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Timely essay from Professor Rachel Rothschild @profrrothschild.bsky.social

Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

“My fear is that this is going to be another notch in a long list of decisions that are threatening to our broader country and democracy, leaving states without the ability to do much on very flimsy and poorly reasoned legal grounds.” —Prof. @profrrothschild.bsky.social grist.org/accountabili...

grist.org

States want to make Big Oil pay for climate harm. Now, courts are weighing in.

New York’s climate “superfund” law has suffered two losses in court, while a U.S. Supreme Court case next week could determine the fate of similar efforts nationwide.

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Happening now at Michigan Law: The Environmental & Energy Law Program Conference: "Responding to Federal Retreat: Reimagining Environmental and Energy Law in the Great Lakes Region" Panel I: AI and the Great Lakes Region: Energy, Innovation, Development More info: docs.google.com/document/d/1...

Panel of Moderator: Oday Salim, Adjunct Clinical Assistant Professor of Law, Director, Environmental Law and Sustainability Clinic, Co-director, Environmental and Energy Law Program, University of Michigan Law School
Helena Voltzer, Senior Source Water Policy Manager, Alliance for the Great Lakes
Michael P. Vandenbergh, David Daniels Allen Distinguished Chair in Law; Director, Climate Change Research Network; Co-Director, Energy, Environment and Land Use Program; Vanderbilt University Law School
Sue Shink, Michigan State Senator, District 14
Dan Scripps, Commissioner and Chair, Michigan Public Service Commission

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Michigan Law #MorningRead The Institutions of Exceptions: Justification in Trade and Investment Treaties By Professor @aratojulian.bsky.social in the Michigan Journal of International Law repository.law.umich.edu/mjil/vol47/i...

Abstract
International economic law binds states in the interest of liberalizing markets, including in cross-border trade in goods and services (trade) and capital (investment). The treaty regimes for both trade and investment do this by disciplining states through legal rules, while preserving a modicum of governmental authority over domestic policy. The preservation of policy space in these regimes usually involves a process of exceptions-based justification – through formal exceptions clauses in most trade treaties and some investment agreements, and also through informal exceptions-style reasoning by adjudicators in the investment treaty regime more generally. This “exceptions paradigm” of justification has worked well in the trade regime, especially in the WTO where it has been key to securing a justifiable and legitimate balance between market disciplines and regulatory autonomy. But ex post justification has been less successful at striking a tolerable balance in the investment regime, even when formally codified in an exceptions clause. This article seeks to explain why that is, by focusing on the institutions within which exceptionsbased justification is embedded. Key institutional differences between these regimes help explain the varied success of the exceptions paradigm in trade and investment, in particular: the right of action (private vs public); the degree of judicial centralization (ad hoc arbitration vs court system); and the available remedies (retrospective compensation vs prospective injunctive relief). I argue that it is trade law’s public-oriented institutions that have made the exceptions clause workable – not the other way around. By contrast, investment law’s private-oriented institutions make that system particularly inhospitable to exceptions-style justification.

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Michigan Law #EveningRead Preserving Both Agency Expertise and Accountability in the Unitary Executive By Professor @chrisjwalker.bsky.social in @ssrn.bsky.social papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Abstract
In response to the Supreme Court’s increasingly unitary executive approach to presidential power, this symposium essay sketches out a vision for the administrative state that preserves both accountability and expertise in regulatory governance. In particular, it makes the conservative case for a professionalized civil service—one with meritocratic hiring and firing practices—that operates within a politically accountable structure. This argument may cut against the “deep state” narrative on the political right, but it reinforces traditional conservative values of protecting liberty and preventing government overreach as well as promoting innovation and free markets through fostering more effective, efficient, predictable, and stable regulatory environments.

This vision is not new. It is the “standard model” Congress embraced in the Administrative Procedure Act of 1946. Nor is it unconstitutional under the Roberts Court’s unitary executive precedents or inconsistent with the Court’s formalist approach to separation of powers. Indeed, last Term, in Kennedy v. Braidwood Management, a 6–3 majority confirmed that this vision for regulatory governance that “preserves both expertise and accountability” is “fully consistent” with separation of powers. As such, even after the Supreme Court overrules Humphrey’s Executor this Term in Trump v. Slaughter, one should resist the parade of horribles that the unitary executive theory’s next target is the civil service. The Court answered that question the Term before in Braidwood. In so doing, the Braidwood Court preserved Congress’s ability to structure executive branch institutions that ensure the political chain of accountability while allowing the agency to leverage the expertise of a professionalized civil service.

