Galle, Gamage & Kuchumova: Tax Base Diversification As An Enforcement Tool

Brian D. Galle (Georgetown; Google Scholar), David Gamage (Missouri-Columbia; Google Scholar) & Yulia (Paramonova) Kuchumova (National Research University; Google Scholar), Tax Base Diversification as an Enforcement Tool, 26 Am. L. & Econ. Rev. __ (2025):

We examine when it is optimal to employ sales or VAT-type taxes as complements to a labor income tax. We find a Ramsey-type result in which each tax instrument should be imposed in inverse proportion to the combined elasticity of real and avoidance responses to the respective tax. Contrary to some prior results, we find that sales-type taxes are optimally non-zero across a variety of settings, and in particular when the (weighted) elasticity of taxable income with respect to the wage tax is greater than the cross-elasticity of taxable income with respect to the sales tax. 

Continue reading

What Do We Really Know About The 19 Online Law Schools?

ABA Journal, Mythbusters: What Do We Really Know About Online Law Schools?:

The journeys of individual students enrolling in online law school are as varied as the programs themselves, the ABA Journal finds.

Currently, only law schools with brick-and-mortar campuses can gain ABA accreditation for their online JD programs. To date, 19 have received that blessing, and others are carefully considering joining the ranks. ...

Continue reading

Help Me, Help You: What You Should Know Before You Ask Your LRW Professor For Help

Meredith Geller (Northwestern), Help Me, Help You: What You Should Know Before You Ask for Help: 

I got an email the other day from a student who was having some difficulty writing his arguments. The student wrote that he kept rewriting his arguments in response to my comments but that he still had not been able to get them written satisfactorily. I could tell the student was frustrated and I could also tell that, for the moment, at least, I was the target of that frustration. Essentially, the student was telling me that he had changed things in accordance with my comments, but I still was not happy. Having been teaching for fifteen years, the frustration alone neither surprised nor upset me. However, I certainly know that there are times when it would and that there are colleagues who can and do get irritated by emails like this. So, I created a guide to help provide my students with tips on what they need to know about asking me for help. 

Continue reading

Soled: The Estate Tax And Its Tacit Push To Be Charitable

Jay Soled (Rutgers; Google Scholar), The Estate Tax and Its Tacit Push to Be Charitable, 185 Tax Notes Fed. 2375 (Dec. 23, 2024):

In this article, Soled argues that Congress should maintain the estate tax because it nudges taxpayers to be more charitable than they likely would be without it.

Societies have levied estate taxes on accumulated wealth throughout ancient and modern history. In most industrialized countries, some people amass sufficient affluence for estate tax exposure, and those who fall within the scope of this prosperity often take extraordinary measures to defeat those taxes.

Continue reading

2025 Tax Prof Rankings: Google Scholar H-Index Since 2020

Yesterday, I posted Google Scholar H-Index All rankings of the Top 128 tax professors with Google Scholar pages (data collected on January 6). The Google Scholar H-Index Since 2020 rankings are below. If you are a full-time law school tax professor with a Google Scholar page and we missed including you, please contact me.

Rank	Name	School	Google Scholar H-Index (Since 2020)
1	Joel Slemrod	Michigan	54
2	Alan Auerbach	UC-Berkeley	41
3	James Hines	Michigan	33
4	Reuven Avi-Yonah	Michigan	27
5	Dhammika Dharmapala	UC-Berkeley	24
6	Jacob Goldin	Chicago	23
7	Kimberly Clausing	UCLA	22
8	Daniel Hemel	NYU	21
8	David Weisbach	Chicago	21
10	Kristin Hickman	Minnesota	20
11	Edward McCaffery	USC	18
12	Leandra Lederman	Indiana (Maurer)	17
12	Dan Shaviro	NYU	17
12	Eric Zolt	UCLA	17
15	Brian Galle	Georgetown	16
15	Robert Sitkoff	Harvard	16
17	Yariv Brauner	Florida	15
17	Zachary Liscow	Yale	15
17	Kyle Logue	Michigan	15
20	Jonathan Choi	USC	14
20	Bridget Crawford	Pace	14
20	Andrew Hayashi	Virginia	14
20	Kyle Rozema	Northwestern	14
24	Nancy Knauer	Temple	13
24	Ruth Mason	Virginia	13
24	Diane Ring	Boston College	13
27	Joshua Blank	UC-Irvine	12
27	Steven Dean	Boston Univ.	12
27	David Gamage	Missouri (Columbia)	12
27	Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer	Notre Dame	12
27	Lawrence Zelenak	Duke	12
32	Hugh Ault	Boston College	11
32	Dorothy Brown	Georgetown	11
32	Clifton Fleming	BYU	11
32	Rebecca Kysar	Fordham	11
32	Sarah Lawsky	Northwestern	11
32	Omri Marian	UC-Irvine	11
32	Ajay Mehrotra	Northwestern	11
32	Amy Monahan	Minnesota	11
32	Susan Morse	Texas	11
32	Shu-Yi Oei	Duke	11
32	Leigh Osofsky	North Carolina	11
32	Chris Sanchirico	Penn	11
32	Darien Shanske	UC-Davis	11
32	Michael Simkovic	USC	11
32	David Walker	Boston Univ.	11
47	Steven Bank	UCLA	10
47	Kathleen Delaney Thomas	North Carolina	10
47	Ari Glogower	Northwestern	10
47	James Repetti	Boston College	10
47	Stephen Shay	Boston College	10
52	Ellen Aprill	Loyola-L.A.	9
52	Leslie Book	Villanova	9
52	John Brooks	Fordham	9
52	Samuel Brunson	Loyola-Chicago	9
52	Lilian Faulhaber	Georgetown	9
52	Miranda Perry Fleischer	San Diego	9
52	Christine Hurt	SMU	9
52	Nancy McLaughlin	Utah	9
52	Jay Soled	Rutgers	9

Continue reading

Yale Law School's ‘Tiger Mom’ Roars Back

Following up on my previous post:  Vanity Fair: What JD And Usha Vance Learned From Their ‘Tiger Mom’ At Yale Law School:  Peter Savodnik (The Free Press), The Tiger Mother Roars Back:

In January 2011, Yale Law School Professor Amy Chua was in the middle of her book tour, in her hotel room in Seattle, when an email came in from the future vice president of the United States.

Her book—Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother—had just come out, and she was getting pummeled in the media for demanding that her daughters get straight A’s and play the piano or violin. She was called the “worst mother ever.” There were death threats.

“I’m not a crier, but I was so depressed,” Chua told me. “I was there by myself—I had bodyguards—and I get an email from J.D. Vance.”

The first-year law student had a question about his upcoming exam in Chua’s Contracts class. She had been mentoring Vance and quickly replied.

