[EL] nonpartisan election administration - Sept. 14 conference

[Rick Hasen]

This is a great time to put in a plug then for the following conference 
(I will put out a link when our RSVP system is up and running), which 
will explore such issues:


  Foxes, Henhouses, and Commissions:
  Assessing the Nonpartisan Model in Election Administration,
  Redistricting, and Campaign Finance

Friday, September 14, 2012
8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

University of California, Irvine
School of Law, EDU 1111 (Directions) 
<http://test.law.uci.edu/directions.html>

For many years, especially since the 2000 presidential election 
controversy, scholars have debated whether nonpartisan actors should 
replace partisan actors or a bipartisan commission in administering 
elections, conducting redistricting, and policing the campaign finance 
system. Some states recently have adopted more nonpartisan models, 
including California's redistricting commission and Wisconsin's 
Government Accountability Board, although most states have retained 
partisan or bipartisan control.

This symposium, sponsored by the UC Irvine School of Law 
<http://law.uci.edu/>, the /UC Irvine Law Review 
<http://www.law.uci.edu/lawreview/index.html>/, and the UCI Center for 
the Study of Democracy <http://www.democracy.uci.edu/> will offer 
empirical, legal, normative, theoretical, and historical perspectives on 
the use of partisanship in the agencies governing election 
administration, redistricting, and campaign finance laws. How should the 
success or failure of such institutions be assessed? Are nonpartisan 
agencies normatively preferable to partisan and bipartisan agencies in 
achieving the goals of the political system? What explains why 
jurisdictions adopt or fail to adopt nonpartisan institutions? The 
symposium will bring together leading scholars in the field of election 
law and political science to consider such questions in the weeks 
leading up to the presidential election of 2012.


      FEATURED SPEAKERS

*Richard Briffault <http://www.law.columbia.edu/fac/Richard_Briffault>*
Columbia Law School

*Bruce Cain <http://berkeley.edu/news/extras/experts/cain.html>*
UC Berkeley

*Guy-Uriel Charles <http://www.law.duke.edu/fac/charles>*
Duke Law

*Karin MacDonald <http://swdb.berkeley.edu/contact.html>*
UC Berkeley
Statewide Database

*Christopher Elmendorf <http://www.law.ucdavis.edu/faculty/Elmendorf/>*
UC Davis School of Law
*Edward Foley <http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/electionlaw/faculty/foley.php>*
Ohio State University
Moritz College of Law

*Michael Franz <http://www.bowdoin.edu/faculty/m/mfranz/index.shtml>*
Bowdoin College

*Heather Gerken <http://www.law.yale.edu/faculty/HGerken.htm>*
Yale Law School

*Bernard Grofman <http://www.faculty.uci.edu/profile.cfm?faculty_id=2564>*
UC Irvine

*Richard Hasen <http://law.uci.edu/faculty/page1_r_hasen.html>*
UC Irvine School of Law
*Samuel Issacharoff 
<http://its.law.nyu.edu/facultyprofiles/profile.cfm?personID=23845>*
New York University School of Law

*Pamela Karlan <http://www.law.stanford.edu/directory/profile/32/>*
Stanford Law School

*David Kimball <http://www.umsl.edu/%7Ekimballd/>*
Univ. of Missouri-St. Louis

*Martha Kropf 
<http://politicalscience.uncc.edu/full-time-faculty-people-85/48-full-time-faculty/66-martha-kropf.html>*
Univ. of North Carolina, Charlotte
*Justin Levitt <http://www.lls.edu/academics/faculty/levitt.html>*
Loyola Law School
Los Angeles

*Daniel Lowenstein 
<http://www.law.ucla.edu/faculty/all-faculty-profiles/emeritiprofessors/Pages/daniel-hays-lowenstein.aspx>*
UCLA School of Law

*Peter Miller <http://www.polisci.uci.edu/polis_grad_profile/peterm>*
UC Irvine

*Jeff Milyo <http://economics.missouri.edu/people/milyo.shtml>*
Univ. of Missouri-Columbia

*Richard Pildes 
<http://its.law.nyu.edu/facultyprofiles/profile.cfm?personID=20200>*
New York University School of Law
*Douglas Spencer 
<http://www.law.berkeley.edu/php-programs/jsp/viewProfile.php?id=105>*
UC Berkeley
School of Law

*Jennifer Steen <https://webapp4.asu.edu/directory/person/1622079>*
Arizona State University

*Daniel Tokaji <http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/faculty/bios.php?ID=52>*
Ohio State University College of Law

*Martin P. Wattenberg 
<http://www.faculty.uci.edu/profile.cfm?faculty_id=2541>*
UC Irvine














On 6/14/2012 11:00 AM, Vladimir Kogan wrote:
>
> Rick calls for: "An election czar or board nominated by the president 
> and confirmed by a three-quarters vote of the U.S. Senate."
>
> Given the current judicial and FEC vacancies under the existing much 
> lower three-fifths filibuster threshold, it's hard to believe that 
> this model would work. As Jim Bopp points out, there would have to be 
> some provision to deal with what happens if there is deadlock, and 
> that provision would almost certainly favor one party over the other 
> in any given year. Which would give that side incentive to hold out 
> and prevent the appointment(s) from being filled.
>
> I think the California redistricting commission provides another 
> cautionary example: The process was designed -- to an absurd degree -- 
> to purge the commission from partisanship. Party leaders even had the 
> power to veto applicants. Yet Republicans are still convinced the 
> commission's maps stacked the deck to help Democrats (despite evidence 
> to the contrary).
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
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> Law-election at department-lists.uci.edu
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-- 
Rick Hasen
Chancellor's Professor of Law and Political Science
UC Irvine School of Law
401 E. Peltason Dr., Suite 1000
Irvine, CA 92697-8000
949.824.3072 - office
949.824.0495 - fax
rhasen at law.uci.edu
http://law.uci.edu/faculty/page1_r_hasen.html
http://electionlawblog.org
Pre-order The Voting Wars: http://amzn.to/y22ZTv
www.thevotingwars.com



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