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

“I thought Climate Week was a great opportunity to bring some of that material out of the Law School classrooms and into a more public-facing environment,” Korn said. “The law impacts everyone, and our ability to communicate it to the public is so important.” michigan.law.umich.edu/news/climate...

michigan.law.umich.edu

For Climate Week, a Walk through Climate Law | University of Michigan Law School

During Climate Week 2026 at the University of Michigan, which runs from September 26 to October 4, a series of exhibits placed around the Law Quad delves into how the law affects the environment and t...

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Alliance for the Great Lakes @alliancegreatlakes.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Join us on Oct. 2 in Ann Arbor! Two Alliance for the Great Lakes experts, Helena Voltzer and Meleah Geertsma, will join the conversation on AI, energy, innovation, and environmental justice at @umichlaw.bsky.social Free & open to the public. RSVP to join us! bit.ly/46Sg7rj

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Join us tomorrow for the EELP Conference: Responding to Federal Retreat—Reimagining Environmental and Energy Law in the Great Lakes Region 📆: Friday, October 2, 2026 🕑: 8:30 AM - 4:30 PM 📍: Jeffries Hall 1225 More info: michigan.law.umich.edu/events/eelp-...

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Michigan Law #MorningRead The Future of Environmental Law Amid the Destruction of Science by Professor @profrrothschild.bsky.social on @ssrn.bsky.social papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Essay in the Harvard Environmental Law Review's Symposium Issue on the Future of Environmental Law One Year into Trump; responding to Richard Revesz's Inverted Positions: The Trump Administration’s Concerted Effort To End the Use of Regulatory Benefit-Cost Analysis.

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Today at Michigan Law: MLaw Matters: Debating the Abundance Movement with Professors @chrisjwalker.bsky.social, @nbagley.bsky.social, @noahkazis.bsky.social, Alexandra Klass, and @sbagen.bsky.social

A panel of the listed professors sit in front of a packed Jeffries Hall classroom

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Michigan Law #EveningRead The fundamental confusions of federal Indian law by Professor Matthew Fletcher in @scotusblog.com www.scotusblog.com/2026/09/the-...

scotusblog.com

The fundamental confusions of federal Indian law

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Sam Bagenstos @sbagen.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Walking home, listening to someone blasting Main Street by Bob Seger. Ann Arbor, man.

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Leah Litman @leahlitman.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

some ~personal news~ as they say .... I'm writing a second book! I loved writing Lawless & working with One Signal. And I'm having a 💥blast 💥working on ... IDENTIFIED! more info coming, soon(ish)?

Author of LAWLESS and cohost of the Strict Scrutiny podcast Leah Litman's IDENTIFIED, chronicling the paradigm shift in how law and politics approach issues of identity, with right-wing ideology transforming identity-based discrimination into a tactic to restructure government and civic institutions, to position themselves as victims, and to persecute the very minorities those classifications were created to protect, to Alessandra Bastagli at One Signal, in an exclusive submission, for publication in spring 2028, by Amelia Atlas at CAA (world English).

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Michigan Law #MorningRead Amicus brief by Professor Alexandra Klass, et al., which was cited by United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in State of Michigan v. United States Department of Energy. statepowerproject.org/wp-content/u...

ORAL ARGUMENT NOT YET SCHEDULED
Case No. 25-1159 (consolidated with 25-1160 and 25-1162)

IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT
PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN, et al.,
Petitioners,
v.
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY, et al.,
Respondents.
MIDCONTINENT INDEPENDENT SYSTEM OPERATOR, INC.,
Intervenor-Respondent.
On Petitions for Review of Final Order of the
Department of Energy
BRIEF OF ENERGY LAW SCHOLARS AMICI CURIAE
IN SUPPORT OF PETITIONERS
Jonas Monast
James P. Duffy
Alexandra L. St. Romain
CENTER FOR APPLIED ENVIRONMENTAL
LAW AND POLICY
712 H Street NE, Suite 90006
Washington, DC 20002
(802) 233-7967
jay.duffy@caelp.org
Counsel for Energy Law Scholars Amici
Cu

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Acting isn’t something Andy Clubok, ’93, pursued past high school drama class. But his legal experience led to a role in episode 3 of Larry David’s sketch comedy series Life, Larry, and the Pursuit of Unhappiness: An Almost History of America. michigan.law.umich.edu/news/andrew-...

michigan.law.umich.edu

Andrew Clubok, ’93, Plays Senator in Larry David Comedy Show | University of Michigan Law School

Acting isn’t something Andrew Clubok, ’93, pursued past high school drama class. But his legal experience led to a role in episode 3 of Larry David’s sketch comedy series Life, Larry, and the Pursuit ...

