Cauble: Taxing Composite Transactions

Emily Cauble (Wisconsin; Google Scholar), Taxing Composite Transactions, 77 SMU L. Rev. 349 (2024):

In a variety of contexts, taxpayers engage in composite transactions — essentially two transactions in one. For instance, when an individual sells property for less than its fair market value to a friend or relative, the transaction involves a sale and a gift. As another example, from time to time, retailers run promotions offering to rebate the price of merchandise if a team wins a sporting event. A buyer of the merchandise, effectively, makes a purchase and also places a bet on the sporting event's outcome.

Tax law's treatment of composite transactions is not uniform. In some contexts, tax law fully bifurcates these transactions into their separate components. Under this bifurcated approach, a taxpayer who engages in a composite transaction receives the same tax treatment as a taxpayer who goes through the motions of engaging in the component transactions separately. In other contexts, tax law adopts a collapsed approach under which taxpayers obtain markedly different tax treatment by engaging in a composite transaction instead of carrying out the components as separate transactions.

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Forward Looking Academic Impact Rankings For U.S. Law Schools

Matthew Sag (Emory; Google Scholar), Forward Looking Academic Impact Rankings for U.S. Law Schools, 51 Fla. St. U. L. Rev. 763 (2024):

Although the very concept of law school rankings is currently under fire, rankings abolitionism is misplaced. Given the number, diversity, and geographic dispersion of the more than 190 law schools fully accredited by the American Bar Association, rankings are essential to enable various stakeholders to make comparisons between schools. However, the current rankings landscape is dire. The U.S News law school rankings rely on poorly designed, highly subjective surveys to gauge “reputational strength,” rather than looking to easily available, objective citation data that is more valid and reliable. Would-be usurpers of U.S. News use better data but make other arbitrary choices that limit and distort their rankings. One flaw common to U.S. News and those who would displace it is the fetishization of minor differences in placement that do not reflect actual differences in substance. This information is worse than trivial: it is actively misleading. This Article proposes a new set of law school rankings free from all of these defects.

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2025-26 U.S. News Trial Advocacy Rankings

The new 2025-26 U.S. News Trial Advocacy Rankings include the trial advocacy programs at 195 law schools (the faculty survey had a 47% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank	School
1	Stetson
2	Temple
3	Baylor
4	Samford
5	Fordham
5	UCLA
7	Loyola-L.A.
8	Denver
8	Drexel
8	Hofstra
8	Syracuse
12	Chicago-Kent
12	Mercer
12	South Carolina
12	South Texas
16	Pacific
16	St. Mary's
16	UC-Berkeley
19	Northwestern
19	Pace
21	Georgetown
21	Loyola-Chicago
21	St. John's
24	American
24	Emory
24	Maryland
24	Nova
24	Ohio Northern
29	Houston
29	Howard
29	Inter-American (PR)
29	Suffolk
29	Texas
34	Georgia
34	Harvard
34	Illinois-Chicago
34	Pepperdine
34	Quinnipiac
34	Texas Tech
34	Washington Univ.
41	Campbell
41	Missouri-Kansas City
43	George Washington
43	Louisiana State
43	Ohio State
43	SUNY-Buffalo
43	Villanova
48	Akron
48	Case Western
48	Florida
48	Georgia State
48	Illinois
48	Seton Hall
48	SMU
48	UC Law - SF

2024-25 U.S. News Trial Advocacy Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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The Professional Employer Organization Regulatory Regime

Ursula Ramsey (North Carolina), The Professional Employer Organization Regulatory Regime, 20 UC L. SF Bus. J. 95 (2024)

Employment taxes constitute over thirty percent of the revenue collected by the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”). For fiscal year 2022, the IRS’s employment tax collections totaled over 1.3 billion dollars. Over the past few decades, a new industry has emerged that provides payroll, human resources, and employment tax services to its small to mid-sized business clients.to its small to mid-sized business clients payroll, human resources, and employment tax services. On behalf of business clients, these professional employer organizations (“PEOs”) remit the employment taxes associated with 216 billion dollars in worksite employee wages. This number represents the wages of four million worksite employees. Though there are 487 PEOs operating in the United States with over 170,000 client companies, the industry has received little scholarly study. Beyond the government’s interest in the efficient collection of employment taxes, regulation in the PEO industry warrants attention to ensure that those 170,000 small businesses receive the services for which they contract. Additionally, regulation in the industry warrants attention to ensure that those four million workers receive the protections to which they are entitled by law.

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Clarke Presents Apportioned Direct Taxes Today At Columbia

Conor Clarke (Washington University; Google Scholar) presents Apportioned Direct Taxes (with Ari Glogower (Northwestern; Google Scholar)) at Columbia today as part of its Davis Polk & Wardwell Tax Policy Colloquium hosted by Michael Love:

The Constitution requires that Congress apportion any “direct” tax among the states by population. This once-dormant provision is now the most important constitutional limitation on Congress’s taxing power. Last year, in Moore v. United States, the Supreme Court seriously considered, for the first time in decades, whether to invalidate an Act of Congress as an unapportioned direct tax. While the law survived, Moore signals a new era in which scholars and policymakers must again take apportionment seriously. Yet the apportionment requirement remains poorly understood.

This Article provides a new account of apportionment by examining how Congress and Treasury actually designed and implemented apportioned direct taxes. 

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Legal Ed News Roundup

• ABA Journal, Conservative Group Sues ABA Over Legal Opportunity Scholarship Fund Program
• ABA Journal, House Committee Drops Information Request About Law Clinics Amid ‘Ongoing Negotiations’ With Northwestern
• Above the Law, Law School Cutting Scholarships For Students Who Don’t Commit Fast Enough?
• Above the Law, T14 Law School’s Faculty Shows Biglaw What A Spine Looks Like
• The Alligator, University of Florida Law Student Trespassed From Campus After Racist, Antisemitic Social Media Posts
• Peter Berkowitz (Hoover Institution), Harvard Law School Professors Politicize the Rule of Law
• Bloomberg Law, Cornell Law Grad Quits Simpson Thacher as Firm ‘Capitulates’ to Trump
• Law.com, ‘White Students Not Eligible to Apply’: ABA Facing Lawsuit Over Race-Based Law School Scholarship 

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Roberts: The Tax Trench Deepens

Tracey M. Roberts (Cumberland; Google Scholar), The Tax Trench Deepens, 28 Fla. Tax Rev. ___ (2025):

Congress, long divided, has been in gridlock for decades. The result has been regulatory ossification. Existing statutes lack the flexibility to manage the country’s many technological, social, environmental, sectoral, and market challenges. However, without a Senate super-majority vote to override the filibuster, new legislation fails. While the budget reconciliation process has provided one of the few pathways around the filibuster, that process is limited to budgetary outlays and revenue measures. Consequently, a “tax trench” has been worn from Congress repeatedly pushing major regulatory and public benefits legislation through the process as tax provisions. Now, the tax trench is set to deepen. Following a spate of cases decided in 2024, U.S. Supreme Court has placed a series of checks on federal regulatory authority, discretion, and enforcement capacity. 

