FedSoc Forums

With final congressional review action on the Iran Deal just days away, is Congress empowered to act in a fully informed manner with the vital information pertinent to all side agreements? Is the IAEA predictably a trustworthy actor? What tools might the people’s branch of government utilize to provide oversight and enforcement capability if Iran is in violation? Prof. Alan Dershowitz and Ambassador Dennis Ross approached these questions from different perspectives drawn from deep historical and geopolitical experience. Prof. Dershowitz is author of a book entitled The Case Against the Iran Deal: How Can We Now Stop Iran from Getting Nukes? and Ambassador Ross most recently wrote "How to Put Some Teeth into The Nuclear Deal with Iran" with David Patraeus. -- Featuring: Professor Alan Dershowtiz, Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law, Harvard Law School and Ambassador Dennis Ross, William Davidson Distinguished Fellow and Counselor, The Washington Institute. Moderator: Jamil Jaffer, Former Chief Counsel and Senior Advisor, Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

On July 24, 2015, the D.C. Circuit Court issued an opinion allowing a challenge to the constitutionality of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and of the recess appointment of its director to continue. Our expert discussed the implications of this decision and other recent developments in Dodd-Frank Act litigation. -- Featuring: Gregory F. Jacob, Partner, O'Melveny & Myers LLP.

When the United States government passed the Bill of Rights in 1791, its uncompromising protection of speech and of the press were unlike anything the world had ever seen before. But by 1798, the once-dazzling young republic of the United States was on the verge of collapse: Partisanship gripped the weak federal government, British seizures threatened American goods and men on the high seas, and war with France seemed imminent as its own democratic revolution deteriorated into terror. Suddenly, the First Amendment, which protected harsh commentary of the weak government, no longer seemed as practical. So that July, President John Adams and the Federalists in control of Congress passed an extreme piece of legislation that made criticism of the government and its leaders a crime punishable by heavy fines and jail time. Liberty’s First Crisis tells the story of the 1798 Sedition Act, the crucial moment when high ideals met real-world politics and the country’s future hung in the balance. Author Charles Slack discussed his latest book and answered questions from the audience. -- Featuring: Charles Slack, Author, Liberty's First Crisis: Adams, Jefferson, and the Misfits Who Saved Free Speech and Stephen Klein, Attorney, Pillar of Law Institute.

On June 30, 2015, the Supreme Court decided to revisit whether the First Amendment permits the government to compel its employees to financially support a union by granting certiorari in Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, No. 14-915. In Friedrichs, the Court will consider whether to overrule Abood v. Detroit Board of Education (1977), which held that public employees can be compelled to financially support union collective-bargaining with government, but not union political activities. -- The Court’s grant of certiorari in Friedrichs comes on the one-year anniversary of its decision in Harris v. Quinn, where Court criticized Abood’s rationales, but did not overrule Abood after finding it inapplicable to the non-employee Medicaid providers who brought the case. Unlike Harris, Friedrichs squarely presents the issue decided in Abood—whether public school teachers can be required to pay compulsory union fees as condition of their employment. -- The Friedrichs petitioners argue that Abood should be overturned because there is no distinction between bargaining with government and lobbying government—both are political speech. The respondent California Teachers Association, however, counters that union bargaining with government is akin to bargaining with a private employer, and that it wrongful for teachers to get a so-called “free ride” on union bargaining efforts. -- Is the Court likely to overrule Abood? And what will be the implications if it does? -- Featuring: Erwin Chemerinsky, Dean and Distinguished Professor of Law, University of California, Irvine and William Messenger, Staff Attorney, National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, Inc.

In The Conservative Heart: How to Build a Fairer, Happier, and More Prosperous America, American Enterprise Institute’s Arthur Brooks declares that it’s time for a new conservative movement — one where fighting poverty, promoting equal opportunity, celebrating earned success, and valuing spiritual enlightenment are embraced as universal goals. A movement with a positive agenda to help people lead happier, more satisfying lives. A movement that can speak to voters’ hearts as well as their minds and reunite the country. Capitalism has been the greatest tool to draw people out of poverty around the world. Yet here in America, the conservatives who champion this system are viewed as callous and disinterested in helping the poor. And, ironically, while American-style free enterprise has been changing the developing world, decades of ineffective government policy in the US have left our own “war on poverty” stagnate. Brooks identifies some new canons of conservative thought. Among them are rebuilding human capital to help people succeed, maintaining fiscal conservatism while making “peace” with a safety net for the truly indigent, reforming education, and fighting for entrepreneurship — not for the wealthy, but for those at the very bottom of the income distribution. Mr. Brooks discussed his latest book and answered audience questions on this Teleforum call. -- Featuring: Arthur C. Brooks, President, American Enterprise Institute and Author, The Conservative Heart: How to Build a Fairer, Happier, and More Prosperous America.

