Daniel Hays Lowenstein

Professor of Law Emeritus

  • A.B. Yale, 1964
  • LL.B. Harvard, 1967
  • UCLA Faculty Since 1979

Daniel Lowenstein was the first American law professor to specialize in Election Law and established a leading reputation in that field. He authored the first twentieth century textbook in the field — Election Law: Cases and Materials (Carolina Academic Press, 1995), now in its sixth edition.  As co-editor with Professor Rick Hasen he inaugurated the Election Law Journal, the leading journal in the field. On January 29, 2010, leading scholars in Election Law put on a festschrift celebrating Lowenstein’s work in the field.

On July 1, 2009, Lowenstein became Director of the new UCLA Center for the Liberal Arts and Free Institutions (CLAFI), intended to facilitate and promote study of the great works and achievements of western civilization. He currently teaches undergraduate courses, primarily in literature.

Lowenstein worked as a staff attorney at California Rural Legal Assistance for two and one-half years beginning in 1968. While working for California's Secretary of State, Edmund G. Brown Jr. starting in 1971, he specialized in Election Law and was the main drafter of the Political Reform Act, an initiative statute that California voters approved in 1974, thereby creating a new Fair Political Practices Commission. Governor Brown appointed Lowenstein as first chairman of the Commission in 1975. Lowenstein has served on the national governing board of Common Cause and has been a board member and a vice president of Americans for Nonsmokers' Rights. He has also served as chairman of the Board of Directors of the award-winning theatre troupe Interact and regularly brings the company to the School of Law to perform plays with legal themes, such as Sophocles' Antigone, Ibsen’s An Enemy of the People, and Wouk's The Caine Mutiny Court Martial.

Professor Lowenstein’s published research runs the gamut of Election Law subjects, including campaign finance, redistricting, voting rights, political parties, and initiatives. He has also published literary criticism on works such as The Merchant of Venice and Bleak House.

To obtain news and information about CLAFI or about the Interact play readings at the School of Law, please write to Lowenstein at Lowenstein@law.ucla.edu.