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Are Appellate Clinics Effective?

Xiao Wang (Virginia), Are Appellate Clinics Effective?, 31 Clin. L. Rev. 427 (2025):

Law school clinics are integral to legal education, offering students practical experience while serving clients in need and affecting the law more broadly. But despite the enormous investments in experiential learning that law schools make each year, there remains a lack of comprehensive research assessing the efficacy of clinics in serving clients.

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Tax Notes’ Taxing Issues Webinar: Pillar Two At A Crossroads: U.S. Policy And What Comes Next

(Sponsored post) Tax Notes will present Pillar Two at a Crossroads: U.S. Policy and What Comes Next on Wed., April 23. The webinar is free, and CPE credits are available to attendees who meet the requirements.

The future of the OECD’s pillar 2 project and U.S. involvement remains a focal point of international tax discussions. As the global minimum tax continues to gain traction across jurisdictions, questions emerge about the direction of U.S. policy under the new administration. Can pillar 2 function effectively without U.S. participation? Are there possible compromises between the OECD and U.S. positions? How will companies be affected in a fragmented system?

Panelists include Mindy Herzfeld (Florida), Pat Brown (PwC), Joachim Englisch (Münster), and Scott M. Levine (Georgetown). The moderator is Tax Analysts’ President and CEO, Cara Griffith.

Register for the Event

2025-26 U.S. News Legal Writing Rankings

The new 2025-26 U.S. News Legal Writing Rankings include the legal writing programs at 109 law schools (the faculty survey had a 52% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank	School
1	Oregon
1	UNLV
3	Arizona State
3	Stetson
3	Suffolk
6	Seattle
7	Wake Forest
8	UC-Irvine
8	University of Arizona
10	North Carolina
11	Georgetown
11	Nova
11	Rutgers
11	Washburn
15	Houston
15	Mercer
17	Denver
17	Drake
17	Indiana (McKinney)
17	Kansas
17	Lewis & Clark
17	Marquette
17	North Dakota
17	Ohio State
17	St. John's
17	Wyoming
27	Duke
27	Illinois-Chicago
27	Michigan
27	Northeastern
27	Temple
27	Texas A&M
27	William & Mary
34	Arkansas-Little Rock
34	Boston University
34	George Washington
34	Louisville
34	Loyola-L.A.
34	Missouri-Kansas City
34	New York Law School
34	Northwestern
34	St. Thomas (MN)
34	Wisconsin
44	Chicago-Kent
44	Drexel
44	Duquesne
44	Pacific
44	Texas Tech
44	University of Washington
44	Willamette

2024-25 U.S. News Legal Writing Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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Bob Jones And The Conservative Case For Not Revoking Harvard's Tax Exemption

The Atlantic:  The Conservative Case for Leaving Harvard Alone, by Conor Clarke (Washington University; Google Scholar):

The Supreme Court precedent allowing the IRS to revoke a university’s tax-exempt status is a textualist’s nightmare.

The past few days have seen a dramatic escalation in the Trump administration’s brawl with universities in general and with Harvard in particular. According to multiple reports, the IRS has begun planning to revoke the university’s tax-exempt status. Losing exemption from income taxation would be disastrous for Harvard. Not only does exemption save universities enormous amounts of money that would otherwise be taxed; it is also essential for fundraising, because it allows donors to take charitable deductions.

What is the rationale for the IRS revisiting Harvard’s exemption status? A theory is needed, because section 501(c)(3) of the federal tax code says that an organization “shall”—not “may”—be exempt from taxation if it meets criteria listed in the statute. One of those criteria is for an institution to be organized exclusively for “educational purposes.”

The Trump administration—which shoots first and theorizes later—has not said much. But an intellectual agenda has been building recently to challenge the exempt status of universities and other organizations viewed as left-leaning. (You can see that momentum gathering steam on the Wall Street Journal editorial page here, here, and here.) The unifying theory of this movement is to make expansive new use of a 1983 Supreme Court decision, Bob Jones University v. United States.

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TaxProf Blog Weekend Roundup

Saturday:

• This Week's Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts
• Nearly All Elite Law Schools Move Up Summer Associate Job Interviews To May And June
• Haneman: The Liminality Of Transactional Relationships
• 2025-26 U.S. News International Law Rankings
• Tax Day At North Carolina Law School

Sunday:

• The Epic Jesus Follower Fail: The Cringe-Worthy Subplot Of Holy Week Underscores The Truth Of The Gospel
• Things Worth Remembering: The Resurrection Of The Body And The Immortality Of The Soul
• NY Times: White House Of Worship — Christian Prayer Rings Out Under Trump
• Are Faith-Based Law Schools Fairly Ranked By U.S. News?
• Can Universities (And Law Schools) Still Diversify Faculty Hiring Under Trump?
• The Top Five New Tax Papers

The Epic Jesus Follower Fail: The Cringe-Worthy Subplot Of Holy Week Underscores The Truth Of The Gospel

Christianity Today Op-Ed:  The Epic Jesus Follower Fail: The Cringe-Worthy Subplot of Holy Week Underscores the Truth of the Gospel, by Tish Harrison Warren (Priest, Anglican Church; Author, Prayer in the Night: For Those Who Work or Watch or Weep (2021) (Christianity Today's 2022 Book of the Year)):

From its earliest days, God has pursued and propelled the church in spite of our bumbling and failure.

And this week, Holy Week, we notice that in the midst of Christ's passion, death, and resurrection, we also find an embarrassingly painful display of the weakness, confusion, even imbecility of his earliest followers.

In each unfolding event of the week, the apostles disappoint. During the Last Supper, Jesus tells his friends that one of them will betray him and that they'll all abandon him. They respond by telling Jesus that he's underestimated them and arguing about who is the greatest, the most loyal disciple. Then, they fall asleep, more than once, in Gethsemene, too weak to be a friend to Jesus when he is most desperate for one. Then, they panic and draw swords against those who arrested Jesus. Next, in a scene recounted with cringe-worthy detail, Peter swears up and down that he doesn't know Jesus even though it's pretty obvious to everyone around him that he does.

As painful as it is to watch as those closest to Jesus abandon him, this subplot of Holy Week gives me hope. It is good news that the crux of Christianity, that which compels me to believe, is not the coherence of abstract principles writ by holy men or the perfect lives of Christ's followers, but is instead a claim to historic fact. This story of Jesus, this Holy Week, happened in time and space with messy, broken men and women who didn't understand at the time that their friend and teacher was in the process of saving the world.

