How to Steer an Ocean Liner

13 Pages Posted: 18 Sep 2016

Date Written: 2014

Abstract

Steering an ocean liner or supertanker is reportedly very difficult; the vessel itself is unwieldy, and there are many fast-changing problems to navigate through or around, including inclement weather, ocean currents, and shoals of various sorts. Steering the rulemaking process sounds easier, but it has recently been anything but. Mark Kravitz proved himself a master of that difficult task during a time of considerable stress on the rulemaking process and set an agenda that has guided us, and will probably continue to guide us, for years to come. It is worth emphasizing that rulemaking has been under stress before, while also avoiding the temptation to overstate the challenges it faces now. More than twenty years ago, Professor Mullenix foresaw that the Advisory Committee might "go the way of the French aristocracy"' and suggested that the rulemaking process might become "a quaint, third branch vestigial organ. Meanwhile, some predicted that what the rulemakers were doing would wreak havoc unless they were reined in. For example, in 1992 Nan Aron of the Alliance for Justice announced that the pending proposal to add initial disclosure in a new Rule 26(a) (1) "would end public-interest litigation as we know it." Well, Rule 26(a) (1) went through, and so far as I know public interest litigation did not end. But similar forebodings are being trumpeted today.

Suggested Citation

Marcus, Richard, How to Steer an Ocean Liner (2014). Lewis & Clark Law Review, Vol. 18, 2014, UC Hastings Research Paper No. 207, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2840025

Richard Marcus (Contact Author)

UC Law, San Francisco ( email )

200 McAllister Street
San Francisco, CA 94102
United States
415-565-4829 (Phone)
415-565-4865 (Fax)

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