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Professor @leahlitman.bsky.social and her co-hosts are back together to break down the biggest cases and legal battles coming to the Supreme Court this term. Listen to the newest episode of @strictscrutiny.bsky.social: crooked.com/podcast/a-ne...

A list of the current episodes of the podcast, in a screenshot taken from the website

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MDefenders at Michigan Law @mdefenders.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Adolescents are more susceptible to outside influences than adults. This makes them more likely to give false information & introduces reliability concerns to police evidence based on adolescent interrogation. Our model motion outlines the arguments: datafordefenders.org/wp-content/u...

datafordefenders.org

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sanjukta paul @sanjukta.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Wrote a paper.

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Michigan Law #EveningRead "What's the Point of Reparation?" Professor Daniel Fryer in the Tulsa Law Review digitalcommons.law.utulsa.edu/cgi/viewcont...

Despite its ancient history in philosophical and legal thought, importance to progressive social movements, and relative simplicity as a notion of fairness—if you break
something, you ought to fix it—reparative justice is largely misunderstood. This is problematic given increasing calls for reparation from historically disadvantaged groups. Rather than assessing the validity of these claims, this Article addresses a fundamentally
antecedent issue: what’s the point of reparation? Rejecting arguments that claim reparation is about compensation, supplementing distributive justice, and reconciliation, I argue
that the point of reparation is to repair unjust social relations created by past wrongdoing.
The relational theory of reparation that I sketch here will help provide clarity on other
complicated issues, such as what reparation ought to look like and whether demands for
reparation are morally valid. Knowing the point of reparation would also have important
implications for the design of reparation programs being requested. This Article attempts
to reshape how we think about reparation in scholarly and public discourse. My hope is
to start a new scholarly discussion about reparation that avoid common misunderstandings. Providing a due diligence investigation into the point of reparation serves as a start
to answering more general questions about the proper place of reparative justice in our
theories of what we owe each other.

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

It's Climate Week at Michigan Law! Join us for exhibits in the Law Quad and our EELP Conference on Friday. M-F stop by for "A Walk Through Climate Law on the Law Quad." And on Friday, join us for an all-day conference, "Responding to Federal Retreat" in Jeffries Hall.

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Michigan Law #MorningRead "Uncorrected." By Professor @nicholson.bsky.social and Janet Freilich in the Boston University Law Review. www.bu.edu/bulawreview/...

In addition to making rules and deciding outcomes, the legal system
generates, curates, and shares information. When the system gets rules and
outcomes wrong, it is obviously a problem, and much effort (and scholarly
attention) goes into identifying those mistakes and fixing them. But the system
also gets information wrong, a problem mostly overlooked by policymakers and
scholars. Those information mistakes matter too—they are prevalent and
harmful. We show here that even when the mistakes are widely known and the
errors broadly acknowledged, the information very often goes uncorrected. As
a result, people make decisions based on bad information from a system that
should be trustworthy and authoritative: builders build houses in mislabeled
floodplains, patients use medical devices that are not really safe and effective,
background checks disqualify potential employees based on crimes they did not
commit, and inventors rely on falsified data in patent disclosures, to name a few.
Why are so many legal information mistakes uncorrected? We identify
multiple reasons, including lack of support for public correction mechanisms,
lack of robust private mechanisms, challenges in communication between
institutions, and an overreliance on self-interest. An underlying problem,
though, is that information mistakes just are not given enough focus as the major
trans-substantive problem they are. That is its own mistake, because in a world
where an increasing number of decisions incorporate an increasing amount of
information, mistakes in that information matter more and more. Thankfully,
technology makes that task somewhat easier, as does increased attention toward
improving incentives and allocating responsibility. It is worth tackling the

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Eve Brensike Primus @primuseve.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Attn: @umichlaw.bsky.social and @mdefenders.bsky.social is hiring a Clinical Assistant Professor of Law/Associate Director for the new MDefenders Center for Public Defense. Job posting here: careers.umich.edu/job_detail/2.... Come work w/me to train the next generation of public defenders!

careers.umich.edu

Clinical Assistant Professor of Law and Associate Director MDefenders Center for Public Defense | U-M Careers

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MDefenders at Michigan Law @mdefenders.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Amazing lunchtime panel @umichlaw.bsky.social today on different kinds of indigent defense with speakers talking about trial-level adult defense, juvenile defense, family defense, appellate defense, postconviction defense, federal defense, and special litigation.

