Author: admin

Oregon Cops Are No Longer Allowed To Routinely Turn Traffic Stops Into Criminal Investigations

When he pulls over cars for traffic violations, police officer Erik Faulkner testified in 2015, he routinely asks drivers if they have weapons, drugs, or any other contraband. Because of a recent decision by the Oregon Supreme Court, Faulkner will have to cut that out, and so will every other cop in the state.

Under Oregon’s constitutional ban on unreasonable seizures, the court said, “all investigative activities, including investigative inquiries, conducted during a traffic stop are part of an ongoing seizure and are subject to both subject-matter and durational limitations. Accordingly, an officer is limited to investigatory inquiries that are reasonably related to the purpose of the traffic stop or that have an independent constitutional justification.” The decision gives Oregon drivers extra protection against the use of traffic stops to conduct criminal investigations that would not otherwise be justified.

The case involves a driver, Mario Arreola-Botello, whom Faulkner pulled over in 2015 for failing to signal a turn and a lane change. While Arreola-Botello was looking for his vehicle registration and proof of insurance, Faulkner said, he asked him about guns and drugs, then asked if he could search the car. Arreola-Botello, whose grasp of English was spotty, reportedly said, “Sure, OK.” The search turned up a package containing methamphetamine, which led to Arreola-Botello’s arrest and conviction for illegal possession of a controlled substance.

On appeal, Arreola-Botello argued that the evidence should have been suppressed because Faulkner unconstitutionally exceeded the proper scope of the traffic stop. The Oregon Supreme Court agreed. “Put simply,” it said, “an ‘unavoidable lull’ does not create an opportunity for an officer to ask unrelated questions, unless the officer can justify the inquiry on other grounds.”

If an officer incidentally discovers evidence of criminal activity after stopping a car, the court said, he may investigate based on “reasonable suspicion.” But he may not randomly fish for incriminating information or evidence simply because a driver has committed a traffic violation. Given the myriad excuses that traffic codes give police for pulling people over, that’s an important constraint. Unlike most of us, Oregon drivers no longer have to worry that they will be interrogated or pressured into allowing a search merely because they exceeded the speed limit or neglected to buckle their seat belts.

“This decision closes a loophole in the protection of our constitutional rights that police had been using to conduct warrantless searches,” ACLU of Oregon attorney Leland Baxter-Neal told Oregon Public Radio. “And those searches had disproportionately targeted people of color.”

A 2018 analysis of traffic stops in Portland found that “American Indian/Alaskan Native and Black/African American drivers were searched at significantly higher rates when compared to overall stop rates.” Drivers in those two groups were searched 4 percent and 3 percent of the time, respectively, compared to a rate of 0.5 percent for white drivers.

Nationwide data reveal similar, though less dramatic, disparities. A 2017 analysis of data from 20 states found that “white drivers are searched in 2.0% of stops, compared to 3.5% of stops for black motorists and 3.8% for Hispanic motorists.” After the researchers controlled for stop location, date and time, and driver age and gender, they calculated that “black and Hispanic drivers have approximately twice the odds of being searched relative to white drivers.” They also found that “black and Hispanic drivers are searched on the basis of less evidence than white drivers, suggestive of bias in search decisions.”

from Latest – Reason.com https://ift.tt/35z9ngc
via IFTTT

The ’80s “Fear Of Inflation” & “Ignorance” Now – Polar Opposites

The ’80s “Fear Of Inflation” & “Ignorance” Now – Polar Opposites

Excerpted from a Twitter thread by Garic Moran,

Polar opposites

My first job in the investment field was as an intern at a local brokerage firm in New Orleans in the summer of 1981. At that time the Federal Reserve was a couple of years into targeting money supply.

President Carter had nominated Paul Volcker Jr. as Fed Chairman in August of 1979. The dollar’s status as the reserve currency of the world was in serious doubt.