This year I went through a brief, difficult season of doubt. During this period of struggle, I could not get away from a simple question: Was Jesus resurrected or not?

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Things Worth Remembering: The Resurrection Of The Body And The Immortality Of The Soul

Douglas Murray (The Free Press), Things Worth Remembering: The Resurrection of the Body and the Immortality of the Soul:

Preacher-poet John Donne gave voice to his faith with a sermon on how God will raise the dead.

I wonder if there has ever been a bigger change in our collective way of thinking than in our transition from the age of faith to the age of doubt. Inevitably, it is on my mind this Easter.

Millions of people around the world believe in the literal resurrection, when God lifts His believers into heaven. I suppose untold numbers are unsure or doubtful about this, while keeping within the borders of faith. For myself, I can’t help looking back at the age of faith—or even certainty—with envy.

Last year, I wrote in this space about the great English poet John Donne. He was perhaps the greatest of the “metaphysical” poets, a man whose work was laced with a raciness and a realness that, for some, lay in contradiction with his position as a clergyman and dean of St Paul’s Cathedral in London. ...

His very last sermon, given on February 25, 1631, and posthumously published as “Death’s Duel,” was given when Donne was so feeble that those who saw him give it said he already resembled a corpse.

In an age of doubt all this might have been depressing. But in an age of faith—and faith such as Donne’s—it was something beautiful. As he wrote in his Devotions: “I am more than dust and ashes: I am my best part, I am my soul.” ...

One of his greatest sermons, Sermon LXXXI, he preached at the Earl of Bridgewater’s House in London on November 19, 1627, where he reflected on one of the most curious aspects of the resurrection.

The problem he turns over in this sermon—given, astonishingly, at the marriage of the Earl’s daughter—is how God, on the day of resurrection, will reassemble the bodies of the faithful long after they have decayed. Some of the dead, he says, have left limbs in other lands, or their bodies have turned to mulch. Others have ended up in the sea’s mouth. So how is it, on the day of resurrection, that God can call even one of these bodies, let alone all of these bodies, together? Donne both addresses these questions unsparingly and gives an answer that is wonderful—wonderful in its faith, and in its theology also. But perhaps most astonishing to me is the wonder of Donne’s language.

For me, this sings beautifully on the page, but it sounds even better to the ear [read by Douglas Murray here]. 

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NY Times: White House Of Worship — Christian Prayer Rings Out Under Trump

New York Times, White House of Worship: Christian Prayer Rings Out Under Trump:

A cappella hymns rising in the Roosevelt Room.

Prayer “in Jesus’ name” proclaimed from the Cabinet Room.

Hands stretching out in the Oval Office, as pastors invoke Bible passages about how kings are established by God.

From the moment Donald J. Trump was re-elected to the presidency, his conservative Christian supporters have rejoiced in a second chance for their values to have power. And now, week after week, scenes like these are taking place at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue as they seize on this opportunity.

Routinely, and often at Mr. Trump’s enthusiastic direction, senior administration officials and allied pastors are infusing their brand of Christian worship into the workings of the White House itself, suggesting that his campaign promise to “bring back Christianity” is taking tangible root.

The result at times is an atmosphere inside the White House of a president operating with a divine mission. Amid his administration’s combative postures on issues of economic tariffs, drastic cuts to foreign aid and immigrant deportations, there is an enduring sense among many of his Christian supporters that Mr. Trump miraculously survived an assassination attempt last summer to remake America.

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Are Faith-Based Law Schools Fairly Ranked By U.S. News?

Anton Sorkin (Director of Law Student Ministries, Christian Legal Society):

Interesting observation from David Lat: “schools with a strong ideological brand, including religiously affiliated law schools  . . .  tend to fare well in rankings[.]”

Imagine how well they'd fare if there wasn't a peer ranking penalty, tabulated by Michael Conklin at 17.65 in his upcoming paper [Religious Law Schools, Rankings, and Bias: Measuring the Rankings Penalty at Religious Law Schools].

Latest rankings has the peer reputation average for the most devout law schools: ...

The RED [above] is all the schools that fare worse among their peers vs. their overall rank. The GREEN are the same schools as last year with positive peer scores. 

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Can Universities (And Law Schools) Still Diversify Faculty Hiring Under Trump?

Inside Higher Ed, Can Universities Still Diversify Faculty Hiring Under Trump?:

Before Donald Trump retook office, advocates of a more demographically diverse U.S. professoriate were already criticizing existing hiring efforts as inadequate. One late-2022 paper in Nature Human Behaviour noted that, at recent rates, “higher education will never achieve demographic parity among tenure-track faculty.”

One example of the disparity: As of November 2023, only 8 percent of U.S. assistant professors were Black, according to the College and University Professional Association for Human Resources. That’s significantly less than Black representation in the U.S. population, currently estimated by the Census to be 13.7 percent. And the CUPA-HR data showed that the Black share of tenure-track and tenured professors decreases as rank increases—only 5 percent of associate professors and 3.6 percent of full professors were Black.

Efforts that institutions have made to racially diversify their faculties drew political backlash well before Trump regained the White House, with activists, organizations and some faculty criticizing university hiring practices and state legislatures passing laws banning affirmative action and/or diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. The goal of a more representative faculty slipped further out of reach starting on Inauguration Day, when Trump issued executive orders targeting DEI, including what he dubbed “illegal DEI discrimination.”

His administration’s crusade has continued, including with a letter Friday demanding that Harvard University end all DEI initiatives, “implement merit-based hiring policies” and “cease all preferences based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin throughout its hiring, promotion, compensation, and related practices.” (Harvard has refused to comply with Trump’s orders, which go far beyond hiring, and the federal government has frozen part of the university’s funding and threatened its tax-exempt status.)

Given the current political situation—not just nationally, but also among the growing number of states with DEI and/or affirmative action restrictions—how can higher ed institutions continue to diversify their faculties?

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The Top Five New Tax Papers

There is a bit of movement in this week's list of the Top 5 Recent Tax Paper Downloads, with new papers debuting on the list at #3 and #4.  The #1 paper is #340 among 11,919 tax papers in all-time downloads.

1. [1,158 Downloads]  Tax Fairness: Reconceptualising Taxation and Inequalities, by Rita de la Feria (Leeds; Google Scholar)
2. [337 Downloads]  Global Tax Wars in the Digital Era, by Assaf Harpaz (Georgia; Google Scholar) (reviewed by Mirit Eyal-Cohen (Alabama; Google Scholar) here)
3. [242 Downloads]  You Play, You Pay! Mobility, Territory, And Exclusive Source Taxation In The 21st Century: , by Yariv Brauner (Florida; Google Scholar) (reviewed by Blaine Saito (Ohio State; Google Scholar) here)
4. [239 Downloads]  From Relic to Relevance, The Resurgence of Tariffs, by Reuven Avi-Yonah (Michigan; Google Scholar), Doron Narotzki (Akron; Google Scholar) & Tamir Shanan College of Management): 
5. [183 Downloads]  Formalism, Functionalism, and Nonfunctionalism in the Constitutional Law of Tax, by Daniel Hemel (NYU; Google Scholar) (reviewed by Adam Kern (San Diego; Google Scholar) here)

Editor's Note:  If you would like to receive a daily email with links to tax posts on TaxProf Blog, email me here.

