corporate Tax Integration and Some Lessons, by George K. Yin (Virginia)
4. [86 Downloads]  The Abandonment of International College Athletes by NIL Policy, by Victoria Haneman (Creighton; Google Scholar) & David Weber (Creighton; Google Scholar)
5. [85 Downloads]  Law, Policy, and the Taxation of Block Rewards, by Omri Marian (UC-Irvine; Google Scholar)

This Week's Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts

1. Bryan Camp (Texas Tech), Lesson From The Tax Court: State Law Label Did Not Control Federal Tax Consequences
2. Academic Freedom Alliance, AFA Calls For An End To Required Faculty Diversity Statements 
3. Bryce Clayton Newell (Oregon), 2021 Meta-Ranking Of Flagship U.S. Law Reviews
4. Elizabeth Katz (Washington University), Kyle Rozema (Washington University) & Sarath Sanga (Northwestern, Women in U.S. Law Schools, 1948-2021
5. Jason Scott (AccessLex) & Joshua Jackson (AccessLex), Are Law Schools Raising Their Attrition And Transfer Rates To Boost Their Bar Exam Pass Rates?
6. Reuters, '$10K Doesn't Make A Big Difference.' Law Grads Are Lukewarm On Biden's Debt Forgiveness Plan
7. Jake Truscott (Georgia), Law School And Law Professor Twitter Rankings
8. ABA Journal, Median Lawyer Income Is Dropping
9. Reuters, ABA Legal Ed Council Signals Support For Bar Exam Alternatives
10. Stephanie Hunter McMahon (Cincinnati), Using the Tax System to Ease Some of the Dobbs Hardship

More On The ABA's Proposal To Make Law School Admission Tests Optional

Following up on my previous posts (links below):  Higher Ed Dive, Mixed Reactions as ABA Considers Tossing LSAT Mandate:

Comments are pouring in from law professors, students and test prep companies as the association ponders chucking the exam requirement.

The American Bar Association’s proposal to remove requirements that applicants submit entrance exam scores — notably the Law School Admission Test — has so far drawn a mixed reaction from legal professionals and academics. ...

The proposal to alter the standard comes as a movement to extract testing requirements from undergraduate admissions sweeps the nation, with at least 1,700 institutions not mandating test results for the fall 2023 admissions cycle. COVID-19 challenged the SAT and ACT’s dominant place in admissions as pandemic restrictions prevented common testing sites from opening.

However, testing requirements may prove more difficult to dislodge from the often competitive law school admissions culture, where the LSAT has been a cornerstone for decades. ...

Supporters of ending LSAT and testing mandates say doing so would remove hurdles for underrepresented students to apply to law school, potentially improving the law field’s racial diversity. Meanwhile, the LSAT’s promoters argue it provides the best objective measure of academic talent before students start taxing law school coursework.

Continue reading

Peking University Seeks To Hire An Entry Level Or Lateral Tax Prof

Peking University School of Transnational Law Faculty Posting:

STL seeks highly qualified entry-level and established scholars who teach first-year J.D. courses in Property, Civil Procedure, or Contracts; U.S. and multinational tax law and policy; U.S. and international bankruptcy; China law and legal history in English; and a variety of upper-level courses with multinational perspectives, such as IBT, Comparative Law, Environmental Law and Policy, and Multinational Litigation and Arbitration. We welcome inquiries from highly qualified individuals regardless of teaching or research area.

Continue reading

NY Times: Federal Judge Rules University's Scan Of Student's Room During Remote Exam Violates The Fourth Amendment

New York Times, Remote Scan of Student’s Room Before Test Violated His Privacy, Judge Rules:

A federal judge said on Monday that it was unconstitutional for a university in Ohio to virtually scan the bedroom of a chemistry student before he took a remote test, a decision that could affect how schools use remote-monitoring software popularized during the Covid-19 pandemic.

The right to privacy of the student, Aaron M. Ogletree, outweighed the interests of Cleveland State University, ruled Judge J. Philip Calabrese of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio. The judge ordered lawyers for Mr. Ogletree and the university to discuss potential remedies for the case [Ogletree v. Cleveland State University, No. 1:21-cv-00500 (N.D. Ohio Aug. 22, 2022].