U.S. investors convinced that inflation would never come down were dumping Treasury’s at any price & panicking into Gold, which peaked in January of 1980 @ $875…

18 months later in the summer of 1981, all traders were transfixed Thursday afternoons with the release of the money supply report.

Interest rates & Gold would move the following morning, rates were floating; the Fed was targeting money supply!

The Fed had already allowed 1 recession in 1980; causing President Carter to lose the election (IMO).

By June of ’81, Fed Funds returned to 19%; a 2nd recession began. The greatest bond bull in history also began. As an aside; Michael Steinhardt was leveraged long Treasury’s & his partners thought he was crazy.

Peak inflation psychology was crushed by the Fed’s targeting of money supply! 3 1/2 years later I started with Smith Barney as a broker selling 30 year BBB Ga Power bonds yielding 13.5%. They were popular as money market rates & bank CD’s had plummeted; yet, investors were deeply skeptical of the BBB rating & concerned about the potential of inflation returning.

Interestingly, we were using leads compiled by people who had bought oil & gas limited partnerships in the late ’70’s., many of which had turned into horrible investments as Chair Volcker had defeated inflation.

Gold mining equities peaked at 8% of the S&P 500 in ’81 as investors paid up for miners after the peak in Gold with the fear that inflation would return. Today, Newmont Mining (less than .5%) is only miner in S&P 500.

Today is the polar opposite

U.S. investors have bought $250B worth of bond ETF’s, YTD. BBB credit has never been a greater % of bond fund holdings. Corporate debt to GDP is at an all-time-high.

Total Financial Assets to GDP have never been higher.

In 1980 Total Financial Assets to GDP bottomed at 2.7X; today they are valued at twice that level.

This summer Chair Powell said the last 2 recessions were caused by financial crises; he would not allow that again unlike Volcker, he has no tolerance for a recession & appears to be supporting the current President (IMO, just as Chair Yellen did with the previous President).

Investors have responded by bidding stocks to new All-Time-Highs & global bond debt is reported to be over $250T.

Incredibly many hedge fund managers are leveraged long negative yielding bonds; their partners have no fear of inflation (polar opposite).

IMO, we will all look back one day & wonder what Central Banks & investors were thinking when $17T of global bonds carried negative rates. Iit will be obvious that was the peak in disinflationary psychology.

So Chair Powell said he would not allow the greatest financial bubble in the history of the world to pop & cause a recession. By this September repo rates spiked as the supply of Treasury Bills from a run-away deficit soaked up liquidity in the financial system: the Fed responded with a Friday afternoon conference call where they unanimously approved $60B in monthly T-Bill purchases (monetization).

At the same time stress in the shadow banking community increased as leveraged loans default rates began to increase. Venture Capital Funds came under pressure as money losing Unicorns began to fail. Private Equity default rates are rising.

The Fed responded with overnight repo’s to provide financing to holders of worthless securities. With real corporate profits down 6%, YOY, stress in the most leveraged corporations in history will continue to grow. The Fed’s commitment to keep Financial Conditions will also continue to grow.

Since repogeddon in September, U.S. M2 has accelerated to a 13.8% annual rate.

They have committed to buying T-BIlls into Q2/20, the above chart will continue to rise. If you look closely at the below chart, M2 appears to be in the early stages of going parabolic.

Yet, I am not aware of any trading desks or investors who are transfixed to the weekly money supply reports. Indeed, disinflation psychology is at such extremes, investors continue to pile record capital into bonds that are yielding less than the current inflation rate. They have chosen to ignore that Cleveland Fed Median CPI is rising.

The Federal Reserve is now allowing money supply to grow at whatever rate it takes to stop “deflation”, but what they are really trying to stop is the greatest financial bubble (which they created) from popping; they have no tolerance for a recession.

There is no concern for the dollar as the reserve currency of the world or future inflation rates: polar opposites.

This is not investment advice; just an observation from 38 years of following capital markets & human psychology!