This Week's Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts

Legal Education: 

1. U.S. News, 2025-26 Law Specialty Rankings
   1. Constitutional Law
   2. Contracts/Commercial Law
   3. Criminal Law
   4. Dispute Resolution
   5. Environmental Law
   6. Health Care Law
   7. Intellectual Property Law
   8. International Law
2. Chronicle of Higher Education Op-Ed (Phillip Levine (Wellesley College & Brookings Institution)), These 77 Colleges (And 45 Law Schools) Have The Most To Lose From Trump’s Cuts
3. CUPA-HR, Tenure-Track Faculty Raises Continue To Lag All Other Higher Ed Workers; Inflation-Adjusted Salaries Are 10% Lower Than In 2017
4. MLive, Hundreds Of ‘Stunned’ Michigan Law Alums Blast DEI Cuts
5. Reuters, ‘White Students Not Eligible to Apply’: ABA Sued Over Race-Based Law School Scholarship
6. Washington Free Beacon, At ‘Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon,’ Harvard Law Students Target Pages Of Law Firms That Criticized School's Response To Anti-Semitism
7. The Walrus, UBC Law School Faces Fresh Allegations Of Discrimination
8. James Ming Chen (Michigan State), Principia Bibliometrica: Modeling Citation And Download Data In Legal Scholarship
9. ABA Journal, California Bar Still Can't Decide How To Make Applicants Whole After Botched February Bar Exam
10. Bloomberg Law, Law Students Sue EEOC Over Big Law Diversity Scrutiny

Editor's Note:  If you would like to receive a daily email with links to legal education posts on TaxProf Blog, email me here.

Tax:

1. Florida Bar, Winners Of The 2025 National Tax Moot Court Competition
2. Brian Galle (Georgetown), David Gamage (Missouri) & Bob Lord (Patriotic Millionaires), Taxing Dynasties
3. Richard Winchester (Brooklyn), Presentation Of A Tax Policing Paradox At Columbia
4. Gladriel Shobe (BYU) & Matthew Johnson (Cravath, New York), Geographic Inequality And The SALT Deduction
5. SSRN, The Top Five New Tax Papers
6. Samantha Strimling (J.D. 2024, Harvard), Good Governance Is Taxing: The Implications Of Tax Policy For Separation Of Powers And The Major Questions Doctrine
7. University of New South Wales, 16th International ATAX Tax Administration Conference: Getting It Right
8. Diane Lourdes Dick (Iowa), Creative Tax Writing At Iowa
9. Emily Cauble (Wisconsin), Channels Of Tax Law (Mis)Information
10. Manoj Viswanathan (UC Law-SF), Presentation Of Damage Award Taxation And Distributive Justice At Duke

Editor's Note:  If you would like to receive a daily email with links to tax posts on TaxProf Blog, email me here.

Faith:

1. Christianity Today (Esau McCaulley (Wheaton College)), This Palm Sunday, Ponder Donkeys, Not Palm Branches
2. Jennifer Lee Koh (Pepperdine), Christian Lawyers In The Public Interest And Outside The Political Right
3. New York Times (Ross Douthat), Can The Jesus Of History Support The Christ Of Faith?
4. The New Yorker (Adam Gopnik), Why We Can’t Stop Talking About Jesus
5. Alistair Begg (Parkside Church, Cleveland), The Essence Of Good Friday: The Man On The Middle Cross

Editor's Note:  If you would like to receive a weekly email each Sunday with links to faith posts on TaxProf Blog, email me here. 

Nearly All Elite Law Schools Move Up Summer Associate Job Interviews To May And June

Reuters, Top Law Schools Move Up Summer Associate Job Interviews to May and June:

Nearly all elite U.S. law schools have pushed up their formal law firm interviewing programs to May and June this year, as law firms increasingly hire summer associates earlier and outside of traditional recruiting schedules.

The shift — from July and August to May and June — means that some law firm interview programs, commonly referred to as on-campus recruiting or OCI, will take place before firms have a full year of a candidate’s grades to consider. Major law firms recruit law students to work as summer associates following their second year of law school, which is typically a three-year program. ...

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Haneman: The Liminality Of Transactional Relationships

Victoria J. Haneman (Creighton; Google Scholar), The Liminality of Transactional Relationships, 109 Minn. L. Rev. Headnotes 67 (2025):

The law is often uncomfortable with liminal space or the space between absolutes. Liminal space is the grey area that defies labels, and creating rules to regulate and navigate liminalities is ultimately where we often find the most important growth and change. In the world of legal theory, liminality is a space that is defined by power and possibility. Taxing Sugar Babies [109 Minn. L. Rev. 737 (2024)] by Bridget Crawford is an important exploration of our societal discomfort with transactional relationships, and the way in which that discomfort is reflected in our tax law. The term sugar dating has come to mean someone (usually a younger person) accepting money or gifts from a sugar daddy (usually an older person) in exchange for a romantic or sexual attention. 

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2025-26 U.S. News International Law Rankings

The new 2025-26 U.S. News International Law Rankings include the international law programs at 195 law schools (the faculty survey had a 47% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank	School
1	NYU
2	Harvard
3	Columbia
3	Georgetown
3	Yale
6	American
6	UC-Berkeley
8	George Washington
8	Michigan
10	Stanford
11	Cornell
11	Virginia
13	Case Western
13	Duke
13	Temple
13	Chicago
17	UCLA
18	Penn
19	Fordham
19	Vanderbilt
19	Washington Univ.
22	Indiana (Maurer)
22	Northwestern
22	UC-Davis
22	Georgia
26	Minnesota
26	Notre Dame
26	Texas
29	Boston College
29	Boston University
29	Emory
29	Tulane
29	UC-Irvine
29	Miami
29	Pacific
29	William & Mary
37	Arizona State
37	Santa Clara
37	University of Washington
37	Wisconsin
41	Florida Int'l
41	Ohio State
41	Denver
41	Washington & Lee
45	BYU
45	Loyola-Chicago
45	Northeastern
45	Rutgers
45	Texas A&M
45	University of Arizona
45	Connecticut
45	Hawaii
45	Maryland
45	Pittsburgh

2024-25 U.S. News International Law Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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Tax Day At North Carolina Law School

On Tuesday, April 15th, Tax Profs Leigh Osofsky and Kathleen DeLaney Thomas hosted North Carolina Law School's annual Tax Day celebration, filling the law school rotunda with tax law students, costume contests, tax bingo, tax challenge problems, tax trivia, prizes, food, and more:

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Weekly SSRN Tax Article Review And Roundup: Saito Reviews Brauner's Mobility, Territory, And Exclusive Source Taxation

This week, Blaine Saito (Ohio State; Google Scholar) reviews a new work by Yariv Brauner (Florida; Google Scholar), You Play, You Pay! Mobility, Territory, And Exclusive Source Taxation In The 21st Century.

