A noteworthy victory for property owners in Brooklyn, following investigative journalism that had exposed a pattern of a seizures by New York City of homes and other properties after procedurally or substantively dubious findings of distressed condition or tax/water arrears. The city then sometimes handed the property over to politically connected developers. In the new decision, Kings County Supreme Court Judge Mark Partnow “ruled that the City of New York violated the U. S. Constitution in the seizure of six central Brooklyn properties, and ordered the city to give them back to their owners.” [Stephen Witt and Kelly J. Mena, Kings County Politics, earlier on the journalism]
Free speech roundup
- “In Cato’s latest ‘funny brief,’ Ilya Shapiro and Trevor Burrus are once again telling the Court that scandalous speech is valuable to society and that there’s no way for a government office to be trusted to decide what’s ‘scandalous.'” [Ilya Shapiro and Trevor Burrus on Cato certiorari amicus brief (with P.J. O’Rourke, Nadine Strossen, and others) in trademark registration case of Iancu v. Brunetti]
- Could someone remind the President of the United States that there’s no law against making fun of him on TV? [Jacob Sullum]
- New Zealand declares it a crime to possess or distribute manifesto of Christchurch mass murderer, begins filing charges against persons who shared on social media [Charlotte Graham-McLay, New York Times via Josh Blackman, Tripti Lahiri/Quartz]
- Airport concession flap appears to set up a First Amendment case that Chick-fil-A would win, should it choose to pursue its rights against the city of San Antonio [KSAT, Hans Bader] Courts take seriously the doctrine of First Amendment retaliation even in otherwise discretionary areas of government operation [David French on Riley’s American Heritage Farms v. Claremont Unified School District, C.D. Calif. (school field trips to “living history farm” with outspokenly conservative owner)]
- Courts should narrowly construe “true threat” exception to free speech law to cases where there is objective threat, not just malicious intent [Ilya Shapiro and Michael Finch on Cato certiorari amicus brief in Knox v. Pennsylvania]
- Did a federal magistrate judge order the Chicago Sun-Times not to publish a juicy, mistakenly unsealed FBI affidavit from the city’s unfolding corruption case? (The paper published anyway) [Tim Cushing, TechDirt]
Rising city land costs and the NIMBY factor
As booming demand to live and work in the most sought-after cities runs into not-in-my-back-yard (NIMBY) restrictions on new housing construction, the ideas of Henry George are getting back into the conversation. Who will invest in civic amenities, even the most basic, if their effect is to cause rents to rise even further? [Tyler Cowen, Bloomberg; related and more on New Zealand cities where strict controls on building have contributed to unaffordable prices]
Related: “Why Is Japanese Zoning More Liberal Than US Zoning?” [Nolan Gray, Market Urbanism]
Devin Nunes, Don Blankenship sue critics
Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) is suing Twitter and several critics, including the anonymous proprietors of accounts styling themselves “Devin Nunes’s Mom” and “Devin Nunes’s Cow,” claiming defamation and other torts. Section 230, which protects Internet companies from liability for users’ postings, is likely to prove an obstacle to his claims against Twitter. [ABA Journal; Eugene Volokh, first (Section 230), second (“fighting words” doctrine inapplicable), and third (injunction that suspends entire Twitter account likely overbroad remedy) posts; Mike Godwin and Elizabeth Nolan Brown, Reason] More: Liz Mair (a defendant in suit), USA Today.
It’s worth emphasizing, in addition, that although the suit claims bias on Twitter’s part against political conservatives, were Nunes somehow to establish as a matter of law that the social media provider is obliged to intervene to remove harsh, unfair personal criticism of public figures, it would engage in much *more* removal of conservatives’ tweets and accounts than it does now.
Meanwhile, Don Blankenship, who lost a Republican Senate primary in West Virginia last year, is suing many media outlets and other organizations claiming defamation. Massey Energy, of which Blankenship had been CEO, “owned a mine where a 2010 explosion killed 29 miners. Blankenship spent a year in federal prison for violating safety regulations, which is a misdemeanor.” The suit says press outlets and critics erroneously described the candidate as a felon. [Anna Moore, WCHS]
In the Washington Post on the Maryland minimum wage
New from me and Cato colleague Ryan Bourne in the Washington Post:
One thing we’ve learned in this year’s debate over a statewide $15 minimum wage, now set to become law after the legislature overrode Gov. Larry Hogan’s (R) veto today, is that affluent central Maryland doesn’t want to listen to hard-hit rural Maryland….
In the debate over the $15 minimum wage, lawmakers from [already high-wage] Montgomery County, Baltimore City and Howard County were nearly unanimously in favor, with most delegates supporting strong versions of the scheme. Meanwhile, most lawmakers from depressed parts of the state were passionately opposed.
Guess who had the numbers to outvote whom?…
Affluent sections of Maryland can vote for $15 without much worry that a large share of their job base will disappear. Poor counties can’t.