Tyler Durden

Mon, 11/25/2019 – 13:55

Tags
Business Finance

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2qIvQIU Tyler Durden

A Record-Breaking Dollar Bond Offering From China Could Be Imminent

A Record-Breaking Dollar Bond Offering From China Could Be Imminent

China is set to expand its bond market through a record sale of sovereign bonds in dollars, according to Bloomberg sources. 

The bond offering could raise up to $6 billion, would be one of the largest dollar bond offerings on record. The offering could be seen as soon as Tuesday. 

Sources said the Ministry of Finance is considering tenors of three years, five years, 10 years and 20 years: 

“It reaffirms China’s determination to develop an orderly offshore dollar bond market for Chinese issuers,” Anne Zhang, head of fixed income for JPMorgan Private Bank in Asia, told Bloomberg. “The new deal will further complete a sovereign curve,” she said.

The size of the issuance would be more than double last year’s size, and triple the amount from 2017. 

“The size is twice what it was last year, that just speaks to the fact that the past two years have been perceived as successful by the Ministry of Finance,” a banker working on one of the dollar bond deals told The Financial Times. He added that previous offers were “not enough to match demand.”

The Chinse dollar bond market is valued at around $740 billion, according to Bloomberg data, and is an important funding source for domestic borrowers. 

Dollar bond issuances slid in 2018 following the escalation of the trade war. Despite the further escalation of the trade war in 2019, dollar bond issuances have increased as US treasury yields have fallen. 

Dollar bond demand from Chinese borrowers has been elevated in 2019, so far there has been $195 billion in recorded issuances, already surpassing levels seen in 2017 at $211 billion. 

At least 53% of the dollar bonds issued this year have been investment-grade securities and 38% high yield notes. 

Property developers have been a huge source of demand for the dollar bond market this year with at least $78.5 billion of the issuances. 

Becky Liu, head of China macro strategy at Standard Chartered Plc in Hong Kong, told Bloomberg that China is expanding its dollar bond market for companies to have ample funding amid periods of uncertainty: 

While China has the world’s second-largest bond market, in some ways it remains relatively underdeveloped, according to Becky Liu, head of China macro strategy at Standard Chartered Plc in Hong Kong. The country is still building out a domestic institutional investor base such as the pension funds and insurers that are a major feature overseas. Banks are the main holders of bonds onshore. “There is a good number of companies that do not have a funding channel at home,” Liu said. That’s why even domestic-focused enterprises can tap the dollar-debt market, she said.The record China sale isn’t huge relative to some other sovereign issues. Italy sold $7 billion of dollar bonds last month. Argentina sold $9 billion in January 2018.

And it makes sense why China is ramping up its dollar borrowing because once it displaces the dollar as a reserve currency with yuan, it would be cheaper to repay dollar debt as the dollar is crushed into oblivion. China is playing the long game. 


Tyler Durden

Mon, 11/25/2019 – 13:40

Tags
Business Finance

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/35CScKV Tyler Durden

Syracuse Students Demand Punishment for Everyone Involved in Racist Speech, Including Bystanders

Over the course of the last month, a series of alleged hate crimes have rocked Syracuse University in New York. In response, student activists are demanding the resignation of the chancellor, Kent Syverud. They also want mandatory diversity training, more counseling services, and punitive action against everyone involved in racist speech—including “bystanders” who merely witnessed the events and said nothing.

“The safety of students on this campus—specifically the safety of underrepresented and underserved students—is paramount,” wrote the leaders of #NotAgainSU, the student activist group.

The incidents began on November 7, when racist graffiti targeting Asian students was found on a campus building. This was soon followed by vandalism evincing animus against black students, Jewish students, and Native American students, according to Inside Higher Ed.