The international tax system's foundation is under unprecedented strain, having weathered BEPS 1.0, BEPS 2.0 with its two pillars, and now facing a competing UN initiative. But at the base of a lot of these is a specter of residence taxation. Yariv Brauner’s You Play, You Pay Mobility, Territory, and Exclusive Source Taxation in the 21^st Century forcefully outlines the problems of residency-based system and advantages for source as the exclusive means. It also addresses many of the critiques of using source as a basis for taxation. Finally, it presents some guidance on how to think of exclusive source-based international tax rules, with an emphasis that, even here, cooperation is needed, but a first mover could push the project along.

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Weekly Legal Education Roundup

• ABA Journal, Federal Judge's Columbia Clerk Boycott Didn't Harm Public Confidence in Judiciary, Judicial Council Rules
• Bloomberg Law, Law School Students Sue EEOC Over Big Law Diversity Scrutiny
• Boston University Law Review, Diversity & Inclusion Book
• Chronicle of Higher Education Op-Ed, by Phillip Levine (Wellesley College & Brookings Institution), These 77 Colleges Have the Most to Lose From Trump’s Cuts
• CUPA-HR, Most Higher Ed Employees Received Raises This Past Year That Outpaced Inflation, But Today’s Pay Still Falls Short of Pre-Pandemic Pay in Inflation-Adjusted Dollars
• Diane Lourdes Dick (Iowa), Creative Tax Writing At Iowa
• MLive, 100s of ‘Stunned’ University of Michigan Law School Alums Blast DEI Cuts
• Reuters, ABA Sued Over Diversity Scholarships by Conservative Group

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Tax Policy In The Trump Administration

• Bloomberg, Bessent Says ‘Everything’s On the Table’ for Taxes on Wealthiest
• Bloomberg, Harvard Sees ‘Grave Consequences’ as Trump Pushes IRS Action
• Bloomberg, Harvard’s $465 Million in Tax Benefits Draw New Scrutiny
• Bloomberg, IRS Purges Old Guidance After White House Deregulation Push
• Bloomberg, Millionaire Tax-Hike Talks Gain Steam as Trump Signals Openness
• Bloomberg, New York City’s Rich Increasingly Using Trusts to Buy Homes for Their Kids
• Bloomberg, States See Low Demand for IRS’s Direct File With Future Unclear
• Bloomberg, Trump Names Whistleblower Gary Shapley as Acting IRS Head
• Bloomberg, Trump Questions Columbia, Princeton’s Tax-Exempt Status
• CNBC, Tax Attorneys Say IRS Has Become a ‘Zombie’ as Agency Cuts Staff and Halts Audits of the Wealthy

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UBC Law School Faces Fresh Allegations Of Discrimination

The Walrus, UBC Law School Faces Fresh Allegations of Discrimination:

In December 2019, Brenna Bhandar interviewed for the position of associate professor at the Peter A. Allard School of Law at the University of British Columbia—one of the most prestigious law schools in Canada. Despite a recommendation from the appointments committee, the dean at the time decided not to hire her. Bhandar uses the lens of settler colonialism to understand how Israel’s legal system has been used to dispossess Palestinians of their land—a framework some members of the department argued was antisemitic. When twelve faculty members wrote a confidential letter to the dean, asking for transparency around the decision, they said they were shunned by their colleagues and bullied by senior leadership.

In an investigation for The Walrus in November [An Elite Law School Promised Reforms, Then Made Inclusion Impossible], I reported on the fallout from the letter, as well as on other allegations of systematic discrimination and harassment at Allard, including allegations from female professors that they were being paid less than their male colleagues. The investigation was shared widely in the legal community, but students and professors say that instead of using the opportunity to address long-standing issues, the administration has doubled down on its refusal to reckon with its workplace culture.

The day after the investigation was published, Ngai Pindell, the current dean at Allard, emailed faculty saying he was concerned by the breach of confidentiality but admitted that sharing information with a journalist “is not a crime.” He added, “This is a grave undermining of faculty governance, collegiality, and a respectful workplace,” he wrote. He didn’t address any of the allegations in the article. ...

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2025-26 U.S. News Intellectual Property Law Rankings

The new 2025-26 U.S. News Intellectual Property Law Rankings include the intellectual property law programs at 194 law schools (the faculty survey had a 56% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank	School
1	Stanford
2	UC-Berkeley
3	NYU
4	Santa Clara
5	George Washington
6	American
6	Cardozo
6	Texas A&M
9	Chicago-Kent
9	Georgetown
9	Penn
12	Boston University
12	Columbia
12	Duke
12	Harvard
12	Houston
12	Michigan
12	Texas
12	UCLA
20	Fordham
20	San Diego
20	Virginia
23	Northwestern
24	Chicago
24	Minnesota
26	Cornell
26	George Mason
26	Northeastern
26	Utah
26	Vanderbilt
31	Boston College
31	North Carolina
31	UC-Davis
31	Washington Univ.
35	DePaul
35	Emory
35	Indiana (Maurer)
35	New Hampshire
35	Richmond
35	Temple
35	UC-Irvine
35	University of Washington
35	UNLV
35	William & Mary
45	Colorado
45	Denver
45	Florida
45	Loyola-Chicago
45	Suffolk
45	USC
45	Villanova
45	Yale

2024-25 U.S. News Intellectual Property Law Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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Next Week’s Tax Workshops

Monday, April 21: Conor Clarke (Washington University; Google Scholar) will present Apportioned Direct Taxes (with Ari Glogower (Northwestern; Google Scholar)) as part of the Columbia Davis Polk & Wardwell Tax Policy Colloquium. If you would like to attend, please contact Michael Love. 

Wednesday, April 23: Shu-Yi Oei (Duke; Google Scholar) will present Global Tax Decluttering, 77 U.C. L.J. __ (2025) (with Diane Ring (Boston College; Google Scholar)) as part of the Missouri Tax Policy Colloquium. If you would like to attend, please contact David Gamage. 

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Cauble: Channels Of Tax Law (Mis)Information

Emily Cauble (Wisconsin; Google Scholar), Channels of Tax Law (Mis)Information, 2026  U. Ill. L. Rev. ___ : 

This Article sheds light on a pervasive phenomenon. In a variety of contexts, third parties provide information about tax law to taxpayers. The information provided by these third parties may guide the tax planning and compliance decisions of taxpayers, some of whom may act upon the information without seeking advice from a tax professional. In some cases, the information is accurate and potentially helpful. In other cases, it is inaccurate and potentially misleading.

