From: Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com>
Date: Mon, 22 Dec 1997 08:53:52 +0800
To: cypherpunks@cyberpass.net
Subject: Building Pro-Monopoly Judges
Message-ID: <v03007807b0c3627251e3@[204.254.22.15]>
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[Hmm. Apparently Charles is reluctant to defend his position here on
cypherpunks. Small surprise. --Declan]

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Date: Sun, 21 Dec 1997 18:49:41 -0500 (EST)
Reply-To: cmueller@metrolink.net
Originator: am-info@essential.org
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From: charles mueller <cmueller@metrolink.net>
To: Multiple recipients of list <am-info@essential.org>
Subject: Building Pro-Monopoly Judges

        Declan McCullagh, still displaying a reluctance to debate with
graciousness (below), now wonders if I've heard of the Federalist Society.
"PS: I wonder if Mueller knows about the Federalist Society, which is a
group of libertarian-leaning lawyers and law professors. Among other things,
they make a point of educating judges about (gasp!) economic theory and this
concept of a government strictly limited in its powers..."

        I've been reporting on this propaganda mill for roughly 2 decades--
and have published hundreds of pages on it.  (See my January post on the
subject, below.)

        Charles Mueller, Editor
        ANTITRUST LAW & ECONOMICS REVIEW
        http://webpages.metrolink.net/~cmueller