In only one case—fraternity members yelling a racial slur—were the perpetrators caught in the act. So students and administrators have no idea who is responsible for the graffiti. At least one incident was just a rumor (and perhaps an outright hoax): Last week, the campus went into lockdown mode when it was reported that someone was using AirDrop to send the Christchurch shooter’s manifesto to student’s iPhones. It turned out that no one had actually received the manifesto.

Students sre understandably on edge, but some people seem to be blowing the danger out of proportion. Inside Higher Ed described the mood as one that “seemed to students like escalating threats and potential for violence”:

Les Rose, a broadcast journalism professor, said he and other Newhouse professors volunteered to take shifts being in the lobby of the Newhouse building to reassure concerned students of their safety.

“It hurt my heart,” Rose said. “I woke up at 2:30 a.m. on Tuesday night because I couldn’t sleep—I was worried about what another racist idiot would do—and there’s an email from a very concerned student of mine who didn’t want to come to class. She was truly unnerved.”

Students of color who participated in the protests say their mental health has deteriorated from mounting fear of being targeted on campus.

“Woke up feeling sad. Like many others over two weeks, I experienced a lot of pain,” an Asian student who participated in the sit-in wrote on Twitter. “It’s been a difficult experience, and one that constantly reminds in my head. I don’t know how to explain it but it hurts. I hope those who cause this pain will be held accountable.”

Gabby de Oliveira, a first-year student from Los Angeles who lives in Flint Hall, where a student wrote a hateful message directed at Native Americans, said she doesn’t feel “completely safe.” While many students have left campus early for the Thanksgiving break—the university is excusing their absences—de Oliviera cannot reschedule her flight.

Yet there is no evidence that anyone on campus is in danger. None of the incidents have involved violence. They could even be the handiwork of an aggrieved employee, or someone else with an ideologically unconnected agenda, rather than a secret racist intent on harming Syracuse’s minority community.

But even if Syracuse’s situation is as bad as it seems, the activists’ demands are seriously flawed. Punishing anyone who so much as listens to racist speech without saying anything would be draconian, and it risks compromising the students’ rights outlined by the school’s code of conduct. (Meanwhile, activists have demanded that their own violations of that code—i.e., their occupations of campus buildings—go unpunished.)

#NotAgainSU also wants tons more money spent on diversity and anti-racism initiatives, including mandatory training for faculty and staff. And they have asked the chancellor to resign for refusing to meet all their demands. He had agreed with a mere “98 percent” of them, and as Syracuse.com reported, this wasn’t good enough:

“The answer is I cannot right now in this room promise that every single word be on the response,” he said. “I can listen to the concerns.”

That response prompted hundreds of students, mostly dressed in black, to walk out of the event, chanting again, “sign or resign.” The students moved their protest to outside the chancellor’s residence nearby campus.

As they marched off campus and arrived at the chancellor’s house, they continued to chant “sign or resign!” and to call for administrators’ resignations.

For more about campus hate incidents and the responses by student activists, check out my book Panic Attack: Young Radicals in the Age of Trump.

from Latest – Reason.com https://ift.tt/2sgPnAO
via IFTTT

Syracuse Students Demand Punishment for Everyone Involved in Racist Speech, Including Bystanders

Over the course of the last month, a series of alleged hate crimes have rocked Syracuse University in New York. In response, student activists are demanding the resignation of the chancellor, Kent Syverud. They also want mandatory diversity training, more counseling services, and punitive action against everyone involved in racist speech—including “bystanders” who merely witnessed the events and said nothing.

“The safety of students on this campus—specifically the safety of underrepresented and underserved students—is paramount,” wrote the leaders of #NotAgainSU, the student activist group.

The incidents began on November 7, when racist graffiti targeting Asian students was found on a campus building. This was soon followed by vandalism evincing animus against black students, Jewish students, and Native American students, according to Inside Higher Ed.

