This blog post is the second in a recurring series to spotlight administrative law scholarship by Conference members and staff. It was prepared by Martin Saunders, a spring semester intern and third-year law student at Wake Forest University. This post and attachment feature administrative law works by Conference members and staff since our last post in August 2013, through April 2014. The views expressed therein are those of the individual authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Administrative Conference.
The administrative law community lost one of its most influential figures in a generation with the passing of Professor Charles H Koch, Jr. Charles Koch’s life and work was celebrated in a symposium held at William and Mary Law School where he was the Dudley Warner Woodbridge Professor of Law. As Chairman Verkuil notes in his memorial remarks, Professor Koch was a longtime friend of the Administrative Conference and served as a consultant to the Conference in earlier research on the federal administrative judiciary. The Conference is currently updating this research as part of an effort to catalog adjudication that takes place in the federal government. ACUS is fortunate to have Professor Koch’s past scholarship as a reference point to complete this latest adjudication mapping.
Conference Chairman Paul Verkuil and Public Member Professor Ronald Levin both participated in the memorial symposium. Chairman Verkuil, in An Essay on Due Process and the Endowment Effect, discusses administrative adjudication, one of Professor Koch’s specialties, in addressing “why…those receiving various kinds of government benefits [are] favored procedurally over those seeking them.” Professor Ronald Levin, in Administrative Judges and Agency Policy Development: The Koch Way, writes on the late Charles Koch and his contributions to the field of administrative law. Levin describes Professor Koch’s nuanced view of the role of administrative law judges as policy makers. Professor Koch suggested that judges could be useful in policy creation by building records for agency personnel to use for appraisal of policy, but also that they should be limited in their policy making. The lasting contributions of Professor Koch to administrative law scholarship will not soon be forgotten.
The loss of Professor Koch and our own efforts to update our understanding of the federal administrative judiciary remind us that administrative law is a constantly changing field. Recent work by ACUS members and staff recognizes the need for agencies to be dynamic policy implementers and to encourage innovation. Is his article Building a Framework for Governance: Retrospective Review and Rulemaking Petitions, ACUS Attorney Advisor Reeve Bull discusses retrospective review and its importance in helping agencies “to determine whether [their regulations] remain appropriate in light of changed circumstances.” Public Member and Professor Jody Freeman’s article with Professor David B. Spence, Old Statutes, New Problems, discusses how agencies are being forced to use statutes designed for old problems to address challenges in an ever-changing world.
For a full list of publications by ACUS Members and staff, please see the attached fact sheet.
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