My article “The Plain-Meaning Fallacy” just published in the B.C. L. Rev.! My favorite illustration of the plain-meaning fallacy is originalist arguments regarding the President’s removal power—an issue now pending before SCOTUS. Here’s a quick explanation 🧵 bclawreview.bc.edu/articles/10....

Readers, today is the exciting launch day for my book! How to Tax the Ultrarich bit.ly/4rk6wBM In partnership with the great economic policy team @rooseveltinstitute.org A few threads will follow. 1st, the key takeaway: even w/ *this* Supreme Court, we can tax wealth at the federal level. 1/12

Fantastic piece from @stevevladeck.bsky.social & @barryfriedman1.bsky.social on how to hold federal law enforcement accountable. As they note, an even better solution would be for Congress to codify Bivens.

Apropos of the TikTok news last week, I have a piece coming out abt how the Supreme Court's decision to uphold the ban-or-sale law belongs in the First Amendment anticanon. It's not just wrong, but so wrong we should hold it up as an exceptional symbol of wrongness. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

I've just uploaded a revised version of "The Chadha Presidency" to SSRN. The revisions both account for some incredibly helpful feedback I've gotten from colleagues and also bring the discussion of the Trump presidency up to date (as of today). papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

It was an honor to receive the Emerging Scholar Award from the AALS Legislation Section — especially while seated next to Bill Eskridge and Mary Ann Bernard (Phil Frickey’s widow). Thanks @kevintobia.bsky.social for the kind words about my work.

A vivid lesson for law students and young lawyers: Statutory interpretation--and, in particular, asking "What was Congress up to here?"--can make a real difference! www.nytimes.com/2025/12/31/u...

Really fantastic new piece by my colleague Dave Rapallo. The most comprehensive treatment I've seen of minority investigative powers in Congress. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

The Supreme Court’s refusal to let the Trump administration deploy National Guard troops in the Chicago area was in large part the result of a friend-of-the-court brief written over a weekend and submitted by a Georgetown law professor. Here's who he is, and why the brief proved so important.

Big ups to Marty Lederman @martylederman.bsky.social who flagged this argument that SCOTUS relied on (that regular forces refer to military forces, not federal law enforcement).

Bystranowski et al on the Empirical Turn in Statutory Interpretation Piotr Bystranowski (Interdisciplinary Centre for Ethics; Jagiellonian University; Max-Planck-Institut für Verhaltenökonomik), Ivar Hannikainen (Department of Philosophy I, University of Granada), Guilherme Almeida (Insper),…

If you want a read about the recent anti-constituonal attempt to denaturalize American children from their claim to birthright citizenship using bad history, @evanbernick.bsky.social, @gowder.io, I wrote about it in the Cornell Law Review Online. publications.lawschool.cornell.edu/lawreview/wp...

This is a fascinating new experimental jurisprudence paper from Chris Jaeger on what is "reasonable." For laypeople's judgments of reasonableness, the probability of harm (P) has an important effect beyond its role in the B<PL formula. yalelawjournal.org/article/the-...

Just had a chance to skim this — fantastic piece, that nicely brings together the new literature on the meaning of “quasi-judicial” with new research to show why originalists and the Court should be on board with the doctrine. Lots more to like here — I just hope SCOTUS sees it!!!

Excited to see my paper "What Are We Debating When We Debate Legal Interpretation?" published today in the B.U. L. Rev. (@bulawreview.bsky.social)! Published next to it is a terrific and constructive response by Francisco Urbina. Both the paper and the response are here: www.bu.edu/bulawreview/...

I've posted a (lightly) revised version of The Chadha Presidency, which takes account of recent tariff disapproval votes and a few other new developments. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

There's a longstanding debate over the value of law professor amicus briefs at #SCOTUS. I'll just note that the additional briefing the Court ordered today in the Illinois National Guard case was in direct response to an amicus brief filed by ... a law professor (@martylederman.bsky.social).

🚨🗣️ The talk given by Ivar R. Hannikainen at the IAS Seminar is now available to view on our YouTube channel. Please click on the link below to access the video 𝐌𝐨𝐫𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲, 𝐜𝐨𝐨𝐫𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐥𝐚𝐰 www.youtube.com/watch?v=m7va...

