Owner at Daniel R. Schramm, L.L.C. (Law Practice)

Over the past few years, we’ve had to endure repeated claims that serious factual accusations were nothing more than a witch hunt. The ABA published this fascinating article on the flawed justice of the Salem witch trials. This is what a true witch hunt looked like.

The Chief Justice, without comment, declined to preside over the second impeachment trial of Donald Trump. This gives the Republican senators a talking point over the process of trying a president after the expiration of his term. But in substance, it doesn't say anything about whether Trump committed an impeachable offense.

The D.C. Circuit struck down the EPA effort to weaken the regulation of coal-fired power plants. This ruling should give the incoming Biden administration a freer hand in regulating emissions from the power sector.

Professor Michael Dorf takes on the notion that Trump is somehow insulated from impeachment or criminal charges by his right of free speech. The Brandenburg decision creates a First Amendment exception when a person uses speech to incite imminent criminal conduct. The Court drew a distinction between the mere advocacy of violence -which is protected speech - and the incitement to imminent violence - which is not.

This article is about more than just making words flow in a cohesive legal argument - as important as that skill can be. It’s more about the flow or fulfillment lawyers can find in tackling a challenging legal project. For me, it’s usually found in crafting a compelling appellate brief.

State officials and lower court judges are seizing on the opportunity created by the confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court. Conservatives now appear to be strategically planning to present at least three cases to the Court on questions of same-sex parenting, abortion and gun control.

The Texas lawsuit to throw out the votes of other states has placed a spotlight on the concept of legal standing. Eric Segall of Dorf on Law criticizes the incoherent approach the courts have taken on this subject. When I was in law school, I was told that judges asked if you gave the plaintiffs everything they wanted in their lawsuit, would they personally benefit? I still think that's a pretty good test for standing. By the way, the law professor who told me about that test was a young Robert Reich. Reich had a brilliant way of looking beyond what judges said in their opinions and focusing instead on what courts actually did.

Legal experts call the Texas lawsuit to overturn the election results in four other states almost laughable. Yet the Missouri Attorney General is now formally supporting this debacle on behalf of our state. What is going on here?

This article suggests the new conservative super-majority of the U.S. Supreme Court may pick up on a Gorsuch dissent in the recent Gundy decision and revive the so-called "non-delegation doctrine." This doctrine would severely limit the ability of Congress to delegate its authority to federal administrative agencies. If the Court were to revive this dead letter of the law, this kind of bombshell could effectively carry out Steve Bannon's provocative goal of "deconstructing the administrative state."

The Trump administration faced skepticism from conservative justices on its plan to exclude undocumented immigrants from the census count this year. Some justices questioned whether the issue was ripe for review when the administration did not yet have the data to know what the effect of its plan would be. Justice Alito observed that getting the information was likely to be a monumental task. And from an originalist standpoint, Justice Barrett got the Acting Solicitor General to admit the exclusion of illegal immigrants cut against how the census had been conducted throughout our history.