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March 17, 2017|Administrative State, Eric Posner, Is Administrative Law Unlawful?, Neil Gorsuch, Woodrow Wilson

Posner and Gorsuch

by Philip Hamburger|

Wooden Gavel with book over white

As the Senate prepares to question Judge Neil Gorsuch for possible appointment to the Supreme Court, my former colleague Eric Posner asks: “Is Gorsuch a Hamburgerian?” Posner thereby attempts to set up Gorsuch by associating him with . . . not really me, nor my scholarship, but a boogeyman of Posner’s imagination.

The version of my scholarship Posner presents to the world is almost unrecognizable: “Hamburger is anti-elite”; “Hamburger is anti-foreigner”; “Hamburger is anti-executive.” These views bear no resemblance to my scholarship or my personal opinions, and it therefore is necessary to state my views as they really are.

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September 15, 2014|Administrative State, Declaration of Independence, Is Administrative Law Unlawful?, Philip Hamburger, Prerogative Power, Rechtstaat

Erasing the Fundamental Commitments of American Constitutionalism

by Joseph Postell|

Philip Hamburger’s Is Administrative Law Unlawful? is a timely and major contribution to the most significant constitutional crisis of our time. As a work of scholarship it will inform and inspire future thinking on the administrative state for years. This book, however, will greatly contribute to an emerging consensus about the perils of the administrative state, and help shape the constitutional response. Therefore it may well be the most important book that has been written in decades. Scholars have been denouncing the modern administrative state as incompatible with American constitutionalism for years, but nobody has made the argument as thoroughly and…

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September 4, 2014|Administrative Law, Is Administrative Law Unlawful?, Philip Hamburger, Progressivism

Philip Hamburger’s German Connection, and Mine: Part I

by Michael S. Greve|

The Federal Administrative Court of Germany

Chapter 24 in Philip Hamburger’s brilliant book on—or rather against—administrative law is entitled “The German Connection.” The Progressive architects of administrative law—Frank Goodnow; Ernst Freund; John Burgess and apparently the rest of Columbia Law School; Woodrow Wilson—all admired the Germans’ post-Hegelian, “scientific” approach to administration. Many had studied at German universities. And so America acquired what she’d never had before: administration. The rule of “experts,” outside constitutional channels and constraints.

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July 31, 2014|Is Administrative Law Unlawful?, Philip Hamburger

Introducing Philip Hamburger as August’s Guest Blogger

by Richard M. Reinsch II|

I am beaming with delight to announce that Philip Hamburger, the Maurice and Hilda Friedman Professor of Law at the Columbia University School of Law, will be joining Law and Liberty for the month of August as a guest blogger. You might have heard of his latest impressive work of scholarship Is Administrative Law Unlawful? My podcast with Prof. Hamburger earlier this month explores his exposition on the extralegal capacity of the administrative state. Progressives claim that law-making executive agencies are a necessity for organizing a large commercial and urban society, but Hamburger convincingly argues that it really is a…

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Book Reviews

A Mirror of the 20th-Century Congress

by Joseph Postell

Wright undermined the very basis of his local popularity—the decentralized nature of the House—by supporting reforms that gave power to the party leaders.

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The Graces of Flannery O'Connor

by Henry T. Edmondson III

O'Connor's correspondence is a goldmine of piercing insight and startling reflections on everything from literature to philosophy to raising peacocks.

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Liberty Classics

Rereading Politica in the Post-Liberal Moment

by Glenn A. Moots

Althusius offers a rich constitutionalism that empowers persons to thrive alongside one another in deliberate communities.

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James Fenimore Cooper and the American Experiment

by Melissa Matthes

In The American Democrat, James Fenimore Cooper defended democracy against both mob rule and majority tyranny.

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Podcasts

Stuck With Decadence

A discussion with Ross Douthat

Ross Douthat discusses with Richard Reinsch his new book The Decadent Society.

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Can the Postmodern Natural Law Remedy Our Failing Humanism?

A discussion with Graham McAleer

Graham McAleer discusses how postmodern natural law can help us think more coherently about human beings and our actions.

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Did the Civil Rights Constitution Distort American Politics?

A discussion with Christopher Caldwell

Christopher Caldwell discusses his new book, The Age of Entitlement.

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America, Land of Deformed Institutions

A discussion with Yuval Levin

Yuval Levin pinpoints that American alienation and anger emerges from our weak political, social, and religious institutions.

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About

Law & Liberty’s focus is on the classical liberal tradition of law and political thought and how it shapes a society of free and responsible persons. This site brings together serious debate, commentary, essays, book reviews, interviews, and educational material in a commitment to the first principles of law in a free society. Law & Liberty considers a range of foundational and contemporary legal issues, legal philosophy, and pedagogy.

The opinions expressed on Law & Liberty are solely those of the contributors to the site and do not reflect the opinions of Liberty Fund.
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