This is a big one! A 4-year writing project over many timezones, arguing for a reimagining of the influential "core knowledge" thesis. Led by @daweibai.bsky.social, we argue that much of our innate knowledge of the world is not "conceptual" in nature, but rather wired into perceptual processing. 👇

In Nix v. Hedden (1893), the Supreme Court held that a tomato is a vegetable. But there's more to the story... 🍅🧵 papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

"People really forget that we're human beings." I wrote about the deep challenges facing Black transgender youth and their families and the support network some are creating to help others navigate a moment of heightened political hostility. capitalbnews.org/black-parent...

Might the concept of "good judgment" vary by framing or social roles? Five studies of four nations (🇺🇸🇨🇦🇬🇧🇨🇳) found some words and roles were more associated with "rational" than "reasonable" (and vice versa). doi.org/10.1162/opmi... #CogSci #xPhi #linguistics #dataViz

(Last) Call for Papers: "New Voices in Legislation", 2026 AALS Annual Meeting in New Orleans (Jan. 7, 4pm). Junior scholars will workshop drafts in groups, led by a senior commenter. Please send drafts to [email protected] by Sep. 19, 2025 with the subject "AALS New Voices Submission."

The fabulous @jrabanos.bsky.social and @BojanSpaic discussed experimental jurisprudence with me in their awesome podcast! If you want to know why experimental jurisprudence is not like theoretical physics, or what does lying and reasonableness have in common, check it out!

(Last) Call for Papers: "New Voices in Legislation", 2026 AALS Annual Meeting in New Orleans (Jan. 7, 4pm). Junior scholars will workshop drafts in groups, led by a senior commenter. Please send drafts to [email protected] by Sep. 19, 2025 with the subject "AALS New Voices Submission."

Final call for global collaborators on this replication collaboration on @bioxphi studies — moral psychologists and x-phi researchers wanted! especially based in SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE! global-bioXphi | moral science lab www.mscilab.com/globalbioxphi/

The final version of my "Corruption and the Supreme Court" has been published in the Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities, and is available for download here: ssrn.com/abstract=497...

After many years of anticipation (mainly by me), @drlarisa.bsky.social and I have a paper on the way people understand two mental state terms used in the criminal law -- "knowingly" and "recklessly" -- forthcoming in JEP:Applied. 1/

I am delighted to share our new #PNAS paper, with @grvkamath.bsky.social @msonderegger.bsky.social and @sivareddyg.bsky.social, on whether age matters for the adoption of new meanings. That is, as words change meaning, does the rate of adoption vary across generations? www.pnas.org/doi/epdf/10....

Last fall, the editors of the Harvard Law Review invited me to write the Foreword for this year's Supreme Court issue. My working draft is below, and comments are most welcome. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Must read. This is criminal conduct, full stop.

Do not look away.

I just posted a new paper on @ssrn.bsky.social, titled "The Chadha Presidency". Here's the link, and I'll post the abstract in the next post. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

There’s so much interesting data in this latest by @adambonica.bsky.social on data and democracy. Highlights (or lowlights) to me include Supreme Court acting virtually opposite the lower courts, the U.S. being the biggest gerontocracy & low Dem turnout in 2024. open.substack.com/pub/data4dem...

Currently accepting applications on a rolling basis! Postdoc in Empirical Approaches to Legal Interpretation, with a start date of Fall 2025. A great opportunity to work with the wonderful @complingy.bsky.social @kevintobia.bsky.social Details here: apply.interfolio.com/170055

What I Heard on a Suicide Hotline for Trans Kids "That more calls came from rural red than from urban blue states was not a mere gut feeling...Published data by the Trevor Project links the dozens of recent anti-trans laws w/ increases in the rates of suicide attempts by trans & nonbinary youth"

Two more overnight wins: my team successfully removed a scheme from the Republican bill to end background checks and registrations for easily-concealed guns and silencers. There’s no limit to the awful stuff they crammed into this bill.

Imagine a friend experienced a dramatic deterioration, becoming cruel and selfish. You might say this is not even the "same person." But studies find that when judging dramatic improvements, people more often say the person is still the same. A new paper finds this same asymmetry across cultures!