The University of Chicago Law School Faculty Blog

Weekend Blog Roundup

Eric Posner has two posts on the Crimean secession referendum, one before and one after; Brian Leiter notes the troubles of University of Florida's law school's dean search and a slight uptick in LSAT takers; Becker and Posner announce a month-long sabbatical.

Recent Faculty Blog Roundup

Eric Posner looks at the growing crisis in Ukraine in a series of posts; Brian Leiter has a poll on New York Times v. Sullivan fifty years later; Will Baude posts his latest discussion with Eric Posner on originalism; Richard Epstein weighs in on the executive branch's dealings with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac; and Richard Posner and Gary Becker discuss ending the embargo on Cuba.

Weekend Blog Roundup

Becker and Posner discuss the decriminalization of marijuana; Richard Epstein weighs in on the minimum wage; and Eric Posner looks at mentions of "law professor" in the New York Times and the rise of the word "theorize."

Weekend Blog Roundup

On Law School Reports, Brian Leiter notes a new preface to his book Why Tolerate Religion? and price competition among law schools in Kansas City; Becker and Posner look at whether or not excess college enrollments are a myth; Eric Posner looks at the campaign contributions of Obama's ambassadors; and Will Baude muses on SCOTUS and same-sex marriage, Cass Sunstein's new book, and SCOTUS's requirement that one need be a lawyer to argue in front of them.

Becker-Posner on the Size of Government

On The Becker-Posner Blog, Becker and Posner weigh in on the optimal size of Government bureaucracies, particularly in the US.

Weekend Blog Roundup

On Law School Reports, Brian Leiter looks at the finanical crisis at Albany Law School and the finalists for dean at Berkeley; At The Volokh Conspiracy, Will Baude notes the existence of Richard Epstein University and opines on originalism and perfectionism, while Eric Posner responds to Will; and The Becker-Posner Blog tackles generational mobility and social mobility and income inequality.

Ambiguity in Legal Interpretation: A Debate

Here at Chicago, we love nothing more than a good debate, and this extends to the Faculty Blog as well. Next week we'll be featuring a conversation about Professor of Law and Aaron Director Research Scholar Anup Malani's paper "Ambiguity about Ambiguity: An Empirical Inquiry into Legal Interpretation." Along with Prof. Malani, the debate will feature Professor Einer Elhauge (Harvard), Professor William Eskridge (Yale), Chicago's own Judge Richard Posner, and Judge Stephen Williams (D.C. Circuit).

The abstract of Anup's paper is below, and you can download the complete paper here. Tune in Monday for what is sure to be a fascinating debate.

Most scholarship on statutory interpretation discusses what courts should do with ambiguous statutes. This paper investigates the crucial and analytically prior question of what ambiguity in law is. Does a claim that a text is ambiguous mean the reader is uncertain about its meaning? Or is it a claim that readers, as a group, would disagree about what the text means (however certain each of them may be individually)? This distinction is of considerable theoretical interest. It also turns out to be highly consequential as a practical matter.

To demonstrate, we developed a survey instrument for exploring determinations of ambiguity and administered it to nearly 1,000 law students. We find that different ways of asking whether a statute is ambiguous produce very different answers. Simply asking respondents whether a statute is “ambiguous” as applied to a set of facts produces answers that are strongly biased by the policy preferences of those giving the answers. But asking respondents whether they would expect others to agree about the meaning of the statute does not produce answers biased in this way. This discrepancy leads to important questions about which of those two ways of thinking about ambiguity is more legally relevant. It also has potential implications for how cases are decided and for how law is taught.

Update: Prof. Malani's co-author on the paper, Ward Farnsworth of Boston University, and Judge Frank Easterbrook will also be joining the debate.

Student Blogger - Philosophy of Utility, Utility of Philosophy

Speaking on the topic of Utilitarianism with the Law and Philosophy Workshop, denizen of the Seventh Circuit and favorite of the Law School, Judge Richard Posner offered the mischievously understated opening: “I don’t really have much interest in the normative side of Utilitarianism.”

This might strike some as odd coming from a thinker popularly associated with the view that judges ought to pursue economic efficiency as a primary goal (a description most recently repeated in January 11^th’s New Yorker).  Posner elaborated that Utilitarianism has been extremely valuable for focusing our attention on practical consequences and for providing a tool to debunk the talismanic use of powerful words like “justice” and “rights.”  But Utilitarianism, taken as a normative doctrine, is plagued by “insuperable boundary problems.”  (With respect to economic efficiency, Posner noted that efficiency is one thing a judge might value, but there are other things that might factor into finding the “best” law.) 

Video: Richard Posner on Fiscal Irresponsibility and the Future of the U.S.

The Council on Foreign Relations has posted a video of Judge Posner discussing the topic "Fiscal Irresponsibility Clouds the Future of the United States." The discussion is part of the CFR's C. Peter McColough Series on International Economics.

Richard Posner Critiques the President's Financial Regulation Reforms

Over on the Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation, Judge Posner has posted a two-part critique of the Obama Administration's report "A New Foundation: Rebuilding Financial Supervision and Regulation." Part 1 of his critique is here; Part 2 is here.