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W. Carson Byrd @wcbyrdphd.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Beautiful early fall day on the @umichlaw.bsky.social quad

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Professor Belisa Pang has been recognized by the American Bankruptcy Law Journal with its Editor’s Prize. The award is presented annually by the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges to an author who demonstrated special excellence in an article published in the journal. bit.ly/pangaward

michigan.law.umich.edu

Pang Earns Honor from Bankruptcy Journal | University of Michigan Law School

Professor Belisa Pang has been recognized by the American Bankruptcy Law Journal with its Editor’s Prize.

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

Call for nominations! Dow Sustainability Fellowship Supporting graduate students who are committed to finding interdisciplinary, actionable, and meaningful sustainability solutions on local-to-global scales.

Dow Sustainability Fellowship flyer.

Application deadline Monday, October 5

What you'll receive: Up to $25,000 to support tuition costs.

How to apply:

The law school can nominate up to 10 students for this prestigious fellowship. To be considered, submite your resume, unofficial transcript, a statement of interest, and the names of two references to lawdowfellowship@umich.edu

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

Deadline coming up! The Program in Race, Law, and History at Michigan Law will award up to five 2026-2027 academic year fellowships to students enrolled in JD, PhD, and other terminal graduate programs. More info: michigan.law.umich.edu/resource-cen...

About the Fellowship
The Program in Race, Law, and History at Michigan Law will award up to five 2026-2027 academic year fellowships to students enrolled in JD, PhD, and other terminal graduate programs at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

The program fosters interdisciplinary research at the intersection of three lines of intellectual inquiry: law, history, and race. Through helping law and graduate students engage in this scholarship and collaborate with scholars in the field at Michigan Law and beyond, the program provides a space for historical investigation into the ongoing salience of race in our world.

Fellows in the Program in Race, Law, and History receive financial support for independent research and present their research findings at the Program’s annual winter term fellows’ symposium. There they receive comments from scholars in the field, including an invited commentator from outside of U-M. Fellows’ research may take shape in conjunction with developing and transforming a note project or seminar paper into a dissertation chapter or a journal article, for example.

Fellows will each receive up to $3,000 in reimbursement for pre-authorized spending, which may include authorized travel, acquisition of digital materials, and other research expenses. This funding also covers travel expenses to the annual American Society for Legal History conference.

Fellows must be enrolled as students for AY 2026-2027 and must be in residence in Ann Arbor during that time as they are expected to participate in the ongoing activities of the Program and other related legal history events in the law school.

Program activities include two fall-term fellows’ meetings, a winter-term fellows’ meeting, and the end-of-year pro-seminar. Importantly, fellows must attend the American Society for Legal History conference, to be held this year on November 12-14, 2026, in Banff, Alberta, Canada.

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

Michigan Law #MorningRead Professor David Santacroce et al: Report on the 2025-26 Survey of Applied Legal Education papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.... in @ssrn.bsky.social

Abstract
This report presents the results of the 2025-26 Center for the Study of Applied Legal Education (CSALE) Survey of Applied Legal Education. The survey was composed of two parts – a Survey of School Programs directed to ABA-accredited U.S. law schools and a Survey of Instructors distributed to each person teaching in a law clinic or field placement course. Ninety-four percent of law schools and over 1,200 teachers participated in the survey.

The results provide valuable insight into law clinic and field placement programs and courses in areas such as design, capacity, administration, funding, and pedagogy, and into the role and status of clinic and field placement educators in the legal academy. This is CSALE's seventh triennial survey, following up on surveys in 2007-08, 2010-11, 2013-14, 2016-17, 2019-20, and 2022-23.

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Michigan Law Review @michlawreview.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Michigan Law Review Online is excited to be hosting this year's National Native American Law Students Association Writing Competition! For submission criteria, deadlines, and more information, please check the Writing Competition's website: www.nationalnalsa.org/writing-comp....

