Federalist Society Practice Groups Podcasts

With the legalization of gay marriage, numerous cases have arisen in which private citizens have refused to provide services to same-sex citizens getting married. Bakers, photographers, and even local magistrates have been taken to court for discrimination. In this Teleforum, our Religious Liberties experts will join us to discuss whether refusing products or services for same-sex weddings should count as sexual orientation discrimination, and if so, whether the law should provide exemptions for refusals based on religion or conscience about the nature of marriage. -- Featuring: Dr. Ryan T. Anderson, Senior Research Fellow in American Principles and Public Policy, The Heritage Foundation and Prof. Anthony Michael Kreis, Visiting Assistant Professor of Law, Chicago-Kent College of Law.

2016 was a big year for labor and employment law. In Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, a deadlocked Supreme Court allowed a lower court ruling to stand, denying a First Amendment challenge to mandatory union dues. Meanwhile, President Obama’s Department of Labor released a new overtime regulation which would more than double the maximum salary required for exemption from overtime pay. The implementation of the regulation was halted just a few days before going into effect by a nationwide injunction by a federal district court judge. -- With 2017 ahead and the general election behind, our experts discussed the future of labor law under the Trump administration. -- Featuring: Mr. David S. Fortney, Co-founder,Fortney & Scott, LLC; Brent Garren, Deputy General Counsel, Local 32 BJ, Service Employees International Union and John S. Irving, Of Counsel, Kirkland & Ellis LLP.

On Tuesday, December 6, the Supreme Court handed down a unanimous opinion in Salman v. United States affirming the judgment of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. This insider trading case considered whether a personal benefit can be established by the fact that a tippee shared a close family relationship. The teleforum recapped Justice Alito's opinion for the Court which held the Court's prior decision in Dirks v. SEC "allowed the jury to infer that the tipper here breached a duty because he made a 'gift of confidential information to a trading -- Featuring: Todd F. Braunstein, Global Head of Legal Investigations, Willis Towers Watson

What is ahead for religious liberties under the Trump administration? Will churches be granted a victory in Trinity Lutheran v. Pauley? Will Trump’s Justice and Education Departments continue the push for transgender rights in public schools? Professor Richard Garnett of The University of Notre Dame Law School and Professor Thomas Berg of the University of St. Thomas School of Law joined us to answer these questions and many others on religious liberties in 2017. -- Featuring: Professor Thomas C. Berg, James L. Oberstar Professor of Law and Public Policy, University of St. Thomas School of Law and Professor Richard W. Garnett, Paul J. Schierl/Fort Howard Corporation Professor and Concurrent Professor of Political Science, University of Notre Dame Law School.

Professor Eugene Volokh of the UCLA School of Law joined us Monday, December 12 to discuss the ABA’s new Rule 8.4 on professional misconduct. The Rule states that it is professional misconduct for a lawyer to “engage in conduct that the lawyer knows or reasonably should know is harassment or discrimination on the basis of race, sex, religion, national origin, ethnicity, disability, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status or socioeconomic status in conduct related to the practice of law.” The ABA goes further in Comments, stating that “Such discrimination includes harmful verbal or physical conduct that manifests bias or prejudice towards others,” and that the Rule applies in any situation, even social, that is “connected to the practice of law.” Professor Volokh discussed the First Amendment implications and reaction to the new rule. -- Featuring: Professor Eugene Volokh, Gary T. Schwartz Professor of Law, UCLA School of Law

“Suggestions that President-elect Donald Trump put his business holdings in a 'blind trust,' which would mean selling them to avoid potential conflicts of interest are unrealistic and unfair,” says David Rivkin, of Baker and Hostetler, in a recent Washington Post piece. University of Minnesota Law School Professor Richard Painter said, in a New York Times piece, that President-elect Trump’s announced plans to cure conflict-of-interest concerns are “not enough.” Join us as these two legal scholars discuss their positions in greater detail. -- Featuring: Professor Richard Painter, S. Walter Richey Professor of Corporate Law, University of Minnesota Law School and Mr. David B. Rivkin Jr., Partner, BakerHostetler