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Washington University Symposium: New Developments In Clinical Education, Dispute Resolution, And Professional Identity

Symposium, New Developments In Clinical Education, Dispute Resolution, And Professional Identity, 75 Wash. U. J. L. & Pol'y 1-215 (2024): 

• Karen Tokarz (Washington University), New Directions in Clinical Education, Dispute Resolution, and Professional Identity: Introduction, 75 Wash. U. J. L. & Pol'y i (2024)
• Bryan L. Adamson (Case Western; Google Scholar), Case Western Reserve University School of Law's Academy for Inclusive Leadership Development: A New Pedagogy Integrating Diversity, Equity, and Inclusive Belonging into Legal Education, 75 Wash. U. J. L. & Pol'y 1 (2024)
• Steven J. Alagna (Washington University), The Pedagogical Value of Clinical Amicus Advocacy, 75 Wash. U. J. L. & Pol'y 47 (2024)
• Megan Bess (Illinois-Chicago; Google Scholar), Nira Geevargis (UC Law-SF) & June T. Tai (Iowa), Case Rounds Redefined: Multidisciplinary Perspectives in Reflective Practice, 75 Wash. U. J. L. & Pol'y 71 (2024)

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Creative Tax Writing At Iowa

Diane Lourdes Dick (Iowa), Creative Tax Writing At Iowa:

This year, I invited students in both of my Spring 2025 tax courses at the University of Iowa College of Law to participate in a new (and entirely optional!) creative writing competition.

The prompt was simple—but strange:

Imagine a world where cash no longer necessarily has a basis equal to face.

Students could respond in any narrative form—short story, poem, or something in between—and were explicitly permitted to use generative AI to assist with brainstorming, drafting, and editing. The result was a wildly creative and pedagogically rich experiment in how tax law can come alive through storytelling.

Submissions were evaluated on three criteria: tax substantive knowledge (40%), creative writing (40%), and overall quality (20%).

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Boston University Law Review: Diversity & Inclusion Book

Diversity & Inclusion Book, 104 B.U. L. Rev. 1-287 (2024):

• Carmen Alvarado-Hernandez (J.D. 2024, Boston University) & Madeline A. Freeman (J.D. 2024, Boston University), Editors’ Foreword, 104 B.U. L. Rev. (2024)
• Asad Rahim (UC-Berkeley), The Legitimacy Trap, 104 B.U. L. Rev. 1 (2024)
• Ndjuoh MehChu (Seton Hall; Google Scholar), Neither Cops nor Caseworkers: Transforming Family Policing Through Participatory Budgeting, 104 B.U. L. Rev. 73 (2024)
• Brenda D. Gibson (Wake Forest; Google Scholar), Affirmative Reaction: The Blueprint for Diversity and Inclusion in the Legal Profession After SFFA, 104 B.U. L. Rev. 123 (2024)

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2025-26 U.S. News Health Care Law Rankings

The new 2025-26 U.S. News Health Care Law Rankings include the health care law programs at 191 law schools (the faculty survey had a 45% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank	School
1	St. Louis
2	Boston University
3	Georgia State
4	Loyola-Chicago
4	Maryland
6	Harvard
7	Stanford
8	Georgetown
9	Houston
9	Northeastern
9	Seton Hall
12	Yale
13	Arizona State
13	Case Western
13	Temple
16	UC Law - SF
17	George Washington
17	Ohio State
17	UCLA
20	American
20	Drexel
20	Michigan
20	Penn
24	Emory
24	Wake Forest
26	DePaul
26	Duke
26	Mitchell | Hamline
29	Minnesota
30	Indiana (McKinney)
30	North Carolina
30	Utah
30	Virginia
34	Boston College
34	Indiana (Maurer)
34	NYU
34	Pittsburgh
34	Texas
34	University of Washington
40	Georgia
40	Oklahoma
40	Vanderbilt
40	Washington Univ.
44	Quinnipiac
44	Texas A&M
46	Columbia
46	Cornell
46	Northwestern
46	SMU
46	Suffolk
46	University of Arizona
46	UNLV

2024-25 U.S. News Health Care Law Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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2025 Tannenwald Tax Writing Competition

The Theodore Tannenwald, Jr. Foundation for Excellence in Tax Scholarship and American College of Tax Counsel are sponsoring the 2025 Tannenwald Writing Competition.

Named for the late Tax Court Judge Theodore Tannenwald, Jr., and designed to perpetuate his dedication to high-quality legal scholarship, the Tannenwald Writing Competition is open to all full- or part-time law school students in J.D., LL.M., and other graduate law programs. This is the 24th year of the competition, and over 600 entries have been received since its inception. All submissions are reviewed by a panel of tax professors and practitioners.

Papers on any federal or state tax-related topic may be submitted in accordance with the Competition Rules. ...

Prizes: 

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Clarke Presents Apportioned Direct Taxes Today At Missouri

Conor Clarke (Washington University; Google Scholar) presents Apportioned Direct Taxes (with Ari Glogower (Northwestern; Google Scholar)) at Missouri today as part of its Tax Policy Colloquium hosted by David Gamage:

The Constitution requires that Congress apportion any “direct” tax among the states by population. This once-dormant provision is now the most important constitutional limitation on Congress’s taxing power. Last year, in Moore v. United States, the Supreme Court seriously considered, for the first time in decades, whether to invalidate an Act of Congress as an unapportioned direct tax. While the law survived, Moore signals a new era in which scholars and policymakers must again take apportionment seriously. Yet the apportionment requirement remains poorly understood.

This Article provides a new account of apportionment by examining how Congress and Treasury actually designed and implemented apportioned direct taxes. 

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Law Students Sue EEOC Over Big Law Diversity Scrutiny

Bloomberg Law, Law School Students Sue EEOC Over Big Law Diversity Scrutiny:

Three law school students sued the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission on Tuesday over the agency’s probe into Big Law diversity hiring practices.

The students—anonymously referenced in their complaint as Doe 1, Doe 2 and Doe 3—asked a District of Columbia federal judge to order the EEOC and acting chair Andrea Lucas to withdraw investigative letters sent to 20 of the country’s most prominent law firms, asking for demographic hiring data dating as far back as 2015.

From the complaint:

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The Normative Shift In Corporate Tax Policy After GloBE

Tarcisio Diniz Magalhães (Antwerp; Google Scholar) & Allison Christians (McGill; Google Scholar), The Normative Shift in Corporate Tax Policy after GloBE, 17 World Tax J. ___ (2025):

In the era of global minimum taxes, the merit of any given national corporate income tax will depend on which governments will be collecting corporate tax revenues, and at whose expense. This marks a shift in focus away from a century-old baseline assumption: before this era, the likelihood that a corporation would face income tax at all was in no way assured, but now, any given corporate income stream will likely be subject to tax by some government, somewhereif not yet in practice, presumably some time in the near future. This shift in assumption alters the terrain for normative policy analysis by centering questions that were formerly sidelined, especially respecting the impact of taxes on the international distribution of wealth among nations. This article examines the implications of this shift and shows why it leads to a clear understanding of corporate taxes as a key international wealth distribution tool.