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Michigan Law #MorningRead Professor @aratojulian.bsky.social in the Michigan Journal of International Law: “The Institutions of Exceptions: Justification in Trade and Investment Treaties.” repository.law.umich.edu/mjil/vol47/i...

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Julian Davis Mortenson @jdmortenson.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

Michigan's fall 2026 public law workshop is presenting a marvelous range of work from an exceptional group of scholars. Our theme this semester is presidential power--anyone in the U of M community is warmly invited to join!

Aug 31 - Anne Joseph O'Connell
Sept 21 - Andrea Katz
Oct 9 - Shalev Roisman
Oct 26 - Rebecca Ingber
Nov 2 - Amanda Hollis Brusky
Nov 9 - Daryl Levinson
Nov 23 - Nicole Hemmer

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

Michigan Law #EveningRead: "Who regulates the physical and informational risks of scientific research?" Read Professor @nicholson.bsky.social's piece in @jotwell.bsky.social: Strings Attached: Science Regulation by Science Funders bit.ly/4iz4o8a

Who regulates the physical and informational risks of scientific research? Who makes sure that researchers keep intensely personal data secret, or lock their dangerous chemicals away safely, or don’t haphazardly create superviruses that could kill us all? You could be forgiven for assuming it was, well, a regulator—OSHA or the CDC or some similar entity that can promulgate binding rules and enforce them. But as Doni Bloomfield shows in the fascinating How Science Grantmakers Govern, you’d be (mostly) wrong. Instead, a key substantive and procedural regulator of the risky business of scientific research is, in fact, the funder of that research. Bloomfield’s case study considers the leviathan of basic research funding, the National Institutes of Health (NIH). In the first part of this article, Bloomfield pulls apart how NIH acts as a regulator. The second part of this piece draws out implications in a clearly written and fascinating read.

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Michigan Law @umichlaw.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

Michigan Law #MorningRead: Professor @sbagen.bsky.social: “COVID and the Great Retrenchment” in the Houston Law Review. "The COVID experience raises serious questions about whether benefits expansions can be durable without first attending to imbalances of political power." bit.ly/4heWWMX

The past six years have seen two dramatic shifts in federal health and benefits policy. First, during the COVID pandemic, the government dramatically expanded public benefits. These expansions had incredibly positive effects, and recipients were largely satisfied with them. But after a relatively short time, Congress rolled back nearly all of the expansion. Worse, the immediate pullback set the stage for even more significant retrenchments in the second Trump Administration. Where in 2023 the United States came closest to universal health care in its history—with a record low uninsured rate of 7.7%—the Trump Administration’s Medicaid cuts and failure to extend enhanced marketplace subsidies will have wiped out essentially all gains made since adoption of the Affordable Care Act. That is not what drafters of the COVID era expansions expected. They thought people would rely on and appreciate the new benefits, resist rollbacks, and lead Congress to make the expansions permanent. These ideas, informed by political science literature on the durability of benefits expansions, have shaped Democratic domestic policy priorities for years.

From the COVID experience, we learned that universal benefits are not as politically durable as many believe, particularly in their early years. Because universal benefits give workers more bargaining power vis à vis employers, employers have strong incentives to fight against such expansions. Opponents recognized that whether benefits programs are understood as universal is a matter of social meaning. They successfully reframed the programs not as universal protections but as compassionate aid for the deserving poor—arguing that extending them stretched programs beyond their purpose. The COVID experience raises serious questions about whether benefits expansions can be durable without first attending to imbalances of political power.

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Eve Brensike Primus @primuseve.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

I just posted a new article challenging the idea that public defense must choose b/t "vertical" representation, in which the same attorney handles a case from initial appearance to disposition & "horizontal" representation, in which different attorneys handle different stages of the same case. /1

papers.ssrn.com

Beyond the Horizontal-Vertical Divide: The Case for Team-Based Representation in Public Defense

This Article challenges the conventional wisdom that public defense systems must choose between "vertical" representation, in which the same attorney

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Nicholas Bagley @nbagley.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

After years of thinking and writing about why American governance is so clunky and slow, I wrote a book about how our well-intentioned laws have lots of unintended consequences. Why We Can’t Have Nice Things comes out Dec. 1 from Norton. Pre-order now! www.nicholasbagley.com

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