The use of virtual software to remotely monitor test takers exploded during the first years of the coronavirus pandemic, when millions of students were suddenly required to take classes online to minimize the spread of the disease. Students and privacy experts have raised concerns about these programs, which can detect keystrokes and collect feeds from a computer’s camera and microphone. ...

Continue reading

Weekly SSRN Tax Article Review And Roundup: Elkins Reviews Plekhanova's Taxes Through The Reciprocity Lens

This week, David Elkins (Netanya, visiting NYU 2021-2023; Google Scholar) reviews a new paper by Victoria Plekhanova (Massey), Taxes Through the Reciprocity Lens, 70 Can. Tax J. 303 (2022).

In this week’s feature article, Victoria Plekhanova formulates what she describes as a reciprocity-based framework for a systematic assessment of the normative merits and effectiveness of taxes. Painting with a broad brush, the author begins by describing Aristotelian concepts of justice, and in particular distributive justice (those who are equal are entitled to equal shares, and those who are unequal are entitled to unequal shares in proportion to their inequality) and commutative justice (a corrective remedy should rectify the injustice inflicted by one person on another). Each deals with a different moral problem. Distributive justice focuses on the sharing of burdens and benefits, while corrective justice links the wrongdoer and the sufferer of injustice in terms of their correlative positions prior to and after an interaction.

Continue reading

Weekly Legal Education Roundup

• ABA Journal, Fewer People Are Interested in Becoming Law Professors, New Data Shows
• Kevin Ashley (Pittsburgh), Teaching Law and Digital Age Legal Practice with an AI and Law Seminar: Justice, Lawyering and Legal Education in the Digital Age
• Chronicle of Higher Education, More Colleges Are Adding Diversity to Tenure Standards. But the Debate’s Not Settled.
• Diverse Issues in Higher Education, University of Idaho Law School Discrimination Case Will Go to Trial
• Elizabeth Katz (Washington University), Kyle Rozema (Washington University) & Sarath Sanga (Northwestern), Women in U.S. Law Schools, 1948-2021
• Press Release, AFA Calls for An End to Required Diversity Statements
• Reuters, '$10K Doesn't Make a Big Difference.' Law Grads Lukewarm on Debt Forgiveness Plan

Continue reading

Tax Policy In The Biden Administration

• Bloomberg, IRS Will Wipe Away $1.2 Billion in Late Fees From Pandemic
• Bloomberg, 'Medtronic' Ruling Bolsters Multinational Corporate Tax Options
• Bloomberg, Next, the Supreme Court Decides How to Punish US Expats
• Bloomberg, Offshore Tax Loophole Helps Americans Cheat IRS, Senate Says
• Bloomberg, States to Weigh Entering Charity Info-Sharing Agreement With IRS 

Continue reading

'$10K Doesn't Make A Big Difference.' Law Grads Are Lukewarm On Biden's Debt Forgiveness Plan

Reuters, '$10K Doesn't Make a Big Difference.' Law Grads Lukewarm on Debt Forgiveness Plan:

Forgiving $10,000 or $20,000 of federal student loan debt may not be a game-changer for most debt-strapped lawyers, but experts say other provisions in the White House's new debt-relief plan could save attorney borrowers far more over time. ...

The plan is a mixed bag for lawyers. Biden did not restrict forgiveness to undergraduate borrowers as some had feared, meaning loans taken out to fund law school are eligible. Borrowers qualify if they earned less than $125,000 individually or who had family incomes of less than $250,000 in either 2020 or 2021.

But $10,000 or even $20,000 may not make a significant dent for many lawyers. Nearly 71% of law students leave campus with student loans, according to the U.S. Department of Education, and their average debt hovers around $138,500 — higher than any other field besides medicine.