“Three hours later, probably after a beer, he writes me another email, and he’s like, ‘You know what? I should be studying, but I’m so curious about all this furor, so I went to Barnes & Noble, and I read it,’ ” she said, referring to her book. “He’s like, ‘I do not know why this is controversial.’ ”

Then, he told her, “You remind me of Mamaw”—Vance’s grandmother, who raised him with the same tough love that courses through Tiger Mother.

Vance added that he “felt a little bit bad” for giving her the impression that he came from an intact family, saying things were “more complicated” back home. He attached a document to the email, “and it’s the opening of Hillbilly Elegy,” Chua said, “and even though I was in trauma about my own situation, I read this thing, and I said, ‘J.D., you have to write your own book.’ ”

Which, of course, he did.

Continue reading

Generative AI And The Purpose Of Legal Scholarship

Following up on my previous post, Andrew Perlman (Dean, Suffolk), Generative AI and the Future of Legal Scholarship: Michael L. Smith (St. Mary's), Generative AI and the Purpose of Legal Scholarship: 

What does generative AI mean for the future of legal scholarship? The topic has been the talk of the town around academic water coolers. Some legal scholars have tried their hand at generating legal scholarship using generative AI. The accompanying commentary is varied, but advocates for the technology suggest that generative may become a common tool for legal scholars, leaving those who refuse to adapt at a severe disadvantage.

Continue reading

Tax Treaties Do Not Protect Overseas Americans

Laura Snyder, Karen Alpert & John Richardson, Tax Treaties Do Not Protect Overseas Americans, 185 Tax Notes Fed. 793 (Oct. 28, 2024):

We appreciate this opportunity to respond to “Trump Vows to End ‘Double Taxation’ of Overseas Citizens” by Alexander Rifaat. 

While we have multiple concerns with the opinions expressed by professor Reuven Avi-Yonah in the article, we would like to focus on his comment about the tax treaties the United States has concluded with other countries. According to professor Avi-Yonah, the “tiebreaker” clause contained in these treaties serves to protect overseas Americans from double taxation.

Continue reading

2025 Tax Prof Rankings: Google Scholar H-Index All

Below are the updated Google Scholar H-Index All rankings of the Top 119 U.S. tax professors with Google Scholar pages (data collected on January 6). If you are a full-time law school tax professor with a Google Scholar page and we missed including you, please contact me.

Rank	Name	School	Google Scholar H-Index (All)
1	Joel Slemrod	Michigan	100
2	Alan Auerbach	UC-Berkeley	98
3	James Hines	Michigan	67
4	Reuven Avi-Yonah	Michigan	40
5	David Weisbach	Chicago	38
6	Dan Shaviro	NYU	35
7	Dhammika Dharmapala	UC-Berkeley	34
8	Kimberly Clausing	UCLA	31
8	Edward McCaffery	USC	31
10	Brian Galle	Georgetown	28
10	Lawrence Zelenak	Duke	28
10	Eric Zolt	UCLA	28
13	Kristin Hickman	Minnesota	27
13	Kyle Logue	Michigan	27
15	Jacob Goldin	Chicago	26
15	Chris Sanchirico	Penn	26
15	Robert Sitkoff	Harvard	26
18	Daniel Hemel	NYU	25
18	Nancy Knauer	Temple	25
20	Steven Bank	UCLA	24
20	Leandra Lederman	Indiana (Maurer)	24
22	Dorothy Brown	Georgetown	21
22	Diane Ring	Boston College	21
24	Richard Kaplan	Illinois	20
24	Nancy McLaughlin	Utah	20
24	David Walker	Boston Univ.	20
27	Ellen Aprill	Loyola-L.A.	19
27	Yariv Brauner	Florida	19
27	Bridget Crawford	Pace	19
27	Ruth Mason	Virginia	19
31	Clifton Fleming	BYU	18
31	David Gamage	Missouri (Columbia)	18
31	Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer	Notre Dame	18
34	Karen Burke	Florida	17
34	Paul Caron	Pepperdine	17
34	Anthony Infanti	Pittsburgh	17
34	Amy Monahan	Minnesota	17
34	Richard Pomp	Connecticut	17
34	James Repetti	Boston College	17
34	Kyle Rozema	Northwestern	17
34	Darien Shanske	UC-Davis	17
34	Jay Soled	Rutgers	17
43	Hugh Ault	Boston College	16
43	John Coverdale	Seton Hall	16
43	Victor Fleischer	UC-Irvine	16
43	Sarah Lawsky	Northwestern	16
43	Zachary Liscow	Yale	16
43	Ajay Mehrotra	Northwestern	16
43	Shu-Yi Oei	Duke	16
43	Gregg Polsky	Georgia	16
51	Joshua Blank	UC-Irvine	15
51	Bradley Borden	Brooklyn	15
51	Steven Dean	Boston Univ.	15
51	Andrew Hayashi	Virginia	15
51	Omri Marian	UC-Irvine	15
51	Stephen Shay	Boston College	15
51	Linda Sugin	Fordham	15

Continue reading

NY Times: Tenured Columbia Law Professor Says She Was Pushed To Retire Because Of Her Pro-Palestine Activism

Following up on my previous posts (links below):  New York Times, Columbia Professor Says She Was Pushed to Retire Because of Her Activism:

Columbia University and one of its longtime law professors, Katherine Franke, have severed ties after an investigation stemming from her advocacy on behalf of pro-Palestinian students.

It was the latest fallout from student and faculty activism related to the Gaza War on a major university campus.

Ms. Franke, a tenured professor known primarily for her work as founder and director of Columbia’s Center for Gender & Sexuality Law, had been an advocate for pro-Palestinian students as protests erupted on the campus last school year.

She was also one of several faculty members investigated by the university over allegations of antisemitism, after the school received complaints about comments she made about Israelis on a radio program.

Statement From Katherine Franke (Jan. 10, 2025):

[T]he University has allowed its own disciplinary process to be weaponized against members of our community, including myself. I have been targeted for my support of pro-Palestinian protesters — by the president of Columbia University, by several colleagues, by university trustees, and by outside actors. This has included an unjustified finding by the University that my public comments condemning attacks against student protesters violated university non-discrimination policy.

I have come to the view that the Columbia University administration has created such a toxic and hostile environment for legitimate debate around the war in Israel and Palestine that I can no longer teach or conduct research.

Continue reading

Some Los Angeles Law Schools Begin Spring Semester Remotely Due To Fires

The Recorder, Some Los Angeles Law Schools Begin Spring Semester Remotely:

Some Los Angeles law schools are starting their first week of the spring semester remotely as nearby wildfires continue to burn.