In only one case—fraternity members yelling a racial slur—were the perpetrators caught in the act. So students and administrators have no idea who is responsible for the graffiti. At least one incident was just a rumor (and perhaps an outright hoax): Last week, the campus went into lockdown mode when it was reported that someone was using AirDrop to send the Christchurch shooter’s manifesto to student’s iPhones. It turned out that no one had actually received the manifesto.

Students sre understandably on edge, but some people seem to be blowing the danger out of proportion. Inside Higher Ed described the mood as one that “seemed to students like escalating threats and potential for violence”:

Les Rose, a broadcast journalism professor, said he and other Newhouse professors volunteered to take shifts being in the lobby of the Newhouse building to reassure concerned students of their safety.

“It hurt my heart,” Rose said. “I woke up at 2:30 a.m. on Tuesday night because I couldn’t sleep—I was worried about what another racist idiot would do—and there’s an email from a very concerned student of mine who didn’t want to come to class. She was truly unnerved.”

Students of color who participated in the protests say their mental health has deteriorated from mounting fear of being targeted on campus.

“Woke up feeling sad. Like many others over two weeks, I experienced a lot of pain,” an Asian student who participated in the sit-in wrote on Twitter. “It’s been a difficult experience, and one that constantly reminds in my head. I don’t know how to explain it but it hurts. I hope those who cause this pain will be held accountable.”

Gabby de Oliveira, a first-year student from Los Angeles who lives in Flint Hall, where a student wrote a hateful message directed at Native Americans, said she doesn’t feel “completely safe.” While many students have left campus early for the Thanksgiving break—the university is excusing their absences—de Oliviera cannot reschedule her flight.

Yet there is no evidence that anyone on campus is in danger. None of the incidents have involved violence. They could even be the handiwork of an aggrieved employee, or someone else with an ideologically unconnected agenda, rather than a secret racist intent on harming Syracuse’s minority community.

But even if Syracuse’s situation is as bad as it seems, the activists’ demands are seriously flawed. Punishing anyone who so much as listens to racist speech without saying anything would be draconian, and it risks compromising the students’ rights outlined by the school’s code of conduct. (Meanwhile, activists have demanded that their own violations of that code—i.e., their occupations of campus buildings—go unpunished.)

#NotAgainSU also wants tons more money spent on diversity and anti-racism initiatives, including mandatory training for faculty and staff. And they have asked the chancellor to resign for refusing to meet all their demands. He had agreed with a mere “98 percent” of them, and as Syracuse.com reported, this wasn’t good enough:

“The answer is I cannot right now in this room promise that every single word be on the response,” he said. “I can listen to the concerns.”

That response prompted hundreds of students, mostly dressed in black, to walk out of the event, chanting again, “sign or resign.” The students moved their protest to outside the chancellor’s residence nearby campus.

As they marched off campus and arrived at the chancellor’s house, they continued to chant “sign or resign!” and to call for administrators’ resignations.

For more about campus hate incidents and the responses by student activists, check out my book Panic Attack: Young Radicals in the Age of Trump.

from Latest – Reason.com https://ift.tt/2sgPnAO
via IFTTT

“Financialization”: A New Feature And Risk Of Monetary Policy

“Financialization”: A New Feature And Risk Of Monetary Policy

Submitted by Joseph G. Carson, Former Director of Global Economic Research, Alliance Bernstein

Financialization has become a new feature and risk of monetary policy as decisions on policy rates and the balance sheet operate mainly through the portfolio channel.

At the center of financialization are actual and perceived changes in monetary policy interacting with equity prices. Investors see easy policy as cumulative and mutual reinforcing, but so too at some point could their reversals.

Financialization is to financial stability what inflation is to price stability. Both, financial and price stability are under the mandates of the Federal Reserve. Yet, policymakers have specific targets or objectives for inflation, but no such goal or gauge has been established for financial stability.

What constitutes the relevant metrics for financialization?

