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On Monday, the Supreme Court will hear oral argument in a seemingly minor zoning case, Murr v. State of Wisconsin. In reality, the case involves a fundamental challenge to public authority to protect our communities and private property. In particular, if the Court were to rule in favor of petitioners, it would make it vastly […]

The Trump administration’s fundamental hostility to government is by now plainly apparent. The President issued an executive order requiring agencies to get rid of two regulations for each new one that is adopted. He appointed administrators who have been extraordinarily hostile to the missions of the departments and agencies that they now head, such as […]

This op-ed originally ran in The Hill. The Feb. 28 executive order overturning a Clean Water Act rule clarifying EPA’s jurisdiction over wetlands furnishes but the latest example of President Trump’s propensity to rule by almost daily fiat. Trump has ruled by decree ever since he assumed office. He has not proposed a single bill […]

Originally published on Environmental Law Prof Blog by CPR Member Scholar Dave Owen. Last Tuesday, President Trump signed an executive order directing EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers to begin work on a new rule defining the scope of federal jurisdiction under the Clean Water Act. The rule, if and when it is finalized, would replace the […]

Unless you regularly read newspapers from markets ranging from Baltimore to Houston to the San Francisco Bay area, chances are that you missed some of the op-eds that CPR’s scholars and staff published in the nation’s newspapers in February. We post links on our website, of course; you can find them on the various issue […]

The first rule of reading anti-regulatory bills, executive orders, and other policy prescriptions is: Sweat the hyper-technical, anodyne-sounding stuff. And President Donald Trump’s February 24 executive order on “Enforcing the Regulatory Reform Agenda” demonstrates why this rule exists.  One of the order’s provisions – which no doubt caused glaze to form over many an eye […]

In his first speech upon assuming his duties as EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt informed the agency’s employees that “regulators exist to give certainty to those that they regulate.” No, Mr. Pruitt, they do not. Regulators and the regulations they are responsible for adopting and enforcing exist to protect the public interest. In particular, they exist […]

Originally published on Environmental Law Prof Blog by CPR Member Scholar Lesley McAllister. Did you know that as of July 2016, we have a new federal law mandating that genetically engineered food be labeled? It is true – see 7 U.S.C. § 1639(b)(2)(D) (Jul. 29, 2016). So when, you might ask, will you be able to know […]

Imagine you come across a colleague sitting at his desk amid piles of yellowed papers. When you ask what he is working on, he says it’s his annual family budget. “What’s with all the old papers?” you might ask. “Oh,” he replies, “I always work my new budget off my receipts and bills from 1983, […]