On December 5, the U.S. Supreme Court will hold oral arguments on two redistricting cases, Bethune-Hill v. Virginia State Board of Elections and McCrory v. Harris. After the movement of population, both Virginia and North Carolina legislatures redrew plans for their state legislative districts. However, plaintiffs in each state challenged the plans as racial gerrymanders diluting the vote of African-American voters. Both cases raise the question of how to comply with the Voting Rights Act requirement that racial minorities have the ability to elect representatives of their choice, along with the Constitutional prohibition of race predominating in the drawing of plans. The Court will be also be asked to clarify the acceptable ways to consider minority populations in drawing plans, what plaintiffs need to show to prove a racial gerrymander, and what would trigger strict scrutiny. -- Featuring: Ms. Maya M. Noronha, Associate, Baker & Hostetler LLP.

On November 29, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Moore v. Texas. This case involves the death penalty and the intellectually disabled. Specifically, whether in capital cases it violates the Eighth Amendment and the High Court’s prior rulings in Hall v. Florida and Atkins v. Virginia to preclude the application of current medical standards and require older medical standards to determine the intellectual disability of a criminal defendant. -- Featuring: Kent S. Scheidegger, Legal Director & General Counsel, Criminal Justice Legal Foundation.

For months, Syrian and Russian warplanes have bombed Aleppo, killing and wounding residents. Russian officials have referred to the siege as “diplomacy backed by force.” The US Ambassador to the UN has called it “barbarism.” The US and France have called for a War Crimes investigation, but any meaningful action at the UN has been blocked by Russia’s place on the Security Council. In this Teleforum, two distinguished professors with extensive practical experience examined the status of the siege under the Law of Armed Conflict and International Humanitarian Law. -- Featuring: Prof. Laurie R. Blank, Clinical Professor of Law, Emory University School of Law and Michael A. Newton, Professor of the Practice of Law Director, Vanderbilt-in-Venice Program, Vanderbilt University Law School.

Ronald Meisburg, former National Labor Relations Board Member and General Counsel, joined us to discuss recent updates to joint employment law. Joint Employment is defined under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and the Migrant and Seasonal Agricultural Workers Protection Act as a form of employment that “exists when an employee is employed by two (or more) employers such that the employers are responsible, both individually and jointly, to the employee for compliance with a statute.” -- This issue has risen to the forefront of labor law as President Obama’s Department of Labor has become more aggressive in his last year and as businesses grapple with the coming of a new administration. -- Featuring: Hon. Ronald Meisburg, Special Counsel, Hunton & Williams.

In May, the Department of Labor announced a new overtime regulation, which would require all employers to pay overtime to their salaried employees who make under $47,476 annually. The rule was set to take effect on December 1, 2016. However, 21 states filed suit against the federal government claiming that the rule violated the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and states’ rights by increasing the overtime threshold, which was $23,660 under the FLSA, so drastically and by setting automatic increases to the threshold every three years. The states argue the rule will decrease full-time employment while increasing unemployment and will burden state governments unlawfully under the 10th Amendment by forcing them to conform to the new regulations. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and a coalition of business groups also filed their own suit against the law. The cases were consolidated. -- On November 16, Judge Mazzant of the District Court for the Eastern District of Texas heard the states' motion for a preliminary injunction to temporarily block the rule. On November 22, Judge Mazzant granted the states’ motion and issued a preliminary injunction prohibiting the Department of Labor from implementing and enforcing the new rule. Solicitor General Lawrence VanDyke, Michael Hancock of Cohen Milstein, and Jesse Panuccio of Foley & Larner LLP joined us to discuss the court's ruling and the future of the overtime rule under the new administration. -- Featuring: Mr. Lawrence Van Dyke, Solicitor General of Nevada; D. Michael Hancock, Of Counsel, Cohen Milstein; and Jesse Panuccio, Partner, Foley & Lardner LLP.