The concept of financialization is not new, and it has be defined in variety of ways and seen through different lenses. It is being used in this context to assess the changing and expanding tools of monetary policy working through the portfolio channel and its impact on finance (equity) in relation to economic fundamentals.

For example, the market valuation of domestic companies has skyrocketed in relation to Nominal GDP…

…. and aggregate operating profits (GDP basis) during the current economic cycle as policymakers have used the portfolio channel – with their new tools of forward guidance and asset purchases – to help achieve their mandated objectives on maximum employment and price stability.

Even with market valuations at lofty levels policymakers still decided to lower official rates three times over the past several months in order to show a commitment to achieving its price stability target. And the reduction in official rates also came with a commitment by the Fed chair not to reverse course and raise rates until inflation turns higher on a sustained basis.

Policymakers are effectively making investing and risk-taking far too easy since the most important item over time in the valuation of the equity market is the current and prospective level of interest rates.

It is far too soon to judge the economic and inflation effects from recent policy decisions, but the impact on finance has been swift and substantial. Updating for the gains in equity prices since June 30th the market valuation of domestic companies jumps to approximately 1.8X to GDP and near 20X to operating profits, close to levels reached during the dot.com speculative boom.

(Note: the ratio of market valuation of domestic companies to operating profits is not comparable to the P/E ratio used by analysts for individual companies or groups of stocks, like the S&P 500 index. Operating profits in the GDP framework differ from the reported profits of companies and companies also report their earnings on a per share basis.)

Financialization is an unfamiliar outcome of monetary policy. Asset price increases due to fundamental causes are desirable and pose no significant risk to economic or financial stability. Yet, gains that become unhinged from economic growth and operating profits and are based on speculation of any type – even ones tied to monetary policy – do pose a huge risk.

The transmission of monetary policy has fundamentally changed as it now operate mainly through the portfolio channel and with that comes new trade-offs. The new trade-off is easy money risks an increase in “financialization” and not general inflation. As such, policy decisions made solely to achieve the price stability mandate will eventually clash with financial stability, raising the risk of a bad outcome.


Tyler Durden

Mon, 11/25/2019 – 13:20

Tags
Business Finance

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2QQZyGy Tyler Durden

Strong 2Y Auction As Direct Bidders Surge To 6 Year High

Strong 2Y Auction As Direct Bidders Surge To 6 Year High

As a result of the holiday-shortened week and the truncated Treasury auction schedule, moments ago the US sold 2Y paper in what was a very solid auction.

The high yield of 1.601% was just fractionally higher than last month’s 1.594%, and stropped through the 1.605% When Issued, the 3rd consecutive stopping through auction. The Bid to Cover was also in line with recent auction, dipping modestly from 2.695 to 2.626, right on top of the 6 auction average.

However, while the headline numbers were solid, there was a notable change in the internals, where the near-record Direct takedown soared from 14% to 29.1%, the highest in nearly six years going back to December 2013. The offset was a drop in both Indirects, which dropped from 54.8% to 47.8%, the lowest since August, and below the 49.6% recent average, as well as Dealers, whose allotment declined from 31.22% to 23.11%, also below the 29.3% six auction average.

While there was no immediate explanation for the dramatic surge in Direct bidding, the stronger than expected auction did not spook markets, and the 10Y yield has continued to trade near session lows, at just below 1.76%, as stocks bond yields diverge for another day.


Tyler Durden

Mon, 11/25/2019 – 13:16

Tags
Business Finance

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/35EoW6B Tyler Durden

Kavanaugh Joins Gorsuch in Fight To Revive Nondelegation Doctrine

The U.S. Supreme Court narrowly upheld a law in June that, in the dissenting words of Justice Neil Gorsuch, “hand[ed] off to the nation’s chief prosecutor the power to write his own criminal code.” Today, Justice Brett Kavanaugh spoke up in support of Gorsuch.

The June ruling came in Gundy v. United States, a case that centered on a 2006 federal law known as the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA). Among other things, SORNA required convicted sex offenders to register, check in periodically in person, and share personal information with the authorities.