University of California, Los Angeles, located just outside the southeastern perimeter of the Palisades fire in Westwood, announced Saturday that all undergraduate and graduate classes would be held remotely through Friday. ...

Pepperdine University, located on the west side of the Palisades fire’s edge in Malibu, also announced Friday that the university would move classes online through Sunday. 

“We are mindful and deeply impacted by the devastation wreaked by the recent fires in the Los Angeles area as we prepare to support our community in the days ahead,” Jim Gash, the school's president and CEO, said in a message to the university community. “We have prayed, and continue to pray, for God’s protection and provision for the University community and communities throughout Los Angeles County.”

Caruso School of Law dean Paul Caron confirmed the Pepperdine campus had not been affected by the fire.

Inside Higher Ed, Some L.A. Colleges to Reopen This Week, Others Stay Closed Amid Wildfires:

Continue reading

Dagan: Substantive Tax Sovereignty Under Globalization

Tsilly Dagan (Oxford; Google Scholar), Substantive Tax Sovereignty Under Globalization, 29 Tilburg L. Rev. 1 (2024):

Tax sovereignty stands for the ability of a political community to design its fiscal system in ways that support its collective self-determination. This article argues that substantive sovereignty is not merely about power, rather, it is about legitimate authority. It addresses the impact of globalisation on such sovereignty, considering the impact it has on the ability of the state to provide public goods, to promote distributive justice, and to respect political participation and membership in a political community.

Continue reading

Hickman Presents A Study Evaluating OIRA Review Of Treasury Regulations Today At San Diego

Kristin Hickman (Minnesota; Google Scholar) presents A Study Evaluating OIRA Review of Treasury Regulations (with Bridget C.E. Dooling (Ohio State; Google Scholar)) at San Diego today as part of its Tax Law Speaker Series hosted by Michelle Layser:

The second term of the Trump Administration portends significant changes to federal policy, many of which have received large amounts of heated attention both in public and in private. A lesser-known change is the anticipated reinstatement of centralized review of tax regulations by the Office of Information of Regulatory Affairs (OIRA). For many years, most tax regulations were exempt from OIRA review. That changed in the first Trump administration when the Treasury Department (Treasury) and OIRA signed a memorandum of agreement bringing more tax regulations within OIRA’s oversight sphere. In the Biden administration, Treasury and OIRA reversed course, this time clearly and unequivocally exempting all tax regulations without exception. It was a rare retreat from the expansive approach to presidential authority that dominates the modern era.

Continue reading

Legal Ed News Roundup

• ABA Journal, Latest Try At Rewriting ABA Diversity Standard For Law Schools Gets Pushback From GOP Attorneys General
• ABA Journal, Law Grads With Past Substance-Use Disorders Suffered Disability Bias In Quest For License, DOJ Says
• ABA Journal, Law School Admission Council Names Its Next President And CEO
• ABA Journal, New York Will Adopt Nextgen Bar Exam, Considers Surprising Shifts In State-Law Tests
• ABA Journal Op-Ed (Nicholas Allard (Dean, Jacksonville)), Remembering President James Earl 'Jimmy' Carter, Ever the Teacher
• Michael Dorf (Cornell), The Lasting Legacy of Henry Monaghan
• Harvard Law Today, Harvard Law Faculty Remember Jimmy Carter

Continue reading

New York Is 30th Jurisdiction To Adopt NextGen Bar Exam

ABA Journal, New York Will Adopt NextGen Bar Exam, Considers Surprising Shifts in State-Law Tests:

New York, the jurisdiction with the largest number of bar candidates, will adopt the NextGen bar exam as it considers rejiggering the state-specific part of the exam, too, according to the New York Court of Appeals.

The state, where 14,354 examinees took the bar exam in 2024, becomes the 30th jurisdiction to adopt the test, according to a Jan. 8 press release from the National Conference of Bar Examiners. ...

[T]he notice posted Jan. 8 from the New York Court of Appeals states that a committee will develop “options for a robust New York-Specific bar eligibility requirement, … including the possibility of an in-person New York law component.”

Continue reading

Ellen Aprill And Beverly Moran Receive AALS Tax Section Lifetime Achievement Awards

Ellen Aprill (Loyola-L.A.; Google Scholar) and Beverly Moran (Vanderbilt) received the AALS Tax Section Lifetime Achievement Award at the year's AALS Annual Meeting in San Francisco: 

Ellen Aprill

Ellen Aprill is a teacher, a scholar, a mentor, and a mensch. As noted in our call for nominations, the purpose of the Section of Taxation’s Lifetime Achievement Award is to honor an individual who has had a distinguished career of teaching, service, and scholarship. The recipient should be someone who has impacted the field of taxation, the legal community, the academy through mentoring, writing, speaking, activism, and by providing opportunities to others.

Ellen recently retired from over 30 years of teaching at Loyola Los Angeles School of Law. (Teaching, check!)

She also was the founding director of Loyola's Tax LLM program. She has written over 50 articles focusing on tax-exempt organizations and many related issues, such as legislative process and election law. (Writing, check!)

Ellen has made countless presentations, including a memorable one in 2018 for the Tax Policy and Simplification Committee, in which she defined Bryd droppings, complete with a tasteful graphic (Speaking, check!)

She co-chaired the ABA Tax Force on Patenting Tax Strategies and is a favorite of journalists who seek information on exempt orgs, one of whom penned an ode for Ellen's festschrift. (Activism, check!)

Ellen has also mentored countless grateful tax scholars, including me. (Thank you!) And she's not finished yet, not by a long shot.  Ellen is currently serving as Senior Scholar in Residence at UCLA School of Law. ...

Ellen, thank you for all you do and for all you have done.  Mazel tov!

Beverly Moran: 

Continue reading

TaxProf Blog Weekend Roundup

Saturday:

• This Week's Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts
• AALS Tax Section Program Today: Teaching Tax — Textbooks, Tools, And Techniques
• Next Week’s Tax Workshop

Sunday:

• NY Times: At The Intersection of A.I. And Spirituality
• How Intellectuals Found God
• NY Times Op-Ed: What If Our Democracy Can’t Survive Without Christianity?
• Supreme Court Grants Cert Petition Authored By Pepperdine Religious Liberty Clinic Director And Alum
• The Top Five New Tax Papers

NY Times: At The Intersection of A.I. And Spirituality

New York Times, At the Intersection of A.I. and Spirituality:

For centuries, new technologies have changed the ways people worship, from the radio in the 1920s to television sets in the 1950s and the internet in the 1990s. Some proponents of A.I. in religious spaces have gone back even further, comparing A.I.’s potential — and fears of it — to the invention of the printing press in the 15th century.