Bibliography

  • Books
    • Election Law: Cases and Materials (with Richard L. Hasen, Daniel P. Tokaji, and Nicholas Stephanopoulos). 6th ed. Carolina Academic Press (2017).
  • Articles And Chapters
    • Presidential Nomination Reform: Legal Constraints and Procedural Possibilities, in Reforming the Presidential Nomination Process, 173-96 (edited by Steven S. Smith & Melanie S. Springer, Brookings Institution Press, 2009).
    • Law and Mercy in The Merchant of Venice, in Law and Language: Theory and Society (edited by Frances Olsen, et al., Dusseldorf University Press, 2008).
    • The Meaning of Bush v. Gore, 68 Ohio State Law Journal 1007-33 (2007).
    • Legal Regulation and Protection of American Parties, in Handbook of Political Parties, 456-70 (edited by Richard S. Katz & William Crotty, Sage Publications, 2006).
    • Vieth’s Gap: Has the Supreme Court Gone from Bad to Worse on Partisan Gerrymandering?, 14 (3) Cornell Journal of Law & Public Policy 367-95 (2005). Article Link
    • When is a Campaign Contribution a Bribe?, in Private and Public Corruption, (edited by John Kleinig, Rowman & Littlefield, 2004).
    • Lessons from the Florida Controversy, in Realising Democracy: Electoral law in Australia, (edited by Graeme Orr, Bryan Mercurio and George Williams, Federation Press, 2003).
    • An Irresponsible Intrusion, 1 (4) The Forum Article 4 (2003). Published Online
    • Voting with Votes, 116 Harvard Law Review 1971-94 (2003). Review of Voting with Dollars: A New Paradigm for Campaign Finance, by Bruce Ackerman & Ian Ayres.
    • The Stealth Campaign: Experimental Studies of Slate Mail in California (with Shanto Iyengar & Seth Masket), 17 Journal of Law & Politics 295-332 (2002).
    • Initiatives and the New Single Subject Rule, 1 Election Law Journal 35-48 (2002).
    • Campaign Finance, Race, and Equality, 79 North Carolina Law Review 1535-40 (2001).
    • The Supreme Court Has No Theory of Politics--And Be Thankful for Small Favors, in The U.S. Supreme Court and the Electoral Process, (edited by David K. Ryden, Georgetown University Press, 2000).
    • Political Reform Is Political, in The U.S. House of Representatives, (edited by Joseph F. Zimmerman and Wilma Rule, Praeger, 2000).
    • A Role for Parties, in Money and Politics: Financing Our Elections Democratically, (edited by Joshua Cohen & Joel Rogers, Beacon Press, 1999).
    • Election Law as a Subject--A Subjective Account, 32 Loyola L.A. Law Review 1199-1215 (1999).
    • Election Law Miscellany: Enforcement, Access to Debates, Qualification of Initiatives, 77 Texas Law Review 2001-21 (1999).
    • You Don’t Have to be Liberal to Hate the Racial Gerrymandering Cases, 50 Stanford Law Review 779-835 (1998).
    • Election Law and Rules for Using Initiatives (with Caroline J. Tolbert and Todd Donovan), in Citizens as Legislators: Direct Democracy in the United States, (edited by Shaun Bowler et al., Ohio State Univ. Press, 1998).
    • Political Parties and the Constitution, in Voting Rights and Redistricting in the United States, (edited by Mark Rush, Greenwood Press, 1998).
    • Race and Representation in the Supreme Court, in Voting Rights and Redistricting in the United States, (edited by Mark Rush, Greenwood Press, 1998).
    • The Goldwater Institute and the Federalist Society: Federalism and Judicial Mandates (with Lino A. Graglia, et al.), 28 Arizona State Law Review 17-220 (1996).
    • Associational Rights of the Major Political Parties: A Political and Jurisprudential Dead End, 16 American Review of Politics 351-70 (1995).
    • Campaign Contributions and Corruption: Comments on Strauss and Cain, 1995 Univ. of Chicago Legal Forum 163-92 (1995).
    • Are Congressional Term Limits Constitutional, 18 Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy 1-72 (1994).
    • Congressional Term Limits and the Constitution, in The Politics and Law of Term Limits, 125-40 (edited by Edward H. Crane & Roger Pilon, Cato Institute, 1994).
    • The Failure of the Act: Conceptions of Law in The Merchant of Venice, Bleak House, Les Misérables, and Richard Weisberg’s Poethics, 15 Cardozo Law Review 1139-1243 (1994).
    • Associational Rights of Major Political Parties: A Skeptical Inquiry, 71 Texas Law Review 1741-92 (1993). Symposium: Regulating the Electoral Process.
    • American Political Parties, in Developments in American Politics, at 63-85 (edited by G.Peele, C. Bailey, B. Cain, St. Martin's, 1992).
    • A Patternless Mosaic: Campaign Finance and the First Amendment after Austin, Capital University Law Review 381-427 (1992). A Symposium on Comparative Political Expression and the First Amendment.
    • A Democratic Perspective on Legislative Districting (Reflections on the Political Parties and Reapportionment: The 1990 Census and Beyond (with Ronald H. Brown), 6 Journal of Law and Politics 673-81 (1990).
    • Bandemer’s Gap: Gerrymandering and Equal Protection, in Political Gerrymandering and the Courts, 64-116 (edited by (B. Grofman, Agathon Press, 1990).
    • On Campaign Finance Reform: The Root of All Evil is Deeply Rooted (Frameworks of Analysis and Proposals for Reform: A Symposium of Campaign Finance), 18 Hofstra Law Review 301-67 (1989).
    • The First Amendment and Paid Initiative Petition Circulators: A Dissenting View and a Proposal (From Gold Dust to Silicon Chips: The California Constitution in Transition (with Robert M. Stern), 17 Hastings Constitutional Law Quarterly 301-67 (1989).
    • Too Much Puff': Persuasion, Paternalism, and Commercial Speech, 56 University of Cincinnati Law Review 1205-49 (1988). Symposium: Commercial Speech and the First Amendment. Transcript.
    • For God, For Country, or For Me?, 74 California Law Review 1479-1512 (1986). Review of Bribes, by John T. Noonan, Jr.
    • The Quest for Legislative Districting in the Public Interest: Elusive or Illusory? (with Jonathan Steinberg), 33 UCLA Law Review 1-75 (1985). Symposium: Gerrymandering and the Courts.
    • Political Bribery and the Intermediate Theory of Politics, 32 UCLA Law Review 784-851 (1985). Excerpts published in Political Corruption (2nd edition, edited by A. HeidenHeimer, M. Johnston, & V. Levine, 1988).
    • Comments on Magleby, “Researching California’s Direct Democracy,” in Institute of Governmental Studies, Conference Report: Conference on Research Needs in California Government and Politics, May 11-12, 1984, pp. 196-204 (University of California, Berkeley).
    • California Initiatives and the Single-Subject Rule, 30 UCLA Law Review 936-75 (1983).
    • Campaign Spending and Ballot Propositions: Recent Experience, Public Choice Theory and the First Amendment, 29 UCLA Law Review 505-641 (1982).
    • Need for Reform as Great as Ever (Forecast from Lowenstein: Campaign-Finance Scandals Ahead), 10 California Journal 103-05 (1979).
    • Neighborhood Law Offices: The New Wave in Legal Services for the Poor (with Michael J. Waggoner), 80 Harvard Law Review 805-50 (1967).
    • Disqualification of Judges for Bias in the Federal Courts, 79 Harvard Law Review 1435-52 (1966).
  • Other
    • Book Review, 9(3) The Journal of the Federalist Society 116-18 (2008). Review of The Rise of the Conservative Legal Movement: The Battle for Control of the Law, by Steven M. Teles.
    • Should We Dispense with the Electoral College?, 155 University Of Pennsylvania Law Review PENNumbra 10-37 (2007). Debate with Sanford Levinson and John McGinnis. Available at University of Pennsylvania Online.
    • Conflict and Corruption: Appearances and Reality, Western City at 10-12 (May 1999).
    • A Role for Parties, 22 Boston Review 15-16 (April/May 1997).
    • Can States Prevent Candidates from Appearing on the Ballot under More than One Party Label?, West's Legal News (Dec. 6, 1996). WLN 13038, 1996 WL 694945 (1996) (on-line publication).
    • Book Review, 518 Annals of the American Academy of Political & Social Science 202-3 (1991). Review of Beyond the Constitution, by Hadley Arkes.
    • "Oral History Interview with Daniel H. Lowenstein." Los Angeles: UCLA Oral History Program, for the State Government Oral History Program, California State Archives (1989). Interviewed by Carlos Vasquez.
    • Campaign Finance and the Constitution, Social Science Working Papers, Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences of the California Institute of Technology (1989). Also published in 1 Political Parties and Elections in the United States: An Encyclopedia, 121-28 (L. Sandy Maisel, ed., Garland, 1991).
    • Contributer, in Encyclopedia of the American Constitution (edited by Kenneth L. Karst, Leonard W. Levy, et al., Macmillan, 1986).
    • Principal Draftsman, Political Reform Act of 1974 (Prop. 9) (on-line publication)