Continue reading

The Earth Isn't Flat, And Neither Is Illinois'—Or Any Other State's—Income Tax

David Merriman (Illinois-Chicago; Google Scholar), Michael Disher (Illinois-Chicago), Francis Choi (Illinois-Chicago) & Xiaoyan Hu (Illinois-Chicago), The Earth Isn't Flat, and Neither is Illinois' — Or Any Other State's — Income Tax:

In her book, Flat Earth: The History of an Infamous Idea, Christine Garwood explains that from medieval times, long predating Christopher Columbus’ famous voyages, educated people knew that the earth was not flat. Nevertheless, the flat earth myth persisted for centuries and even has some, possibly (non)ironic, modern adherents (see R. Brazil 2020). Simplistic and wrong-head ed ideas often persist despite unassailable evidence to the contrary and a consensus among those who have carefully considered the question. The exaggerated dichotomy between “flat tax rate” and “graduated tax rate” states is a current manifestation of this phenomenon. Many members of the public, and some people on the fringes of the policymaking world, overstate the differences between these cases and conclude that only graduated rate states can deliver “progressive” tax policy that results in tax liabilities rising with incomes. 

Continue reading

Ohio State Seeks To Hire A Lateral Tax Prof

AALS Placement Bulletin:

The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law seeks a junior to mid-career lateral candidate for a position in the area of Tax Law or in both Business and Tax Law. ...

Candidates should send a cover letter, including a statement of work they have done to promote diversity and inclusion, and C.V. to Paul Rose. Applicants are encouraged to submit OSU’s Equal Employment Identification Form.

Continue reading

Morse: APA Challenges To Old Tax Guidance And The Six-Year Default Limitations Period

Susan C. Morse (Texas; Google Scholar), Out of Time? APA Challenges to Old Tax Guidance and the Six-Year Default Limitations Period:

The government has just begun to raise the six-year limitations period under 28 U.S.C. § 2401(a) to defend against administrative procedure challenges to old tax guidance. This defense should work. The tradeoff between accuracy and repose in these cases is solved by the six-year limitations period of 28 U.S.C. § 2401(a), which begins to run when guidance issues for such administrative procedure claims. One complication in tax is that most opportunities to raise administrative procedure claims arise in deficiency or refund cases, where the pre-litigation tax procedure can be lengthy and outside the control of the plaintiff. But the solution is not to hold the limitations period open indefinitely. That would give no weight to the value of repose. Instead, the right solution is to temper the effect of the limitations period with appropriate adjustments, including equitable tolling and estoppel and administrative practices, such as waiving the limitations period with respect to tax returns filed within six years of the issuance of challenged guidance.

Continue reading

Teaching Law And Digital Age Legal Practice With An AI And Law Seminar

Kevin Ashley (Pittsburgh; Google Scholar), Teaching Law and Digital Age Legal Practice with an AI and Law Seminar: Justice, Lawyering and Legal Education in the Digital Age, 88 Chi.-Kent L. Rev. 783 (2013):

A seminar on Artificial Intelligence ("Al") and Law can teach law students lessons about legal reasoning and legal practice in the digital age. Al and Law is a subfield of Al/computer science research that focuses on designing computer programs—computational models—that perform legal reasoning. These computational models are used in building tools to assist in legal practice and pedagogy and in studying legal reasoning in order to contribute to cognitive science and jurisprudence. Today, subject to a number of qualifications, computer programs can reason with legal rules, apply legal precedents, and even argue like a legal advocate.

Continue reading

UMass Seeks To Hire An Entry Level Or Lateral Tax Prof

Massachusetts Faculty Posting:

UMass Law welcomes applications for a tenure-track or tenured faculty position to begin July 1, 2023. The successful candidate will teach Civil Procedure in the law school’s first-year curriculum, as well as one or more of the following areas: Criminal Law, Criminal Procedure, Evidence, Health Law, Intellectual Property Law, Labor and Employment Law, Race and the Law, or Tax Law. ...

Continue reading

Median Lawyer Income Is Dropping

Following up on last week's post, The Median Real Income Of Lawyers Has Fallen 1.9% Since 2001:  ABA Journal, Median Lawyer Income Is Dropping, When Adjusted For Inflation, Study Finds:

Lawyers’ median real income has decreased by 1.9% over nearly two decades, according to the study by researchers at the Old Dominion University.