Religious leaders have used A.I. to translate their livestreamed sermons into different languages in real time, blasting them out to international audiences. Others have compared chatbots trained on tens of thousands of pages of Scripture to a fleet of newly trained seminary students, able to pull excerpts about certain topics nearly instantaneously.

But the ethical questions around using generative A.I. for religious tasks have become more complicated as the technology has improved, religious leaders say. While most agree that using A.I. for tasks like research or marketing is acceptable, other uses for the technology, like sermon writing, are seen by some as a step too far.

Continue reading

How Intellectuals Found God

Peter Savodnik (The Free Press), How Intellectuals Found God:

[S]omething profound is happening. Instead of smirking at religion, some of our most important philosophers, novelists, and public intellectuals are now reassessing their contempt for it. They are wondering if they might have missed something. Religion, the historian Niall Ferguson told me, “provides ethical immunity to the false religions of Lenin and Hitler.”

There is something inevitable about this reassessment, Jonathan Haidt, the prominent New York University psychologist and best-selling author, told me. (Haidt’s books include The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion.) “There is a God-shaped hole in every human heart, and I believe it was put there by evolution,” he said. He was alluding to the seventeenth-century French philosopher Blaise Pascal, who wrote extensively on the nature of faith.

Continue reading

NY Times Op-Ed: What If Our Democracy Can’t Survive Without Christianity?

New York Times Op-Ed:  What if Our Democracy Can’t Survive Without Christianity?, by David French (Author, Divided We Fall: America’s Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation (2020)):

The New York Times Opinion columnist David French, a lifelong evangelical, speaks to Jonathan Rauch (Author, Cross Purposes: Christianity's Broken Bargain with Democracy (2025)), a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and an atheist, about the role of Christianity in redeeming and supporting American democracy.

David French: ... You’re an atheist. You don’t believe in God, but one of the points to your book is for American democracy to flourish, you argue that we need better Christianity. You’re not trying to say that the solution to the crisis in American democracy or problems in American democracy is becoming an atheist. You talk about a solution that is actually about a better version of Christianity, or Christianity living up to its ideals.

I found that fascinating. Why is it that you took this approach that said a better Christianity is the answer, not no Christianity?

Rauch: Well, I wouldn’t even say “better.” The way I think of it is: What really needs to happen to get our country on a better track is for Christianity not to become more secular or more liberal, but to become more like itself, to become more truly Christian.

I came to that for a few reasons, but one of them is knowing people like you and other Christians who showed me that the three fundamentals of Christianity map very well onto the three fundamentals of Madisonian liberalism. And one of those is don’t be afraid. No. 2 is be like Jesus. Imitate Jesus. And No. 3 is forgive each other. And those things are very much like how you run a constitutional republic.

Continue reading

Supreme Court Grants Cert Petition Authored By Pepperdine Religious Liberty Clinic Director And Alum

Pepperdine Surf Report, Cert Petition Authored by Hugh and Hazel Darling Foundation Religious Liberty Clinic Director Eric Rassbach and Pepperdine Caruso Law Alumnus Colten Stanberry (JD '19) Granted by Supreme Court

New York Times, Supreme Court to Hear Catholic Charity’s Bid for Tax Exemption:

The Supreme Court agreed on Friday to decide whether Wisconsin was free to deny a tax exemption to a Catholic charity on the grounds that its activities were not primarily religious.

The court has been notably receptive to arguments from religious groups, and the new case will give the justices another opportunity to explore the limits of the First Amendment’s protection of religious liberty.

The case concerns a Wisconsin law that exempts religious groups from state unemployment taxes so long as they are “operated primarily for religious purposes.”

Continue reading

The Top Five New Tax Papers

There is quite a bit of movement in this week's list of the Top 5 Recent Tax Paper Downloads, with new papers appearing on the list at #4 and #5:

1. [455 Downloads]  Rotten to the Core: The EU's Court of Justice Decision in Apple, by Ruth Mason (Virginia; Google Scholar) & Stephen Daly (King's College London; Google Scholar)
2. [312 Downloads]  The Quiet Evolution In International Tax: Domestic Law And Double Taxation, by Craig Elliffe (University of Auckland; Google Scholar)
3. [239 Downloads]  The Consequences Of Limiting The Tax Deductibility Of R&D, by Mary Cowx (Arizona State; Google Scholar), Rebecca Lester (Stanford; Google Scholar) & Michelle L. Nessa (Michigan State; Google Scholar)
4. [192 Downloads]  Tax Neutrality and Distribution Regimes, by Pablo Hernández González-Barreda (Comillas Pontifical University; Google Scholar)
5. [191 Downloads]  The Spiderweb Of Partnership Tax Structures, by Ryan Hess (Georgia), Emily Black (NYU), Zaynah Javed (Stanford; Google Scholar), Jonathan Hennessy (Stanford; Google Scholar), Rebecca Lester (Stanford; Google Scholar), Jacob Goldin (Chicago; Google Scholar), Daniel E. Ho (Stanford; Google Scholar) & Annette Portz (IRS)

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. Scott Fruehwald, The Best Legal Education Scholarship Of 2024
2. Paul Caron (Dean, Pepperdine), 50% Through The Fall 2025 Law School Admissions Season: Applicants Are Up 24% (Black Applicants Are Up 36%)
3. Jonathan Skrmetti et al., 21 State AGs Rebuke ABA For Walking Back Plan To Remove ‘Race And Ethnicity’ From Law School Diversity Accreditation Standard
4. Steven Arrigg Koh (Boston University), “How Do I Design My New Law Course?”
5. Nancy B. Rapoport (UNLV), Training Law Students To Model Civility In An Uncivil Social Media World
6. ABA Journal, The Five Biggest Changes To The Bar Exam In 2024
7. W. Bradley Wendel (Cornell), The Good Lawyers Of January 6
8. Law.com, LSAC Sues ‘AI Tutor for LSAT’ For Copyright And Trademark Infringement
9. Nancy Levit (UMKC) & Allen Rostron (UMKC), Spring 2025 Law Review Article Submission Guide
10. Paul Caron (Dean, Pepperdine), Legal Ed News Roundup

Tax:

