This week’s Legal Ethics Roundup highlights pressing issues at the intersection of law, ethics, and democracy. Former federal judges warn that DOJ lawyers under the Trump administration have misled courts, raising new questions about government …
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What If the Big Law Firms Hadn’t Caved to Trump?
This New Yorker article examines how major U.S. law firms responded to Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election and the broader implications for the legal profession. It argues that many elite firms, once …
Trump’s Attempt to Roll Back Key Civil Rights-Enforcement Tool
The ACLU is leading the fight to protect civil rights and challenge systemic inequality in housing, employment, education, and beyond. Recent actions by the Trump administration threaten decades of progress by rolling back disparate impact …
Chad: Constitutional Change Threatens Rule of Law and Democracy
Chad’s recent constitutional amendment abolishing presidential term limits marks a major setback for democracy and the rule of law. The reform, fast-tracked through parliament and signed by President Mahamat Idriss Déby, allows him to remain …
Defending Our Ideals in the Face of Adversity
In a powerful reflection, Suren Avanesyan shares his encounter with two leading Russian human rights lawyers, Vadim Prokhorov and Karina Moskalenko, who continue to defend political prisoners from exile. Their work before the European Court …
Satterthwaite, Sydow & Polk (2023). “Unchecking Power and Capturing Courts: How Autocratization Erodes Independent Judicial Systems”.
Satterthwaite, M. L., Sydow, K., & Polk, B. (2023). Unchecking Power and Capturing Courts: How Autocratization Erodes Independent Judicial Systems. Rutgers UL Rev., 76, 1147. The paper argues that courts have increasingly taken on legislative …
Mather & Levin (2022). “When and Why Do Lawyer Organizations Seek to Influence Law?”
Mather, Lynn and Levin, Leslie C., When and Why Do Lawyer Organizations Seek to Influence Law? (2022). Lawyers in 21st Century Societies: Volume 2 (2022), University at Buffalo School of Law Legal Studies Research Paper …
Khalil (2024). “This Country has Laws”: Legalism as a Tool of Entrenching Autocracy in Egypt.
Khalil, H. M. (2024). “This Country has Laws”: Legalism as a Tool of Entrenching Autocracy in Egypt. American Behavioral Scientist, 68(12), 1597-1615. https://doi.org/10.1177/00027642241267936 (Original work published 2024) This article investigates the role of legalism …
Trochev (2024). “Pliant Courts, Recalcitrant Chiefs and Judicial Clientelism in Authoritarian Regimes”.
Trochev, Alexei, ‘Pliant Courts, Recalcitrant Chiefs and Judicial Clientelism in Authoritarian Regimes’, in Björn Dressel, Raul Sanchez-Urribarri, and Alexander Stroh-Steckelberg (eds), Informality and Courts: Comparative Perspectives (Edinburgh, 2024; online edn, Edinburgh Scholarship Online, 18 Sept. 2025), https://doi.org/10.3366/edinburgh/9781399535250.003.0005, accessed 6 Oct. 2025. How and why …
Cummings (2025). “The Autocratic Legal Playbook”.
Cummings, Scott L., The Autocratic Legal Playbook (August 14, 2025). UCLA Law Review, Forthcoming, UCLA School of Law, Public Law Research Paper No. 25-31, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=5392409 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.5392409 This Article examines the development and rapid innovation …