Reuters has the story, while the TaxProf Blog noted the findings. ...

Continue reading

Inflation Reduction Act Could Boost Popularity Of Tax Insurance

Law360, Inflation Reduction Act Could Boost Tax Insurance Popularity:

Concerns that the Inflation Reduction Act's funding boost to the Internal Revenue Service could lead to more audits may spur new interest in tax insurance, an increasingly popular product for mitigating the risk of challenges by taxing authorities.

President Joe Biden signed H.R 5376, or the Inflation Reduction Act, on Aug. 16. Under the law, the IRS will receive a nearly $80 billion funding boost, with nearly $46 billion earmarked for enforcement. As a result, the IRS will not only have the budget to increase the number of audits it performs but also be able to litigate more of the tax positions it reviews, Jessica Harger, North America tax practice leader at Aon, told Law360. Even without the act, the number of IRS audits has been increasing in recent years after hitting a historic low in the last decade, Harger said.

The increased probability of an audit by a taxing authority could result in more taxpayers seeking out tax liability insurance, an insurance product that has been steadily rising in popularity in recent years. Six thousand such policies were placed in 2021, compared to 500 policies placed in 2015, said Dean Andrews, head of tax liability insurance at broker BMS Group.

The product covers a policyholder against the risk of its tax position being successfully challenged by a taxing authority. Tax insurance policies will normally cover the additional tax owed as a result of a successful challenge as well as interest and penalties. They can also cover legal and accounting fees incurred in defending a challenge as well as pay a "gross up," which is a payment made to cover any tax due on the insurance proceeds paid to the policyholder.

Continue reading

Academic Freedom Alliance Calls For An End To Required Faculty Diversity Statements

Following up on yesterday's post, More Colleges (And Law Schools) Are Adding Diversity To Tenure Standards. But The Debate’s Not Settled.:  Press Release, AFA Calls for An End to Required Diversity Statements:

Statement says forced pledges of conformity “threaten to impose a suffocating orthodoxy”

The Academic Freedom Alliance (AFA) today released a statement urging institutions of higher education to desist from demanding “diversity statements” as conditions of employment or promotion. The AFA’s statement responds to the rising trend of academic institutions requiring members or prospective members of faculties to sign pledges or make statements committing themselves to advance “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI) or to detail the ways in which they have done or will do so.

“Academics seeking employment or promotion will almost inescapably feel pressured to say things that accommodate the perceived ideological preferences of an institution demanding a diversity statement, notwithstanding the actual beliefs or commitments of those forced to speak” said Janet Halley, co-chair of the AFA Academic Committee and Eli Goldston Professor of Law at Harvard Law School.* 

Continue reading

Clausing: The Global Minimum Tax Lives On

Foreign Affairs:  The Global Minimum Tax Lives On, by Kimberly Clausing (UCLA; Google Scholar):

For decades, countries have attempted to attract multinational companies by lowering corporate taxes, and companies have responded by shifting reported profits toward low-tax jurisdictions. As a consequence, governments have lost hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue at the same time that multinational companies often pay single-digit tax rates. Although corporations and their shareholders have benefited from this race to the bottom, governments were left with no alternative but to shift tax burdens toward consumers and workers.

Last year, more than 135 countries signed an agreement to transform international taxation by requiring profitable companies to pay at least 15 percent in corporate tax, regardless of where they reported their profits. As Lawrence Summers, the former U.S. secretary of the Treasury Department, noted at the time, this political agreement represented “a triumph of Detroit over Davos”: leaders put their workers and citizens above shareholders, addressing a long-standing global collective-action problem.