1. Bloomberg, Trump Nominates Ken Kies To Be Assistant Treasury Secretary For Tax Policy
2. Michael Schaum (St. Thomas-FL), Stepping Up Basis In Living Taxpayer Assets With Upstream Wealth Transfers Through Intentionally Defective Grantor Trusts
3. Xuan-Thao Nguyen (University of Washington) & Jeffrey Maine (Maine), Tax Treatment Of Crypto Losses
4. SSRN, The 50 Most Downloaded U.S. Tax Law Professors Of 2024
5. Marilyn Hajj (Virginia), Frequently Unanswered Questions: Scrutinizing The IRS's Informal Guidance
6. Benjamin Leff (American), Challenging The Johnson Amendment: What SAFE SPACE Gets Right—And Wrong
7. Bryan Camp (Texas Tech), Lesson From The Tax Court: The 150 Day Rule For Filing Tax Court Petitions
8. Lisa Chen (UC-SF), More T In ESG: Tax As A Crucial Component Of ESG
9. Jacob Todres (St. John's), Current Developments In Tax Malpractice: Basics And Beyond
10. Haozheng Jiang (St. Louis) & Henry Ordower (St. Louis), Cryptocurrency Public Key Reporting: Using Embedded Technology To Aid Tax Compliance

Faith

1. New York Times Op-Ed (David Brooks), My Decade-Long Journey To Faith
2. New York Times Op-Ed (Nicholas Kristof), A Conversation About The Virgin Birth That Maybe Wasn’t
3. Jewish Journal Op-Ed (Jim Gash, President & CEO of Pepperdine University), Jewish Students And Faculty At Christian Universities And Law Schools
4. New York Times Op-Ed (Peter Wehner), Why It Matters That Jesus Came From A Dysfunctional Family
5. Christianity Today, Wicked, Luigi Mangione, And Evil
6. New York Times (Elizabeth Dias), December 23 Is ‘Christmas Adam’
7. The Free Press (Douglas Murray), Winston Churchill’s Christmas Eve Message To America
8. New York Times Interview, Jonathan Roumie Plays Jesus To Millions. It Can Get Intense.
9. Christianity Today Op-Ed (Philip Yancey), Christmas Was Always God’s Plan
10. Wall Street Journal Op-Ed (William McGurn), All The Little Sisters Of The Poor Want For Christmas Is Religious Liberty

AALS Tax Section Program Today: Teaching Tax — Textbooks, Tools, And Techniques

Section on Taxation, Teaching Tax: Textbooks, Tools, and Techniques 
2:40 - 5:10 pm Moscone Center, Level Two South (Room 205)

This panel, designed for new law teachers as well as more experienced teachers, will explore the opportunities and challenges of selecting and developing course materials in tax courses. How do you choose the right textbook for the way you want to teach your class? Should you consider authoring a textbook or signing on to co-author an existing textbook? What supplemental materials should you consider?

• Bridget Crawford (Pace)
• Tessa Davis (South Carolina)
• Roberta Mann (Oregon) (moderator)
• Shu-Yi Oei (Duke)
• Alex Zhang (Emory)

Continue reading

Next Week’s Tax Workshop

Monday, January 13: Kristin Hickman (Minnesota; Google Scholar) will present A Study Evaluating OIRA Review of Treasury Regulations (with Bridget C.E. Dooling (Ohio State; Google Scholar)) as part of the San Diego Tax Law Speaker Series. If you would like to attend, please contact Michelle Layser. 

For individual tax workshop posts, see here.

Continue reading

Weekly SSRN Tax Article Review And Roundup: Eyal-Cohen Reviews Mehrotra's The Intellectual Origins Of The Modern International Tax Regime

This week, Mirit Eyal-Cohen (Alabama; Google Scholar) reviews a new work by Ajay K. Mehrotra (Northwestern; Google Scholar), The Intellectual Origins of the Modern International Tax Regime: Edwin R. A. Seligman, Economic Allegiance, and the League of Nations’ 1923 Report, 5 J. L. & Political Econ. 995 (2025).

As someone deeply fascinated by history and its nuanced narratives, I find immense value in exploring works that shed light on pivotal moments in intellectual and policy evolution. This Article reflects one such cornerstone of tax history literature by offering a unique opportunity to glimpse into how Edwin R. A. Seligman and the League of Nations’ 1923 Report shaped the development of international tax governance. Through a detailed exploration of historical context, intellectual contributions, and lasting impacts, Mehrotra does a great job uncovering the foundational principles that continue to influence contemporary tax policy.

The devastation of World War I left many economies in disarray, burdened with immense debts and the need for reconstruction.

Continue reading

Please Join Us: Pepperdine Caruso Law AALS Reception TODAY (6:00-8:00 PM)

Pepperdine Caruso Law School invites law professors and deans to a reception
hosted by Dean Paul Caron at the 2025 AALS Annual Meeting in San Francisco.

Friday, Jan. 10, 6:00 - 8:00 p.m.
Feinstein's Theater/Kanpai Lounge (Lobby Level) | Hotel Nikko
Please join us for wine & beer and hors d'oeuvres

Weekly Legal Education Roundup

• Paul Caron (Dean, Pepperdine), 50% Through The Fall 2025 Law School Admissions Season: Applicants Are Up 24% (Black Applicants Are Up 36%)
• Steven Arrigg Koh (Boston University), “How Do I Design My New Law Course?
• Robert Kuehn (Washington University), The Employment Benefits of Law Clinics and Externships
• Law.com, LSAT Administrator Sues to Block AI Tutor From Using ‘Famous, Distinctive’ Test Prep Materials
• Nancy Levit (UMKC) & Allen Rostron (UMKC), Spring 2025 Law Review Article Submission Guide
• LSAC, CUNY Law Dean Sudha Setty Named New LSAC President and CEO
• Nancy Rapoport (UNLV), Training Law Students to Model Civility When Social Media Makes Civility Harder to Maintain

Continue reading

AALS Tax Section Program Today: The Expiration Of The TCJA And The Future Of Tax Policy

Section on Taxation, The Expiration of the TCJA and the Future of Tax Policy
4:30 - 6:00 pm Moscone Center, Level Two South (Room 212)

As the expiration of several provisions of the TCJA looms and as a new administration takes over, there is a potential for significant tax policy changes in the coming years. The experts on this panel will bring their experience in government, studying the history of tax law, and their years of work as scholars of tax to help us think through what might be coming in the world of federal tax policy.