The "Iran Deal" as negotiated by the Obama Administration and approved by the UN raises controversies on many levels. One foundational question concerns whether a president's constitutional Article II power extends to an executive agreement that incurs foreign obligations and implicates international law. The congressional response in the Corker-Cardin review act demurred from challenging whether the nuclear deal was an end-run around treaty Senate ratification requirements by acknowledging the executive agreement classification. Now there are questions as to whether the final deal is sufficiently inconsistent with the anticipated agreement such that the Corker-Cardin bill is undermined. Does UN approval prior to congressional review moot Corker-Cardin? Additionally, as yet unquantified side agreements may have a bearing on congressional posture. Also, some states have sanctioned Iran separately. Since an executive agreement does not carry the federal pre-emptive power as would a treaty, may states continue to act independent of Corker-Cardin, UN, or administration commitments? -- Featuring: Jamil N. Jaffer, Adjunct Professor of Law and Director, Homeland and National Security Law Program, George Mason University School of Law and former Chief Counsel and Senior Advisor, Senate Foreign Relations Committee; David B. Rivkin, Jr., Partner, Baker & Hostetler LLP; and Prof. John C. Yoo, Emanuel S. Heller Professor of Law, University of California Berkeley School of Law.

In what is being described as a "landmark" ruling by the National Labor Relations Board, a divided NLRB has changed a decades-long approach and made it easier for contract and temporary workers to unionize. The NLRB decision expands the traditional definition of "employee" to include shift workers, contract workers, and other temporary employees. What will the decision mean for workers and employers? Will it impact franchisers? Will it lead to more contested matters, as the NLRB has suggested that it will make further determinations on a case-by-case basis? These and other questions, including questions from the audience, were be addressed on our Teleforum call. -- Featuring: Mr. Michael J. Lotito, Co-Chairman, Workplace Policy Institute and Shareholder, Littler Mendelson PC.

Is Clay v. United States, currently pending in the 11th Circuit, a case study of overcriminalization and abusive federal prosecution? The case raises basic notions of due process, fair notice, the rule of lenity, mens rea, and actus reus. What began as a highly publicized raid by some 200 FBI agents on a Florida health care company over an accounting dispute of how to interpret a provision in Florida’s Medicaid reimbursement statute with no clarifying administrative regulations, ended in the indictment, conviction, and prison sentences for the company’s top executives for fraud. This case is particularly important for all regulated industries, where there are numerous and ambiguous laws and complex regulations governing conduct subject to administrative, civil, and criminal enforcement. John Lauro, counsel in the case, discussed the lawsuit, with Paul Kamenar joining to offer questions and comments. -- Featuring: Paul D. Kamenar, Washington, D.C. Attorney and Senior Fellow, Administrative Conference of the United States and John F. Lauro, Principal, Lauro Law Firm. Moderator: John G. Malcolm, Director and Ed Gilbertson and Sherry Lindberg Gilbertson Senior Legal Fellow, Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies, The Heritage Foundation.

The Supreme Court issued a number of notable opinions in the area of bankruptcy law during the recently concluded term. Our experts offered their analysis on recent developments in the field and took questions from a call-in audience. -- Featuring: Prof. Thomas Plank, Joel A. Katz Distinguished Professor of Law, University of Tennessee College of Law; Prof. Zvi Rosen Visiting Assistant Professor of Law, Hofstra University Maurice A. Deane School of Law; and Prof. David Skeel, S. Samuel Arsht Professor of Corporate Law, University of Pennsylvania Law School.

On Thursday July 16, 2015, the Wisconsin Supreme Court issued an opinion and order ending the long running “John Doe” investigation into potential violations of Wisconsin campaign finance law and whether candidates and outside groups illegally “coordinated” spending. In mid-June of 2015, a young political consultant was sentenced to nearly two years in federal prison for illegally coordinating between a congressional campaign and a Super PAC. The U.S. Department of Justice also recently announced it will look carefully at allegations of coordination between candidate and outside groups. What does all of this mean? Where is the law heading on this? Are civil and criminal investigations into campaign activity going to be increasing? -- Featuring: Allen Dickerson, Legal Director, Center for Competitive Politics; Edward D. Greim, Partner, Graves Garrett LLC; and Tara Malloy Senior Counsel, Campaign Legal Center. Moderator: Jason Torchinsky, Holtzman Vogel Josefiak PLLC.