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>
>>Return-Path: <antitrust@essential.org>
>>Date: Wed, 15 Jan 1997 19:04:50 -0500 (EST)
>>Errors-To: antitrust-owner@essential.org
>>Reply-To: cmueller@metrolink.net
>>Originator: antitrust@essential.org
>>Sender: antitrust@essential.org
>>From: cmueller@metrolink.net (cmueller)
>>To: Multiple recipients of list <antitrust@essential.org>
>>Subject: GMU's "Law & Economics Center"
>>X-Listprocessor-Version: 6.0c -- ListProcessor by Anastasios Kotsikonas
>>
>>        Perhaps I can add some information on the "Law & Economics Center"
>>at George Mason.  My journal first reported on its teach-in with the federal
>>judges in 1981 (Vol. 13, No. 3, pp. 70-71) and the following year I
>>physically visited the University of Miami campus (where it was then housed)
>>and did extensive interviews with several of the Center's people.  Those
>>interviews, plus another interview series I did at Emory University in
>>Atlanta when the Center moved there, and finally at George Mason itself
>>after the 3rd move, fill a number of my issues, beginning with Vol. 14, No.
>>2 (1982).  I've also reported on a couple of the legal challenges
>>(unsuccessful) to the Center's indoctrination of the federal judges.
>>        For example, U.S. District Judge Spencer Williams presided over a
>>predatory pricing case against ITT Continental Baking (Wonder Bread) some
>>years back.  The day after the jury began its deliberations, Judge Williams
>>left San Francisco to begin attendance at a 2-week "economics" seminar
>>presented by the Law & Economics Center at the Royal Biscayne Hotel in
>>Miami.  While he was gone, his jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff in
>>the amount of $5 million which, under the law, he was bound to triple to $15
>>million.  Instead, he returned from Florida, overturned the jury's verdict,
>>and wrote a letter to Henry Manne in Miami that read in part as follows:
>>"As a result of my better understanding of the concept of marginal cost, I
>>have recently set aside a $15 million antitrust verdict.  I will send you a
>>copy of the memorandum [opinion] as soon as it is prepared."  (See my
>>journal, Vol. 17, No. 2 (1985), p. 13.)
>>        Nan Aron and her colleagues at the Alliance for Justice in
>>Washington published a monograph on the subject--Justice for Sale In
>>America--in 1993 and I reprinted the key chapters in my journal, beginning
>>with Vol. 24, No. 3 (1993).  For earlier background, see Fortune, May 21,
>>1979; Washington Post, January 20, 1980; and The Nation, January 26, 1980.
>>        Put simply, this "Center" is a right-wing propaganda mill
>>masquerading as a purveyor of academic "economics."  The "teachers" have
>>been Harold Demsetz and others from the University of Chicago and its major
>>academic outposts (paid at an hourly rate commensurate with the up to $600
>>per hour commanded by George Stigler and the others as antitrust "experts"
>>in court).  No opposing economists have ever been allowed to appear before
>>the judges.  When I asked the Center's people why they didn't permit
>>distinguished non-Chicago economists to share the podium at these judicial
>>teach-ins, they laughed and said, "Let them go start their OWN seminars for
>>the judges!"
>>        I asked to be allowed to just sit in as an OBSERVER with the judges
>>and/or the 200 antitrust law professors (who have been run through a similar
>>indoctrination program) and Henry Manne himself responded to my request (by
>>telephone), No, "We keep it all in the family."  (Manne, who had been a law
>>professor at the University of Rochester, founded the "Center" in 1974 at
>>the University of Miami, then moved it to Emory and finally to George Mason.
>>A federal judge--Judge Hoffman, as I recall--helped him get the approval of
>>the judiciary's executive body in Washington, headed by the Chief Justice of
>>the Supreme Court.  The money to finance these sessions at luxury resorts
>>(mostly at Key Biscayne and other Florida beach towns) was originally gotten
>>directly from  Fortune 500 companies who had experienced the sting of
>>antitrust prosecution; in response to some criticism of that obvious
>>conflict of interest, Manne, with some creative accounting, arranged it so
>>that the seminars for the judges themselves--in 1981, the cost was $5,000
>>per judge per 2-week seminar--were thereafter paid for exclusively by the
>>corporate foundations, e.g., Schaife, Olin, etc., rather than by active
>>firms that frequently appear before the judges as antitrust defendants.
>>With this accounting twist, the judiciary gave its full blessing to the
>>operation.)
>>        I also did an interview with a federal appeals judge in Washington
>>(DC Circuit).  He saw nothing wrong with Manne's program, even assuming it
>>was pure propaganda designed specifically to bias the federal judiciary
>>against the antitrust laws and in favor of corporate monopoly.  Why?  (1)
>>First, he said, judges are, by the nature of their work, "immune" to
>>propaganda of all kinds.  They hear so much argument on so many sides of
>>every issue that it's simply impossible to "bias" them via argument.  (2)
>>Second, he told me, federal judges have every RIGHT to be as intellectually
>>"biased" as they like and to DEVELOP those intellectual biases with the help
>>of WHOEVER they please.
>>        For example, he said, suppose I go to the beach for a weekend with 3
>>volumes of Karl Marx's writings in my briefcase.  I find Marx so persuasive
>>that I come back to my chambers on Monday, throw away an opinion I had just
>>written on one of the cases before me, and proceed to write a new one
>giving my
>>decision to the opposite party.  Karl Marx "biased" me to change my
>>decision.  He had every right to do it--and I had every right to LET him
>>do it.
>>        George Mason University law school and its economics department
>>aren't scholarly enterprises at all; they're hired propagandists, awash in
>>corporate money awarded precisely for the purpose of making a contrived
>>"economic" case for laissez-faire monopoly.  They get away with it for one
>>reason and one reason only:  Manne's operation had the approval of Reagan's
>>Justice Department (rember Ed Meese?) and now it has the blessing of
>>Clinton's.  All it would take to bring it to a halt would be a couple of
>>speeches by, say, the Attorney General and, if necessary, by Clinton
>>himself.  If Justice treated it as the outrage that it plainly is, the
>>press--and the ensuing public condemnation--would purge the judiciary of
>>this 20-year scandal within a matter of weeks.
>>        Charles Mueller, Editor
>>        ANTITRUST LAW & ECONOMICS REVIEW
>>        http://www.metrolink.net/~cmueller/
>>
>>
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