• Kimberly Clausing (UCLA)
• Christopher Hanna (SMU)
• Ajay Mehrotra (Northwestern)
• Phyllis Taite (Oklahoma) (moderator)

Continue reading

Tax Policy In The Biden Administration

• Bloomberg, Bezos’ Earth Fund Starts Nonprofit Allowing Tax-Free Donations
• Bloomberg, Supreme Court Takes Up IRS Challenge to Tax Court Jurisdiction
• Bloomberg, Trump Allies Fret Tax-Cut Plans at Risk With GOP Infighting
• Bloomberg, Trump Gathers SALT-Focused Republicans Before Tax Fight
• Brookings Institution, How Should We Tax the Great Wealth Transfer?
• Cato Institute, The Case for Trump’s 15 Percent Corporate Tax Rate 

Continue reading

The 50 Most Downloaded U.S. Tax Law Professors Of 2024 (Updated)

Rank	Name	School	Downloads
1	Jonathan Choi	USC	14,026
2	Reuven Avi-Yonah	Michigan	12,982
3	Amy Monahan	Minnesota	8,754
4	Zachary Liscow	Yale	6,831
5	Daniel Hemel	NYU	4,768
6	Bridget Crawford	Pace	4,748
7	Kim Clausing	UCLA	4,606
8	Kristin Hickman	Minnesota	4,575
9	D. Dharmapala	UC-Berkeley	3,966
10	Darien Shanske	UC-Davis	3,761
11	David Gamage	Missouri-Columbia	3,705
12	Louis Kaplow	Harvard	3,631
13	Brad Borden	Brooklyn	3,546
14	David Weisbach	Chicago	3,539
15	Steven R. Johnson	Florida State	3,470
16	Robert Sitkoff	Harvard	3,293
17	Ruth Mason	Virginia	3,265
18	Michael Simkovic	USC	2,882
19	Kyle Rozema	Northwestern	2,779
20	Brian Galle	Georgetown	2,519
21	Ellen Aprill	Loyola-L.A.	2,434
22	Edward G. Fox	Michigan	2,366
23	Young Ran (Christine) Kim	Cardozo	2,363
24	Yariv Brauner	Florida	2,210
25	Edward McCaffery	USC	2,178
26	Richard Ainsworth	Boston University	2,156
27	Andy Grewal	Iowa	2,120
28	Dan Shaviro	NYU	2,076
29	Alex Raskolnikov	Columbia	2,020
30	Calvin H. Johnson	Texas	2,014
31	Richard Pomp	Connecticut	1,903
32	Jim Hines	Michigan	1,901
33	Diane Ring	Boston College	1,866
34	Francine Lipman	UNLV	1,772
35	Lily Batchelder	NYU	1,765

Continue reading

LSAC Sues ‘AI Tutor for LSAT’ For Copyright And Trademark Infringement

Law.com, LSAT Administrator Sues to Block AI Tutor From Using ‘Famous, Distinctive’ Test Prep Materials:

A copyright and trademark infringement lawsuit claims that a company purporting to be an “AI Tutor for LSAT” used proprietary content that belongs to the Law School Admission Council.

The suit, Law School Admission Council v. Chatty Courses, was filed by attorneys from Alston & Bird on Dec. 31 in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, which alleges breach of contract and intellectual property infringement against Chatty Courses, a company called Mun Dot So, and the California man who owns those companies. The complaint alleges that the defendants purchased a subscription to LawHub Advantage, a test preparation program, copied its content, and used Law School Admission Council trademarks, copyrighted works, and proprietary content without permission. ...

Continue reading

Kuehn: The Employment Benefits Of Law Clinics And Externships

Robert R. Kuehn (Washington University; Google Scholar), The Employment Benefits of Law Clinics and Externships, 33 Clin. Legal Educ. Newsletter __ (2025):

One of the reasons law students enroll in a law clinic or externship is the belief that the experience will improve their marketability. Surveys of recent law graduates and employers show that students' perceptions of the positive impact of a clinic or externship experience on their job opportunities upon graduation are well founded. The research summarized herein demonstrates that clinics and externships do aid graduates in obtaining their first job and that potential employers value entry-level candidates with law clinic and externship experience. ...

Continue reading

Avi-Yonah On FDII And Domestic Manufacturing Tax Rate

Reuven S. Avi-Yonah (Michigan; Google Scholar), Should FDII Be Abolished in 2025?, 185 Tax Notes Fed. 2209 (Dec. 16, 2024): 

Avi-Yonah describes the looming international conflicts regarding the U.S. foreign-derived intangible income provision.

Reuven S. Avi-Yonah (Michigan; Google Scholar), A Lower Corporate Tax Rate for Domestic Manufacturing?, 185 Tax Notes Fed. 2401 (Dec. 23, 2024): 

Continue reading

21 State AGs Rebuke ABA For Walking Back Plan To Remove ‘Race And Ethnicity’ From Law School Diversity Accreditation Standard

Letter From Jonathan Skrmetti (Tennessee) and 20 Other Attorneys General to Council of the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar (Jan. 6, 2025):

A coalition of State Attorneys General previously wrote to raise concerns about your Standards and Rules of Procedure for Approval of Law Schools. ... We pointed out that Standard 206, Diversity and Inclusion, fails to account for the Supreme Court’s decision in Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President & Fellows of Harvard College (SFFA), 600 U.S. 181 (2023) and, by all appearances, directs law-school administrators to violate both the Constitution and Title VII. In the months that followed our letter, you proposed revisions to the standard that remedied many of our concerns. But when those revisions received pushback, the Council retreated and once again proposed a Standard that appears to perpetuate unlawful racial discrimination. The proposed revisions, much like the current Standard, impermissibly impose race-based admissions and hiring requirements as a condition of accreditation while leaving law schools in the dark about how to reconcile the Standard’s dictates with their legal obligations. We appreciate that the Council has endeavored to make improvements to the current version of the Standard and attempted to harmonize feedback from a variety of groups. But the law is clear, even as the new proposed Standard is not. We thus once again urge the Council to bring Standard 206 in line with federal law and with the ABA’s purported commitment to set the legal and ethical foundation for the nation’s attorneys and educational institutions. No law school should be confused about whether it should engage in race-based decisionmaking. ...

Continue reading

Challenging The Johnson Amendment: What SAFE SPACE Gets Right—And Wrong

Benjamin M. Leff (American; Google Scholar), Challenging the Johnson Amendment: What SAFE SPACE Gets Right—and Wrong, 185 Tax Notes Fed. 51 (Oct. 7, 2024):

In this article, Leff argues that the IRS’s interpretation of section 501(c)(3)’s prohibition on campaign intervention (the Johnson Amendment) is unconstitutional, as claimed in a recent Tax Court petition, but that the petitioner in that case unnecessarily asserts a dangerously broad strategy for vindicating charities’ free speech rights.

Continue reading

CUNY Dean Sudha Setty Named LSAC President & CEO

LSAC Names CUNY Law Dean Sudha Setty as its New President and CEO:

The Law School Admission Council (LSAC) has named Sudha Setty as its president and chief executive officer, effective July 1, 2025.

Setty is currently serving as dean of the City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law. Previously, she served as dean of Western New England University School of Law.  

“I am honored to have been selected as LSAC’s president and CEO,” Setty said. “For years I have been deeply impressed with LSAC’s mission and work in championing access, equity, and outcomes in legal education that advance law and justice.”