The Federalist Society's Legal Classics Revisited series returns to the writing of Professor Alexander Bickel and his last work, The Morality of Consent. In a July 11, 2016 Teleforum, we discussed Bickel's Least Dangerous Branch. The Morality of Consent is far shorter and was in manuscript form when Bickel died. Based on notes of magazine articles and lectures rather than on the author's plan for a single text, the book is unified by its larger themes rather than a conventional outline. -- Professor Bickel viewed the mid-20th century as a time when the American legal system was challenged by the civil rights movement, the Vietnam protests, and a national reaction led by Richard Nixon. Each raised questions about obedience to the law as it existed. These events from generations ago led Bickel to consider the process by which Americans made law and came to accept and obey it. He worked hard to define the paradox presented by civil disobedience which seemed to be established within American law and yet carried the potential to destroy both law and ordered society. Contemporary readers will find the effort instructive and successful, at least in part. But questions remain. Bickel addressed other topics which "touch and concern" his questions, his misgivings, and his faith in the enterprise of Law. Bickel grappled with questions that resist final answers in each chapter of his book, a legal classic worth a visit in our own day. -- Featuring: Dean Erwin Chemerinsky, Dean and Distinguished Professor of Law, University of California, Irvine; James A. Haynes, Former Attorney and Alternate Judge, U.S. Dept of Labor, Employees Compensation Appeals Board; and John J. Park, Jr., Of Counsel, Strickland Brockington Lewis LLP.

On October 27th, 2016, on a 3-2 party line vote, the Federal Communications Commission adopted controversial new privacy and data security rules for broadband ISPs. The FCC determined such rules were necessary because its Open Internet Order reclassified broadband providers as Title II common carriers. Prior to this reclassification, broadband ISPs operated under the generally applicable privacy and data security framework set forth by the Federal Trade Commission. However, the FCC’s new rules differ from the FTC’s framework in significant ways. Did the FCC need to adopt these new rules to protect consumers, and if so, why? Are there good reasons for these rules to differ from the FTC’s approach, which governs the rest of the Internet? What will be the practical effect of these new rules on companies, competition, and consumers? What might we see from the courts and Congress on this issue in the future? Our panelists discussed these questions and more in a lively Teleforum. -- Featuring: Dallas Harris, Policy Fellow, Public Knowledge and Michelle Rosenthal, Senior Corporate Counsel, T-Mobile. Moderator: Neil Chilson, Attorney-Advisor to Commissioner Maureen Ohlhausen, Federal Trade Commission.

On November 7, the Supreme Court heared oral argument in National Labor Relations Board v. SW General, Inc., which deals with presidential appointment powers and centers on a dispute over provisions of the Federal Vacancies Reform Act of 1998 (FVRA). The case challenges a 2013 National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) determination of unfair labor practices at an Arizona ambulance company, SW General. SW General contends that under the FVRA, President Obama's appointment of an acting general counsel, Lafe Solomon, for an NLRB vacancy was illegal, and therefore the case against them should be dismissed. -- The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit agreed that the acting general counsel Solomon's tenure violated the FVRA and invalidated the decision. The federal government now seeks relief from the High Court, based on alternative statutory interpretation that the President's appointment was fully permissible under the law. -- Featuring: John Elwood, Partner, Vinson & Elkins LLP.

Although a territory of the United States and subject to the Constitution’s guarantees of non-discrimination, Guam law permits only those who meet the definition of “Native Inhabitants of Guam” to vote in a future status plebiscite. Guam thus excludes most citizens of the United States from voting in the plebiscite. Supporters of the plebiscite are forcing a reexamination of the role of the United States on this strategically important island without giving all citizens a voice in the process. What are the implications for the reach of the U.S. Constitution and U.S. national security? An ongoing lawsuit against Guam will be discussed. -- Featuring: J. Christian Adams, Election Lawyer Center.