Unfortunately, although U.S. leadership was pivotal in forging this agreement, U.S. lawmakers have come up short. Senator Joe Manchin, the West Virginia Democrat who has outsize influence in an evenly divided U.S. Senate, declared that moving first on the global minimum tax would be disadvantageous to U.S. companies, and it was not included in the Inflation Reduction Act. This means the United States will not be party to the agreement, since the agreement required all signatories to enact changes to their tax codes. The Inflation Reduction Act did include a corporate alternative minimum tax, but that should not be confused with adopting a global minimum tax: it does not tax the foreign income of U.S. multinational companies on a country-by-country basis, so companies will still have an incentive to operate in countries with rock-bottom tax rates.

All is not lost, however.

Continue reading

The Exclusion Of Public Legal Education From Mandatory And Aspirational State Pro Bono Service Requirements

Amy Wallace (New York Law School), The Exclusion of Public Legal Education from Mandatory and Aspirational State Pro Bono Service Requirements, 23 Loy. J. of Pub. Int. L. __ (2022):

Pro bono service is embedded in legal education and practice. Every year, lawyers and law students across the United States engage in countless hours of pro bono service. There are over 1.3 million lawyers in the country and more than one hundred thousand law students enrolled in law school. Lawyers perform an average of thirty-seven hours of pro bono work each year. They reference several factors that motivate them to perform this work but the desire to help people in need ranks highest. Professional duty is also listed as an important factor for lawyers choosing to perform pro bono work. The moral obligation to help those who do not have access to the legal profession is captured in the mandatory and aspirational pro bono requirements codified in virtually every state. The state standards all include the most essential direct legal services needed to address the urgent needs of those who cannot afford legal representation. The critical importance of direct pro bono legal representation cannot be overstated. Most states also include other voluntary legal activities lawyers can perform to assist their communities. Public legal education projects are programs where law students and lawyers teach community members about the law. 

Continue reading

Loyola-New Orleans Seeks To Hire An Entry Level Or Lateral Tax Prof

Loyola-New Orleans Faculty Posting:

Loyola University New Orleans College of Law is now accepting applications for two tenure-track or tenured positions to begin August 1, 2023. We are seeking candidates with expertise in the following areas: (1) Tax Law and (2) Constitutional Law. We especially welcome applications from candidates who will add to the diversity of our educational community and who have demonstrated expertise in working with a diverse student body. J.D. or equivalent is required. ...

Continue reading

More Colleges (And Law Schools) Are Adding Diversity To Tenure Standards. But The Debate’s Not Settled.

Following up on my previous posts:

• Brian Soucek (UC-Davis), Diversity Statements, 55 U.C. Davis L. Rev. 101 (2022)
• Brian Leiter (Chicago) & Brian Soucek (UC-Davis), The Constitutionality Of Required Faculty Diversity Statements (Chronicle of Higher Education Debate) 
• Brian Leiter (Chicago), The Legal Problem With Diversity Statements (Chronicle of Higher Education)

Chronicle of Higher Education, More Colleges Are Adding Diversity to Tenure Standards. But the Debate’s Not Settled.:

The California Community Colleges system approved a new policy in May that added diversity, equity, and inclusion criteria to tenure and promotion reviews. Then, a couple of weeks later, the University of Washington’s faculty rejected a proposal to have professors submit a diversity statement as part of the tenure process.

The contrast highlights a fierce debate happening across higher education — and across the political spectrum — over whether professors should have to demonstrate support for their institutions’ diversity goals to move up the academic ladder.

Continue reading

NY Times: An Unusual And Tax Savvy $1.6 Billion Donation Bolsters Conservatives

New York Times, An Unusual $1.6 Billion Donation Bolsters Conservatives:

A new conservative nonprofit group scored a $1.6 billion windfall last year via a little-known donor — an extraordinary sum that could give Republicans and their causes a huge financial boost ahead of the midterms, and for years to come.

The source of the money was Barre Seid, an electronics manufacturing mogul, and the donation is among the largest — if not the largest — single contributions ever made to a politically focused nonprofit. The beneficiary is a new political group controlled by Leonard A. Leo, an activist who has used his connections to Republican donors and politicians to help engineer the conservative dominance of the Supreme Court and to finance battles over abortion rights, voting rules and climate change policy.