“Law schools and higher education in general face enormous challenges and opportunities, from the role of the academy in society, to how to preserve the rule of law, to how to advance diversity, access, and excellence in legal education,” Setty said​.​ “These​ profound​ issues require all of us to work together towards building a well-equipped, diverse, and engaged legal profession. LSAC plays a vital role in expanding outreach and access to legal education, and its work is more important than ever.”  

Continue reading

Cryptocurrency Public Key Reporting: Using Embedded Technology To Aid Tax Compliance

Haozheng Jiang (J.D. 2026, St. Louis) & Henry Ordower (St. Louis), Cryptocurrency Public Key Reporting: Using Embedded Technology to Aid Tax Compliance, 185 Tax Notes Fed. 2119 (Dec. 16, 2024):

This report proposes that U.S. taxpayers report each blockchain public key they control and associate it with their taxpayer identification numbers or with the TINs of the beneficial owners of the public keys and the underlying cryptocurrency positions. Public key disclosure and association will enable the IRS to develop the capability to match public blockchain transactions with the U.S. taxpayers engaged in them and thereby counteract the anonymity or, more accurately, pseudonymity of cryptocurrency. This reporting would (1) supplement the contentious and incomplete existing third-party reporting of cryptocurrency transactions involving U.S. taxpayers; (2) diminish the perceived competitive disadvantage that third-party reporting places on hosting services; (3) limit demands for legislation requiring the marking to market of cryptocurrency transactions or outlawing cryptocurrency unless governing software automatically collects owner data and reports it to governmental authorities; and (4) facilitate the determination and collection of income tax from taxpayers who invest or transact in cryptocurrencies.

Continue reading

More T In ESG: Tax As A Crucial Component Of ESG

Lisa Chen (J.D. 2023, UC-SF), More T in ESG: Tax as a Crucial Component of ESG, 75 UC L.J. 1245 (2024):

ESG is a framework used to assess the sustainability of a company and to measure financial risk arising from potential environmental, social, and governance issues. Investors and consumers typically rely on ESG ratings generated by third-party ratings agencies to evaluate a company’s ESG quality. Critics of ESG assert that ESG ratings are misleading because neither the rating agencies nor the ESG disclosures used to generate ratings are regulated. Despite these criticisms, demand for ESG-related products has grown four-fold in the last decade, reflecting the change in societal expectations regarding corporate behavior.

Continue reading

50% Through The Fall 2025 Law School Admissions Season: Applicants Are Up 24% (Black Applicants Are Up 36%)

We are now 50% of the way through Fall 2025 law school admissions season. The number of law school applicants reported by LSAC is up 24.3% compared to last year at this time:

187 of the 196 law schools are experiencing an increase in applications. Applications are up +40% or more at 49 law schools:

Applicants are up in every region, and are up the most in Northwest (+37.1%), Northeast (+29.8%), and New England (+28.5%):

Applicants' LSAT scores are up +30.2% in the 170-180 band, +25.0% in the 160-169 band, +18.2% in the 150-159 band, and +19.5% in the 120-149 band:

Continue reading

Spring 2025 Law Review Article Submission Guide

Nancy Levit (UMKC) & Allen Rostron (UMKC) have updated their incredibly useful document, which contains two charts for the Spring 2025 submission season covering the 196 main journals of each law school.

We have created hyperlinks for each law review to take you directly to the law review’s submissions page. Again the chart includes as much information as possible about what law reviews are not accepting submissions right now and what months they say they’ll resume accepting submissions. 

The most interesting change here is the approximately sixty journals (that aren’t already open) that say they plan to reopen for submissions in February (February 1 is a popular date).

Continue reading

Current Developments In Tax Malpractice: Basics And Beyond

Jacob L. Todres (St. John's), Current Developments in Tax Malpractice: Basics and Beyond, 57 Loy. L.A. L. Rev. 423 (2024):

It was always assumed that “tax malpractice” referred to a situation in which an error occurred with respect to some tax provision or in a tax-related administrative or legal proceeding. However, several recent cases have expanded this thinking, introducing the possibility that tax malpractice may also occur where damages include an increase in taxes—irrespective of whether there was an error that directly involved tax law. Beginning with a discussion of the evolving definition of that term as seen in the New York cases of Serino v. Lipper and Bloostein v. Morrison Cohen LLP and whether these cases may have returned New York to its traditional negligence measure of damages in such tax malpractice situations, this Article presents a survey of current developments in the tax malpractice area.

Continue reading

Lesson From The Tax Court: The 150 Day Rule For Filing Tax Court Petitions

Section 6213 generally gives taxpayers 90 days after the IRS mails them a Notice of Deficiency (NOD) to petition the Tax Court for review.  That’s the 90-day rule.  But some lucky taxpayers get 150 days instead of the usual 90.  That’s the 150-day rule.  Who are those lucky taxpayers?  Well, the statute says the 150-day rule applies “if the notice is addressed to a person outside the United States.”  The Tax Court has interpreted that phrase to mean that taxpayers get the 150-day rule when they are outside on foreign travel when the IRS mails the NOD, or maybe when the Post Office delivers the NOD.  Hmmmm ... it's hard to say exactly because there is no bright line here.  Case law varies.  Not everyone who is outside the United States on one of those two days automatically gets the 150 period.  It just depends on whether the Tax Court believes that the travel interfered with the taxpayer’s ability to meet the 90 day deadline.  That’s partly what makes these taxpayers lucky.

Today we learn that a taxpayer who is in the country on both the day of mailing and the day of delivery will probably not be lucky.  Later travel outside the country will not trigger the 150 day deadline.  That’s one takeaway from Rosa M. Marcano v. Commissioner, T.C. Summ. Op. 2024-26 (Dec. 23, 2024) (Judge Abeit).  There, the taxpayer was in the country when the NOD was mailed and delivered.  But she then traveled outside the country for approximately 50 days and did not file her Tax Court petition until 107 days after the IRS mailed the NOD.  The Tax Court, however, did not give allow her the 150-day rule because, it said, “the crucial inquiry” (Op. p. 3) was the taxpayer’s location on two crucial dates: the date the IRS mailed the NOD and the date the Post Office delivered it.  Here, the taxpayer was in the country on both those particular days.  Unlucky!

It seems to me this is not the only lesson here.  Despite the language in Judge Arbeit's well-written opinion, I would resist reading this case as creating a bright-line rule.  Reading it that way makes it difficult to square with its past approaches.  Detail below the fold.