Conclusion
Even before its full implementation, GloBE has shifted the focus of corporate tax policy from domestic incidence to the question of which government will ultimately collect the tax revenue. This article has demonstrated why this shift is critical, arguing that GloBE renders obsolete the traditional emphasis on domestic tax incidence. 

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‘White Students Not Eligible to Apply’: ABA Sued Over Race-Based Law School Scholarship

Reuters, ABA Sued Over Diversity Scholarships by Conservative Group:

A prominent conservative group sued the American Bar Association on Saturday, alleging that a scholarship program meant to boost the number of racially and ethnically diverse law students is discriminatory.

In a complaint filed in an Illinois federal court, the American Alliance for Equal Rights — led by anti-affirmative action activist Edward Blum — alleged that the ABA’s 25-year-old Legal Opportunity Scholarship discriminates against white applicants because they are ineligible to apply. ...

The Alliance said it is representing an unnamed white male law school applicant who would apply for the $15,000 Legal Opportunity Scholarship were he eligible. The ABA awards between 20 and 25 such scholarships annually to incoming law students, according to its website.

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2025-26 U.S. News Environmental Law Rankings

The new 2025-26 U.S. News Environmental Law Rankings include the environmental law programs at 189 law schools (the faculty survey had a 50% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank	School
1	Pace
2	Lewis & Clark
2	UC-Berkeley
4	Vermont
5	Columbia
6	UCLA
7	Colorado
7	Harvard
7	NYU
7	Oregon
7	Utah
12	Stanford
12	Vanderbilt
14	Duke
14	Georgetown
16	Arizona State
16	UC-Davis
18	Florida State
18	George Washington
18	Michigan
21	Denver
21	Maryland
21	UC Law - SF
21	Yale
25	Kansas
25	Penn
25	Texas A&M
25	Tulane
25	Virginia
30	Case Western
30	Florida
30	Minnesota
30	New Mexico
30	UC-Irvine
30	University of Arizona
36	Hawaii
36	Houston
38	Emory
38	Indiana (Maurer)
38	Miami
38	Texas
38	University of Washington
38	Wisconsin
44	Northwestern
44	Ohio State
46	Cornell
46	Maine
46	Montana
46	Wyoming
50	Boston College
50	Georgia
50	Iowa
50	North Carolina
50	Notre Dame
50	San Diego

2024-25 U.S. News Environmental Law Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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Geographic Inequality And The SALT Deduction

Gladriel Shobe (BYU; Google Scholar) & Matthew S. Johnson (Cravath, New York), Geographic Inequality and the SALT Deduction: 

The state and local tax (“SALT”) deduction remains one of the most hotly contested issues in federal tax policy, and its significance will only grow as the $10,000 cap is set to expire on January 1, 2026. Much of the SALT debate has been driven by politics rather than empirical analysis, leaving key questions about the deduction’s true impact unresolved. This study moves beyond partisan narratives to provide a clearer picture of who truly gains from the SALT deduction and who bears the cost of its limitation. While the SALT deduction is often characterized as a subsidy for blue states, the reality of where the benefits flow is more complex than the straightforward red state versus blue state distinction. Nearly half of the deduction applies to local taxes, yet the local-level portion of the SALT deduction has received little attention. In the local portion of the SALT deduction, however, lie unique inequality dynamics that should be considered as part of any debate about the future of the deduction.

This Article uses a novel dataset to provide the first empirical analysis of the local portion of the SALT deduction across several states.

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Galle, Gamage & Lord: Taxing Dynasties

Brian D. Galle (Georgetown; Google Scholar), David Gamage (Missouri; Google Scholar) & Bob Lord (Patriotic Millionaires),  Taxing Dynasties, 174 U. Pa. L. Rev. ___ (2026):

The estate tax and the broader wealth-transfer-tax system are even more broken than is commonly understood. Over the past two decades, researchers and policy experts have identified a handful of key tactics that mega-rich families use to pass wealth from generation to generation without paying tax. These tax dodges are notorious enough to be known by their acronyms, such as the IDGT and the GRAT. Scholars and policymakers have proposed reforms to block these tactics, or at least to make them more difficult.

In this Article, we present new analysis, backed by new empirical findings, to show that these proposed reforms would not suffice for restoring wealth-transfer taxes to their original purpose—curbing intergenerational transmission of vast dynastic wealth and power.

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At ‘Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon,’ Harvard Law Students Target Pages Of Law Firms That Criticized School's Response To Anti-Semitism

Washington Free Beacon, At Harvard-Hosted 'Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon,' Law Students Target the Pages of Firms That Criticized School's Response to Anti-Semitism:

Harvard Law students also edited Wikipedia to downplay anti-Semitic activity on college campuses.

Anti-Israel Harvard Law School students organized a workshop on the Ivy League campus earlier this month to edit the Wikipedia pages of more than a dozen prominent law firms, singling out some that threatened to stop recruiting at the school over its failure to rein in anti-Semitic activity.

Harvard’s National Lawyers Guild chapter, a left-wing legal advocacy group, hosted the "Wikipedia Edit-A-Thon" on April 2 at Harvard Law’s WCC student center, according to an announcement on Harvard Law’s website [Big Law, Big Secrets: Wikipedia Edit-A-Thon]. ...

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Cauble: Non-Experts' Impressions Of Informal Tax Guidance

Emily Cauble (Wisconsin; Google Scholar), Non-Experts' Impressions of Informal Tax Guidance, 76 Syracuse L. Rev. __ (2026):

I conducted a survey of 2,191 U.S. adults designed to gain insight into the impact that statements in informal IRS guidance have on non-expert taxpayers. The survey also examines whether respondents form different impressions when they receive guidance delivered by an automated tool rather than guidance contained in IRS publications. This Article reports that survey's results. 

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These 77 Colleges (And 45 Law Schools) Have The Most To Lose From Trump’s Cuts

Chronicle of Higher Education Op-Ed:  These 77 Colleges Have the Most to Lose From Trump’s Cuts, by Phillip Levine (Wellesley College & Brookings Institution):

What does President Trump mean for college finances? In January, I speculated that colleges could be in for belt-tightening or even extensive damage in the case of an increased endowment tax — though the situation wasn’t yet clear. A few months into his administration, some of the details are becoming clearer, and the likely result is that many colleges face an enormous financial impact.

