SelectedWorks @ Chapman University Dale E. Fowler School of Law
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The Artifice of Local Growth Politics: At-Large Elections, Ballot-Box Zoning, and Judicial Review
No full textMunicipalities throughout the nation are plagued by a seemingly unresolvable conflict between development interests and homeowners’ groups who oppose growth near their neighborhoods. This paper uses southern California as a case study to examine the problem of local growth politics and the judicial response to it. As I argue, local politics in southern California are structured in such a way that fosters an artificial dichotomy between pro-growth and anti-growth positions, subverting the possibility of compromise and suppressing a wide range of views about growth and other issues. On one hand, the prevalence of at-large voting systems in southern California municipalities favors growth interests by facilitating citywide growth while muting neighborhood opposition. On the other hand, neighborhood groups liberally rely on the initiative and referendum to halt unwanted growth. Ironically, the apparent conflict between pro-growth and anti-growth agendas generated by this political structure conceals a fundamental continuity. Both at-large voting and the initiative process function to dilute the influence of minorities and other geographically concentrated groups, entrench the political power of the professional middle classes, prevent disparate interest groups from negotiating toward terms in the contested terrain of municipal politics, and cloak this ideologically loaded process in the rhetoric of a unitary public interest set against parochial selfishness.
This distorted political system has been the subject of many judicial challenges, most of which have focused on the local initiative process. The courts, however, have taken pains to uphold the right of the people to enact land use laws by initiative or referendum. Rejecting arguments that ballot-box zoning entails an excess of politics without necessary apolitical counterweights, the courts have expressed confidence in the judiciary’s own ability to temper the evils of unchecked politics through judicial review. I assert, however, that this faith in judicial review is misplaced, as the judiciary has proven incapable of balancing the complex array of competing interests involved in land use regulation. Thus, I argue that the judiciary should instead focus on correcting defects in the political process so that the balancing of competing interests can occur, as it should, in the legislative arena
Horizontal Product Differentiation in Auctions and Multilateral Negotiations
No full textWe experimentally compare first-price auctions and multilateral negotiations after introducing horizontal product differentiation into a standard procurement setting. Both institutions yield identical surplus for the buyer, a difference from prior findings with homogeneous products that results from differentiation’s influence on sellers’ pricing behavior. The data are consistent with this finding being driven by concessions from low-cost sellers in response to differentiation reducing their likelihood of being the buyer’s surplus-maximizing trading partner. Further analysis shows that introducing product differentiation increases or leaves unchanged the intensity of price competition among sellers, which contrasts with the conventional wisdom that product differentiation softens competition
Introduction to Special Issue: Determining Legislative Intent in State Courts, Selected Methods and Sources
No full textJudges and legislators alike have expressed a desire for more certainty on how and when legislative history should be used, both in the interpretation of statutes and to ascertain intent. This is an evolving area of the law, and states appear to be taking the lead in experimenting with methods to provide clarity to what has traditionally been a murky issue. These changes will have an impact on researchers in the future. The articles included in this issue were selected to demonstrate a range of approaches in the areas of legislative process, the history of courts and legislatures addressing the need for and use of legislative history in confronting the uncertainties that inevitably arise in the application of laws, and resources available in each state
From Lamentation to Liturgy to Litigation: The Holocaust Restitution Movement as a Model for Bringing Armenian Genocide-Era Restitution Suits in American Courts
No full textThe numerous Holocaust restitution civil lawsuits that began to be filed in the late 1990s and still continue today have yielded over $8 billion in payouts to still-living Holocaust survivors and the heirs of Holocaust victims. The precedent created by the Holocaust restitution movement now makes it possible for suits stemming from the material losses during the Armenian Genocide likewise to be considered by American courts. The Armenian Genocide-era restitution cases filed to date have targeted entities that, while allegedly profiting from the Armenian Genocide, nevertheless were tangential actors to the genocide. The next step in the burgeoning Armenian Genocide-era restitution movement would be the filing of suits against the Republic of Turkey and its state-owned enterprises that directly profited from the genocide. Until recently, suits against these foreign sovereign defendants would have been barred by the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA). However, recent decisions by the United States Supreme Court and the Ninth Circuit interpreting FSIA in relation to Holocaust restitution have now made possible, for the first time in history, actions against the Republic of Turkey and its state-owned entities for acts committed during the Armenian Genocide. This article provides a blueprint for such suits