Continue reading

Legal Ed News Roundup

• Algemeiner, Rutgers Law School Published a Paper Filled with False Anti-Israel Talking Points
• Nicholas Allard (Dean, Jacksonville), ‘Fabulous 14’ Graduate in 2025
• Nicholas Allard (Dean, Jacksonville), Lessons From Jimmy Carter’s Beautiful Life
• CBS 12 News, Local Attorney Creates Scholarship Fund to Help Students Attend Law School
• Daily Record, Jacksonville University College of Law opens permanent campus
• Des Moines Register, Megan Graham, New Voice on Tech Privacy, Safety, Joins University of Iowa's Law School
• Susan Estrich (USC), Harvard Law School Steps Back in Time
• Mississippi Today, On This Day in 1939, Pauli Murray Applied to UNC Law School

Continue reading

Wendel: The Good Lawyers Of January 6

W. Bradley Wendel (Cornell; Google Scholar), The Good Lawyers of January 6:

Much of the response by the community of legal ethics and professional responsibility scholars to the 2020 presidential election has been focused on the wrongs committed by lawyers like John Eastman, Jeffrey Clark, and Kenneth Chesebro, who created the alternate elector scheme to throw the decision regarding the election to the House of Representatives. Yet there was a group of lawyers, that I will refer to as the good lawyers of January 6, who forcefully and unequivocally opposed this plan, refused to cooperate in its execution, advised Vice President Mike Pence that it was not legally supportable, and in some cases threatened to resign in protest if President Trump went forward with it. These lawyers are, almost without exception, card-carrying movement conservatives, with pedigrees including clerkships for conservative Supreme Court Justices, membership in the Federalist Society, and service in prior Republican administrations. They include Greg Jacob, counsel to Vice President Pence; White House Counsel Pat Cipollone; White House Senior Advisor Eric Hershmann; retired federal judge J. Michael Luttig; Acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen; and Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue. 

As a normative legal ethics theorist I am interested in whether there a coherent and attractive ideal or set of principles of ethical conduct by lawyers that would align with the refusal of these lawyers to advice or assist in the overthrow of the election.

Continue reading

Trump Nominates Ken Kies To Be Assistant Treasury Secretary For Tax Policy

Bloomberg, Trump Picks Ken Kies for Key Tax Policy Job at Treasury Ahead of Cuts Push:

President-elect Donald Trump has announced members of his senior leadership team at the Treasury Department, who’ll work alongside Scott Bessent, his pick for secretary.

Ken Kies will be assistant secretary for tax policy, placing him as a point person at the Treasury working on tax cuts Trump has touted as a signature policy issue for 2025. Kies is a longtime Republican tax lobbyist, whose client list has included Microsoft Corp., insurers and financial services groups. [He is Managing Director of The Federal Policy Group.]

Samantha Schwab, granddaughter of billionaire Charles Schwab, will be deputy chief of staff and work under Daniel Katz of the Manhattan Institute, who will be chief of staff. Katz was a senior adviser at the Treasury during Trump’s first term, the president-elect said in a post on his Truth Social platform Thursday night. Schwab worked for the first Trump administration in the office of legislative affairs. Charles Schwab contributed $1 million to Trump’s 2017 inaugural fundraising committee.

Continue reading

TaxProf Blog Weekend Roundup

Saturday:

• This Week's Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts
• Rapoport: Training Law Students To Model Civility In An Uncivil Social Media World
• Stepping Up Basis In Living Taxpayer Assets With Upstream Wealth Transfers Through Intentionally Defective Grantor Trusts

Sunday:

• NY Times Interview: Jonathan Roumie Plays Jesus To Millions. It Can Get Intense.
• WaPo Op-Ed: Living For The Unremarkable Moments
• WSJ Op-Ed: All The Little Sisters Of The Poor Want For Christmas Is Religious Liberty
• “How Do I Design My New Law Course?”
• The Top Five New Tax Papers

NY Times Interview: Jonathan Roumie Plays Jesus To Millions. It Can Get Intense.

New York Times, The Interview: Jonathan Roumie Plays Jesus to Millions. It Can Get Intense.:

It’s common, maybe even natural, for audiences to conflate actors with the roles they play. To assume, for example, that an onscreen action hero is tough offscreen too, or that a rom-com star is a real-life charmer. That blurring of lines is probably a sign that an actor is doing something right, but it doesn’t make the dynamic any less strange or confusing. Especially if the character you’re famous for playing is Jesus Christ.

Since 2017, Jonathan Roumie has starred as Jesus on “The Chosen,” a hit series that takes a prestige-TV approach to the story told in the canonical Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Neither piously solemn nor portentously heavy-handed, “The Chosen,” which was created by Dallas Jenkins (son of the author Jerry Jenkins, a co-writer of the hugely popular “Left Behind” books), instead displays snappy dialogue, tense interpersonal drama, unexpected humor and high production values.

That slickly modern style, which allows the show to appeal to a curious nonbeliever like me, is centered on Roumie’s warm and relatable portrayal, and it has helped the show become a gigantic success. To date, “The Chosen,” which is available for streaming on Amazon, Hulu and other platforms and will return for its fifth season next year, has been watched by more than 250 million people.

Continue reading

WaPo Op-Ed: What To Expect When You Have Expectations

Washington Post Op-Ed:  What to Expect When You Have Expectations, by Anne Lamott (Author, Somehow: Thoughts on Love (2024)):

Sometimes, getting your hopes up backfires.

Having been accused by dark forces of writing about every little thing that happens to me, and in fact having made a career of this, I wonder whether it’s okay to catch readers up on this month’s cataract surgery.

Most things I know about life were reaffirmed, from our periodically doomed circumstances to all legitimate reasons for hope.

I have heard it said in the recovery community that expectations are resentments under construction. But I do not let that stop me: My husband had the surgery two weeks before, my poor Mr. Magoo husband with the worst eyesight of any non-blind person I know, and now he can see. ...

So, naturally, a girl’s thoughts turned to her own shot at experiencing this. ... I had my surgery last week.

Continue reading

WSJ Op-Ed: All The Little Sisters Of The Poor Want For Christmas Is Religious Liberty

Wall Street Journal Op-Ed:  All the Little Sisters Want for Christmas Is Religious Liberty, by William McGurn:

When Christmas arrives for the Little Sisters of the Poor, they will be looking for one special gift under the tree: an end to the lawfare against them.

You remember the Little Sisters. They are a congregation of nuns who fought the Obama administration mandate that would force them to pay for contraception and abortion-inducing drugs. Though they won twice at the Supreme Court, lawsuits by California and Pennsylvania are still alive—and the sisters fear a Grinchly rule stripping them of their religious exemption by Joe Biden on his way out the door.

They aren’t alone. A Baptist baker is taking on California in court over the state’s insistence that she bake a cake celebrating a same-sex wedding. In New York, Yeshiva University is still caught up in litigation over its refusal to recognize an organization of gay students. Across America, religious citizens and organizations are fighting government decrees that would compel them to violate their beliefs.

Continue reading