The law also contained this provision: “The Attorney General shall have the authority to specify the applicability of the requirements of this subchapter to sex offenders convicted before the enactment of this chapter.” Translation: Congress gave the attorney general a blank check when it came to dealing with the estimated 500,000 individuals whose convictions predate SORNA’s passage.

It was that delegation of legislative authority to the executive that sparked Gorsuch’s ire. “The rule that prevents Congress from giving the executive carte blanche to write laws for sex offenders is the same rule that protects everyone else,” the justice wrote in dissent. According to Gorsuch, SORNA combined the lawmaking powers of Congress with the law enforcement powers of the executive, and then gave those combined powers to a single federal official. For the Supreme Court to let that outcome stand, Gorsuch argued, marks “the end of any meaningful enforcement of our separation of powers.”

Justice Brett Kavanaugh took no part in Gundy, leaving court watchers to wonder about how he might have ruled. The Court’s newest justice answered that question today. In a statement respecting the denial of certiorari in Paul v. United States—another separation of powers case, which the Court turned down this morning—Kavanaugh wrote in praise of “Justice Gorsuch’s scholarly analysis of the Constitution’s nondelegation doctrine” in Gundy, noting that this “thoughtful” dissent “raised important points that may warrant further consideration in future cases.”

In other words, Kavanaugh seems to have joined Gorsuch’s campaign to put some judicial teeth into the nondelegation doctrine. That’s welcome news for those who think that the Constitution meant what it said when it placed federal lawmaking power in the hands of Congress, not in the hands of the executive branch.

from Latest – Reason.com https://ift.tt/2rnyEve
via IFTTT

Kavanaugh Joins Gorsuch in Fight To Revive Nondelegation Doctrine

The U.S. Supreme Court narrowly upheld a law in June that, in the dissenting words of Justice Neil Gorsuch, “hand[ed] off to the nation’s chief prosecutor the power to write his own criminal code.” Today, Justice Brett Kavanaugh spoke up in support of Gorsuch.

The June ruling came in Gundy v. United States, a case that centered on a 2006 federal law known as the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA). Among other things, SORNA required convicted sex offenders to register, check in periodically in person, and share personal information with the authorities.

The law also contained this provision: “The Attorney General shall have the authority to specify the applicability of the requirements of this subchapter to sex offenders convicted before the enactment of this chapter.” Translation: Congress gave the attorney general a blank check when it came to dealing with the estimated 500,000 individuals whose convictions predate SORNA’s passage.

It was that delegation of legislative authority to the executive that sparked Gorsuch’s ire. “The rule that prevents Congress from giving the executive carte blanche to write laws for sex offenders is the same rule that protects everyone else,” the justice wrote in dissent. According to Gorsuch, SORNA combined the lawmaking powers of Congress with the law enforcement powers of the executive, and then gave those combined powers to a single federal official. For the Supreme Court to let that outcome stand, Gorsuch argued, marks “the end of any meaningful enforcement of our separation of powers.”

Justice Brett Kavanaugh took no part in Gundy, leaving court watchers to wonder about how he might have ruled. The Court’s newest justice answered that question today. In a statement respecting the denial of certiorari in Paul v. United States—another separation of powers case, which the Court turned down this morning—Kavanaugh wrote in praise of “Justice Gorsuch’s scholarly analysis of the Constitution’s nondelegation doctrine” in Gundy, noting that this “thoughtful” dissent “raised important points that may warrant further consideration in future cases.”

In other words, Kavanaugh seems to have joined Gorsuch’s campaign to put some judicial teeth into the nondelegation doctrine. That’s welcome news for those who think that the Constitution meant what it said when it placed federal lawmaking power in the hands of Congress, not in the hands of the executive branch.

from Latest – Reason.com https://ift.tt/2rnyEve
via IFTTT