This windfall will help cement Mr. Leo’s status as a kingmaker in conservative big money politics. It could also give conservatives an advantage in a type of difficult-to-trace spending that shapes elections and political fights.

The cash infusion was arranged through an unusual series of transactions that appear to have avoided tax liabilities. It originated with Mr. Seid, a longtime conservative donor who made a fortune as the chairman and chief executive of an electrical device manufacturing company in Chicago now known as Tripp Lite.

Rather than merely giving cash, Mr. Seid donated 100 percent of the shares of Tripp Lite to Mr. Leo’s nonprofit group before the company was sold to an Irish conglomerate for $1.65 billion, according to tax records provided to The New York Times, corporate filings and a person with knowledge of the matter.

The nonprofit, called the Marble Freedom Trust, then received all of the proceeds from the sale, in a transaction that appears to have been structured to allow the nonprofit group and Mr. Seid to avoid paying taxes on the proceeds.

Continue reading

Tampon Taxes: Menstruation, Pregnancy, And The Complexities Of Comparison

Emily Gold Waldman (Pace), Compared to What? Menstruation, Pregnancy, and the Complexities of Comparison, 41 Colum. J. Gender & L. 218 (2021): 

When crafting a sex discrimination argument, finding the right comparison can be crucial. Indeed, comparison-drawing has been a key strategy for advocates challenging the constitutionality of the tampon tax. In their 2016 lawsuit challenging New York’s tampon tax, the plaintiffs alleged that the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance had imposed a “double standard” when deciding which products would be considered tax-free medical items and which would not. Similar arguments were made in the subsequent challenge to Florida's tampon tax. In both cases, the arguments had powerful rhetorical force, helping to effectuate legislative repeal of the tampon taxes in those states.

Continue reading

Weekly SSRN Tax Article Review And Roundup: Roberts Reviews Carbon Pricing And The Elasticity Of Co2 Emissions

This week, Tracey Roberts (Cumberland; Google Scholar) reviews Ryan Rafaty (Oxford; Google Scholar), Geoffroy Dolphin (Cambridge) & Felix Pretis (Victoria; Google Scholar), Carbon Pricing and the Elasticity of Co2 Emissions, (Aug. 12, 2022).

In December of 2014, at the 21st Conference of the Parties to the Framework Convention on Climate Change in Paris, nearly 200 countries agreed to hold “the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C.” These temperature goals are designed to avoid the extraordinary economic, social, and ecological damage likely to occur if we fail to address climate change in an effective way. To meet these goals, all countries will need to transform their economies to change their power generation and transmission systems, transportation systems, their industrial processes, their built environments, including heating and cooling systems, and land use policies for timberlands, grasslands, and farms. It will also require that we change our consumption habits. The next question was: “How can we do all of that?”

Continue reading

The Year Of Magical Teaching: Lessons Learned From One Class In Three Modalities

Debra Moss Vollweiler (Nova), The Year of Magical Teaching: Lessons Learned from One Class in Three Modalities:

This article narrates eight key lessons learned by an experienced law professor teaching one course in three different ways during one academic year. During the 2021-2022 academic year, I taught one course—Secured Transactions—three times, for three different schools, and in three different modalities. While I certainly do not stand alone in self-reflecting on my teaching during recent times, in the recent year, I had a unique situation that allowed me to isolate and consider my teaching of a subject, away from preparing the doctrine of the subject itself.

Although thinking about “teaching” historically was not the focus of law professors in legal education, there has been a slow steady change in the interest of the discipline of teaching among legal educators. More recently, it is already clear that the global pandemic of 2020 has awakened a new wave of thinking about teaching in legal education, although this time, hitting more faculty more personally. It is now clear that law faculty all need—and that students deserve—support and training in best educational practices to ensure success. The lessons learned in this past year can further that goal.

