9th Cir. News & Views

Today's DJ reports Grassley moves forward with 9th Circuit nominee, despite lack of support from home state senators -- Trump's first nominee to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, who lacks the support of his home state senators, will get a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee this week, indicating a possible change in the committee chairman’s “blue slip” policy. "The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing Wednesday on the nomination of Assistant U.S. Attorney Ryan Bounds of Oregon to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals." "What this means for circuit nominations for the three open California seats on the court is unclear."

Law360's Expert Analysis Series, Judging A Book (i.e., judges writing book reviews), Judge Marsha Berzon Reviews 'We The Corporations'

Winkler’s tome — the book is nearly 400 pages long, but is eminently readable, indeed charming in places — has two major themes. The first is that there a useful analogy — although “no moral equivalency” — between the movements for civil rights and liberties by racial minorities, women and gays, and “the corporate rights movement,” a targeted, strategic effort by corporations to attain the same — indeed, at times greater — constitutional rights to those afforded individuals by our Constitution.

I found Winkler’s second theme considerably more thought-provoking and persuasive than his analogy to other civil rights movements, although, once again, a bit too neatly packaged. That thesis is that “corporate personhood has played only a small role in the expansion of constitutional rights to corporations,” with that version of the corporate form’s legal significance most favored by justices seeking to curb corporate rights rather than expand them.

She concludes: "We the Corporations is both a good read and an important contribution to legal history. I hope my future law clerks read and relish it."