The obvious examples include the funding-cutoff threats made to Columbia University ($400 million), the University of Pennsylvania ($175 million), Harvard University ($9 billion!), Brown University ($510 million), Princeton University ($210 million), Cornell University ($1 billion), and Northwestern University ($790 million). Those ad hoc threats are extensive, but they overlook the broader financial risk that dozens of institutions face by more-systematic policy interventions. These include potential cuts to National Institutes of Health and National Science Foundation funding, along with a tax on the endowments of wealthy private institutions. I focus on these three policies because they have the greatest potential to significantly disrupt the financial workings of a large number of institutions.

In total, 77 institutions find themselves subject to large costs associated with at least one of these policies. ... The results of this analysis are presented in the following table. It contains estimated endowment taxes, NIH cuts, and NSF cuts separately, along with their total cost for each of the 77 institutions listed. These institutions were selected because they were among the top 50 in the country in the rankings of at least one of three categories: the total cost of these policies, the total cost per student, and the total cost as a percentage of total expenses. Many institutions face top-50-level exposure to more than one of these measures. Other institutions also face risks, but these have the most at stake should Trump’s policies become effective.

Here are the 45 institutions with law schools and the total costs of Trump's cuts:

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2025-26 U.S. News Dispute Resolution Rankings

The new 2025-26 U.S. News Dispute Resolution Rankings include the dispute resolution programs at 149 law schools (the faculty survey had a 43% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank	School
1	Ohio State
2	Pepperdine
3	Harvard
3	Texas A&M
5	Cardozo
5	Missouri-Columbia
7	Northwestern
8	Mitchell | Hamline
9	Arizona State
9	Maryland
9	UNLV
12	Fordham
12	Oregon
14	Florida
14	Quinnipiac
14	Stanford
14	UC Law - SF
18	Georgetown
18	Pace
18	Pacific
18	Stetson
18	Suffolk
23	Columbia
23	Houston
23	South Texas
23	UC-Davis
27	Michigan
27	UC-Irvine
29	Baylor
29	Kansas
29	Loyola-Chicago
29	Miami
29	UCLA
29	Washington Univ.
35	American
35	Creighton
35	Denver
35	Emory
35	Howard
35	Illinois
35	Nebraska
35	NYU
35	St. Mary's
35	Temple
35	Texas
35	Vanderbilt
35	William & Mary
48	Arkansas-Little Rock
48	Boston College
48	Cornell
48	George Washington
48	Indiana (Maurer)
48	Marquette
48	North Carolina
48	Penn
48	UC-Berkeley
48	USC
48	Wake Forest

2024-25 U.S. News Dispute Resolution Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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The First IRS Commissioner: ‘The Most Consequential Public Figure Americans Have Never Heard Of’

Harold Holzer (Director, The Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute (Hunter College)), The First IRS Commissioner: ‘The Most Consequential Public Figure Americans Have Never Heard Of’ (reviewing Jeffrey Boutwell, Boutwell: Radical Republican and Champion of Democracy (2025)):

America’s first IRS commissioner helped raise the vast sums needed to wage the Civil War and was a strong advocate of racial equality.

It took not a village of historians but a lone descendant to rescue George S. Boutwell from the dustbin of American memory. Viewed by many in his own time as both radical and rigid, “hiding in plain sight” since the post-Civil War period, Boutwell has long deserved resurrection. He was—cue the fast-approaching debate over tax cuts—America’s first IRS commissioner.

Now comes Jeffrey Boutwell—a cousin several generations removed and the author of previous books on security issues—to argue that George Boutwell ranks as “the most consequential public figure Americans have never heard of.” This commendably balanced and well-researched biography demonstrates that his kinsman is indeed worth remembering.

Born in Brookline, Mass., in 1818, George Sewall Boutwell worked on the family farm, apprenticed with a village postmaster, studied law, advanced to the state legislature, was governor at age 33 and later served as both a congressman and a U.S. senator. His greatest role was helping raise the vast sums of money needed to wage the Civil War—a staggering million dollars a day by 1862.

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Winchester Presents A Tax Policing Paradox Today At Columbia

Richard Winchester (Brooklyn) presents A Tax Policing Paradox at Columbia today as part of its Davis Polk & Wardwell Tax Policy Colloquium hosted by Michael Love:

If the government audits more taxpayers, that generally leads to higher levels of taxpayer compliance. However, this does not always happen. If the government audits taxpayers and fails to detect a specific form of tax evasion, taxpayer compliance will fall in two respects. The audited taxpayers will continue to engage in the practice that went unnoticed. In addition, as word spreads that the risk of detection or penalty is low, other taxpayers will start to engage in the same form of tax evasion.

There is one specific form of tax evasion that is unlikely to receive the scrutiny it deserves even as the Internal Revenue Service gears up to spend a huge injection of money to police taxpayers more frequently. It is often called the S corporation employment tax dodge and it works like this. If a closely held S corporation has an owner who also works for the firm, that individual can access the company’s earnings in two ways: as compensation for their work or as a distribution of profits. The main difference is that distributions are not subject to employment tax, while compensation is. So, the low-tax option is for the employee-owner to work for free and to cause the firm to pay them a distribution that is nothing more than disguised compensation.

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Legal Ed News Roundup

• ABA Journal, After Texas Chief Justice Criticizes ABA, State Supreme Court Reconsiders ABA Accreditation For Law Schools
• ABA Journal, Changing Course: An Olympian, an Actor and a Priest Prepare For the Bar–But What Led Them to Law School?
• ABA Journal, Federal Judge’s Columbia Clerk Boycott Didn’t Harm Public Confidence In Judiciary, Judicial Council Rules
• ABA Journal, Harvard Law, Duke University Fall Out Of Top 5 In Latest Us News Law School Rankings
• ABA Journal, Which Firms, Legal Groups, Law Profs Signed Briefs Supporting Perkins Coie In Challenge To Punitive Trump Order?
• Business Insider, I Helped My Daughter Get Into Law School by Pulling Strings and Got Her a Job at My Law Firm. Some Colleagues Don't Respect Her at Work.

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Trafficking-In And Harvesting Tax Benefits May Be Subject To Restrictions And Limitations

Ray A. Knight (Elon) & Dr. Lee G. Knight (Wake Forest), Trafficking-In and Harvesting Tax Benefits May Be Subject to Restrictions and Limitations, 46 Campbell L. Rev. 51 (2023): 

Trafficking in and harvesting preexisting or manufactured tax losses and credits may be both beneficial and lucrative, but it may be subject to restrictions and limitations. Internal Revenue Code (“IRC”) Section 269 generally provides that acquisition of control of a corporation to gain the benefit of a deduction, credit, or other allowance is prohibited. Does the Section 269 prohibition present a concrete barrier or is it just a smoke screen? This article examines the business purpose and economic substance doctrines to explain ways to circumvent Section 269. 

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