Continue reading

George Washington Seeks To Hire An Entry Level Or Lateral Tax Prof

George Washington Faculty Posting:

The George Washington University Law School invites applications for multiple tenure-track or tenured faculty appointments, at the rank of Associate Professor or Professor, beginning as early as Fall 2023. The school may hire in any area based on a candidate’s overall strength. Areas of particular interest include 1L classes (torts, contracts, criminal law, civil procedure, property, legislation & regulation, and constitutional law); business and finance, including corporate governance, tax, and bankruptcy; civil rights law; cybersecurity; environmental law; health law; international law; intellectual property; labor law; privacy and technology; and trusts and estates. ...

Continue reading

Women In U.S. Law Schools, 1948-2021

Elizabeth D. Katz (Washington University), Kyle Rozema (Washington University; Google Scholar) & Sarath Sanga (Northwestern; Google Scholar), Women in U.S. Law Schools, 1948-2021:

We study the progress of women’s representation and achievement in law schools. To do this, we assemble a new dataset on the number of women and men students, faculty, and deans at all ABA-approved U.S. law schools from 1948 to the present. These data enable us to study many unexplored features of women’s progress in law schools for the first time, including the process by which women initially gained access to each law school, the variance in women’s experiences across law schools, the relationship between women’s representation and student achievement, and the extent to which women occupy lower status faculty and deanship positions. We contextualize our findings by situating them within the vast qualitative literature on women’s experiences in law schools and the legal profession.

Continue reading

McMahon: Using The Tax System To Ease Some Of The Dobbs Hardship

Stephanie Hunter McMahon (Cincinnati), Using the Tax System to Ease Some of the Dobbs Hardship, 176 Tax Notes Fed. 1105 (Aug. 18, 2022):

Through Dobbs, the Supreme Court has ensured that many women throughout this country won’t have access to abortion in their home states. Even before Dobbs, however, many states had extremely limited access to this medical care. For many women to exercise their fundamental human right to abortion and attendant healthcare, it has been necessary that they travel sometimes hundreds of miles and often pay significant sums. That cost is an economic hardship in addition to the other hardships imposed by states that refuse to recognize a woman’s right to an abortion.

This article doesn’t have an answer for the Dobbs decision; it merely provides information about the resources in the IRC to help those with limited access to abortion.

Continue reading

Federal Court Allows Tenured Professor's Discrimination Lawsuit Against Law School To Go To Trial

Following up on my previous posts (links below):  Diverse Issues in Higher Education, University of Idaho Law School Discrimination Case Will Go to Trial:

A discrimination case involving University of Idaho College of Law professor Shaakirrah Sanders will go to trial, giving Sanders the chance to argue that she was discriminated against by school deans, KTVB7 reported.

This development comes after a judge said the court found sufficient evidence to raise issues of alleged discrimination. The trial is set for Oct. 11 in Coeur d'Alene.

Sanders will now be able to sue former interim dean Dr. Jerrold Long and former dean Mark Adams.

Continue reading

Increased Corporate Political Contributions In The Decade Since Citizens United Has Not Affected State Tax Policy

Cailin R. Slattery (UC-Berkeley; Google Scholar), Alisa Tazhitdinova (UC-Santa Barbara; Google Scholar) & Sarah Robinson (UC-Santa Barbara; Google Scholar), Corporate Political Spending and State Tax Policy: Evidence from Citizens United (NBER 30352) (Aug. 2022):

To what extent is U.S. state tax policy affected by corporate political contributions? The 2010 Supreme Court Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission ruling provides an exogenous shock to corporate campaign spending, allowing corporations to spend on elections in 23 states which previously had spending bans.

Ten years after the ruling and for a wide range of outcomes, we are not able to identify economically or statistically significant effects of corporate independent expenditures on state tax policy, including tax rates, discretionary tax breaks, and tax revenues.

Wall Street Journal Editorial, Citizens United Bought . . . Nothing?:

Corporate dollars made zero difference in state tax policy, a study says.

According to progressive demonology, the Supreme Court’s 2010 ruling in Citizens United v. FEC unleashed corporate election spending, allowed fat cats to buy politicians, and turned the U.S. into an oligarchy, more or less. This is a canard, and further proof is a new study that sifts data to see if Citizens United had any effect on state tax policy.

Continue reading