Whole thing here (update: unpaywalled version). Related: Highly informative Jacob Vigdor/Russ Roberts interview on the Seattle studies, and on the strategies that employers (restaurants in particular) use to adjust [David Henderson, Econlib] More on the problems of applying a uniform law to portions of the country with seriously different wage levels and costs of living [Daniel McLaughlin, NRO] Some observations of mine at an earlier stage of the Maryland debate [Free State Notes] Ryan Bourne on adjustments at Whole Foods following its accession under political pressure to a $15 minimum [Cato].
Celebrity attorney Michael Avenatti charged with extortion
Federal prosecutors in New York have charged celebrity attorney Michael Avenatti with trying to extort $20 million from Nike by threatening to vent allegations that he threatened would knock billions off its market capitalization. A simultaneous federal indictment in California charges Avenatti with embezzling from a client and defrauding a bank. [Chris Dolmetsch and Erik Larson, Bloomberg]
Two tweets 47 minutes apart tell quite a story [Joe Weisenthal] The complaint filed in New York also describes an unnamed co-cpnspirator, who is not charged with any wrongdoing; Wall Street Journal reporting says that figure is California-based celebrity attorney Mark Geragos, a longtime Overlawyered favorite who has lately represented Jussie Smollett and Colin Kaepernick and until this week was billed as a legal commentator at CNN, where Avenatti too has made frequent guest appearances.
As in many other situations, the question arises: what would the legal difference be between extortion and ordinary lawyer behavior in settlement negotiations? Part of the answer is that Avenatti was alleged to be angling for his own, rather than the client’s advantage. From p. 9 of the New York complaint:
Comments Jeb Kinnison on Twitter: “Must observe the forms. If only he’d started a nonprofit to take the payoffs and pay him a salary…” And another reader is reminded of the 2013 Paula Deen episode [American Thinker, earlier]
“The article Alan Krueger wrote that I wish Fight For 15 advocates would read”
The late and widely mourned Princeton economist was celebrated for his work across many areas, especially in empirical applications. But some of those who cite him on the effects of minimum wage laws do not always well understand his views, as manifested in for example this 2015 New York Times piece. More from David Henderson, Tom Firey, NPR, New York Times. [Headline via Peter Isztin]
Krueger’s work, often with Morris Kleiner, was instrumental in the revived wave of interest in recent years in the costs of occupational licensure policies, a welcome development in which both the Obama administration and free-market groups have played a role. [Eric Boehm, Reason; Brookings]
Lamone v. Benisek, brought to life on video
The Maryland gerrymander case, back for its third trip to the Supreme Court, was argued March 26. This Federalist Society animated video about the case has me as narrator. Jon Levitan at SCOTUSBlog rounds up commentary on the oral argument. The Brennan Center offers an annotated guide to the amicus briefs.
March 27 roundup
- U.S. Department of Justice files brief in Kisor v. Wilkie somewhat critical of Auer deference, i.e. of deference to the federal government’s own positions. That’s pretty special, and commendable [William Yeatman, Cato; Jonathan Adler, earlier here and here]
- Parsonage exemption (i.e., favored treatment of allowance for religious housing) does not violate Establishment Clause, rules Seventh Circuit panel [Gaylor v. Mnuchin; background, Kelsey Dallas, Deseret News; earlier]
- Showing middle finger to police officer counts as constitutionally protected speech, and Sixth Circuit says every reasonable officer should know that already [Eugene Volokh]
- Home-share hospitality is here to stay, unless regulators get it very wrong [Federalist Society video with Gwendolyn Smith, Matthew Feeney, and Pete Clarke]
- “Tens of thousands of people in Missouri cannot drive as a result of their licenses being suspended over child support they are unable to pay.” A newly filed lawsuit challenges that practice [Hans Bader]
- Only Congress can make new law, and administration can’t reach desired ban on “bump stock” firearms accessories just by reinterpreting existing federal law [Ilya Shapiro and Matthew Larosiere on Cato amicus brief in D.C. Circuit case of Guedes v. BATFE]
No, the college admissions scandal doesn’t serve to justify racial preferences
My new piece for Real Clear Policy examines and rejects the argument that the college admissions scandal retrospectively validates the use of racial preferences in college admissions.
If racial preference in college admissions is unjust, it doesn’t magically become just because people identify some other injustice that has different beneficiaries.
Many of those arguing that the admissions scandal somehow vindicates racial preferences seem unaware that Singer repeatedly falsified students’ ethnicities to get them into affirmative action categories….
If you’re an applicant who doesn’t fit in *either* the celebrities-and-cheaters pool or the racial-preference pool, things definitely aren’t somehow canceling out. You’re competing with other families like yours for an artificially small number of remaining admission seats….
Public universities should not discriminate by race, especially not on the excuse that someone managed to game the system on other grounds. Two injustices do not add up to one justice.