Ken MacVey has been a litigator and trial lawyer in private practice for over four decades. He started his legal career with the Federal Trade Commission where he did civil antitrust and consumer protection enforcement, including prosecuting industry wide antitrust cases involving the motion picture and record industries. He has published treatise chapters and numerous articles for lawyers and other specialists, and has served as a professor of practice at the university level. Ken is interested in all things legal. He also has an abiding interest in contemporary philosophy and its potential relevance to those outside the academic philosophy world. He is a graduate of UCLA School of Law and Occidental College. Email: [email protected].
by Ken MacVey Chief Justice Roberts in his 2005 confirmation hearing famously testified that as a Supreme Court justice his job was not to “pitch or bat” but to be an “umpire” calling “balls and strikes.” History since suggests otherwise. In collaboration with his conservative colleagues on the court, Roberts has been more like an…
by Ken MacVey The preamble of the US Constitution famously begins with the phrase “We the People”. Who, and how many, constituted this self-identified group? How well founded was this invocation of “We the People”? Let’s start by looking at the US population as a whole when the Constitution took effect in 1789. The Constitution…
by Ken MacVey You may not have heard of Brendan Carr—he is not exactly famous but with time he is getting better known, and you are likely to hear more about him in the coming months. Officially, he is the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, which licenses radio and television broadcast stations in the…
by Ken MacVey Now that Americans are celebrating the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, it is worth visiting its metaphysical foundations. Many don’t talk about “the metaphysics of the Declaration of Independence.” But the story about where this metaphysics has taken America and where it could take it can be both inspiring and…
by Ken MacVey The Heritage Foundation in its Project 2025 volume—a 900-page blueprint for a right-wing take-over of America—urged that the Comstock Act of 1873 be enforced to ban mifepristone, the so-called abortion pill. Justice Clarence Thomas last month ended up championing the Heritage Foundation’s cause. On May 1st, the Fifth Circuit US Court of…
by Ken MacVey Justice Clarence Thomas recently gave a speech at the University of Texas on the Declaration of Independence in anticipation of its 250th anniversary this coming July. In giving his take on the Declaration and its ties to the Constitution, Thomas interspersed autobiographical details with commentary on what he perceives to be America’s…
by Ken MacVey It has become harder to be a judge, especially when it comes to politically controversial cases handled by federal judges. President Trump, his cabinet members, and White House spokespersons have relentlessly shot off barrages of nasty, personal attacks on judges for making decisions Trump disapproves. One stand – out is Trump’s comment…
by Ken MacVey There are many things about who we are that we take for granted yet can still find mysterious. Why do we sleep? Why do we dream? Why do we sing and dance? Why do we laugh? Another, perhaps, is why do we get angry at inanimate objects? You might pinch your finger…
by Ken MacVey Several years ago I was the moderator of a bar association debate between John Eastman, then dean of Chapman University School of Law, and a dean of another law school. The topic was the Constitution and religion. At one point Eastman argued that the promotion of religious teachings in public school classrooms…
by Ken MacVey The Supreme Court’s power does not rest on brute force but on the power of authority. This power of authority heavily rests upon public perception of the Supreme Court’s legitimacy as a fair and impartial arbiter of the law. That perception has seriously eroded. With its current case docket that will address…
by Ken MacVey Donald Trump has creatively explored ways to monetize the presidency. These include launching the $TRUMP crypto business a few days before resuming office on January 20, 2025 or using Truth Social–a private business venture he helped start– to platform his presidential and personal pronouncements. Monetization began early in the first Trump administration…
by Ken MacVey The full title of Charles Dickens’ 1843 classic is “A Christmas Carol in Prose: Being a Ghost Story for Christmas.” Inspired by a report on child labor, Dickens originally intended to write a pamphlet titled “An Appeal to the People of England on behalf of the Poor Man’s Child.” But this project…
by Ken MacVey When promoting her new book in September, Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett stated in an interview as quoted in Politico : “I think the Constitution is alive and well.” She went on – “I don’t know what a constitutional crisis would look like. I think that our country remains committed to…
by Ken MacVey In my last two columns, I raised issues about certain versions of right-wing libertarianism. In my column “How Yard Sales Could Explain the Rise of Billionaires and Challenge Libertarian Thinking” I argue that the “yard sale model” developed by mathematicians and physicists to explain wealth inequality presents a provocative challenge to philosopher…
by Ken MacVey There are many causes of Trump’s double ascent as president, including, perhaps just randomness, such as Comey’s re-opening of the FBI investigation of Hillary Clinton 11 days before the 2016 election supposedly based on a belatedly discovered laptop. But it can be argued there were a number of background features in our…
by Ken MacVey By many measures wealth inequality in the US and globally has increased significantly over the last several decades. The number of billionaires has increased at a staggering rate. Since 1987, Forbes has systematically verified and counted the global number of billionaires. In 1987, Forbes counted 140. Two decades later Forbes tallied a…
by Ken MacVey Since 1914, the Federal Trade Commission ‘s mission has been to enforce civil antitrust and unfair competition/consumer protection laws. The question is whether this mission has been supplanted—whether the FTC under Trump 2 .0 is becoming the Federal Political Truth Commission. My Background: The FTC Investigates the Movie and Record Industries Many…
by Ken MacVey One argument for the existence of a creator /designer of the universe that is popular in public and academic circles is the fine-tuning argument. It is argued that if one or more of nature’s physical constants as mathematically accounted for in subatomic physics had varied just by an infinitesimal amount, life would…
by Ken MacVey Many have talked about Trump’s war on the rule of law. No president in American history, not even Nixon, has engaged in such overt warfare on the rule of law. He attacks judges, issues executive orders that are facially unlawful, coyly defies court orders, humiliates and subjugates big law firms to his…
by Ken MacVey Do corporations have free will? Do they have legal and moral responsibility for their actions? Many argue that legal and moral responsibility must rest on free will. If there is no free will there cannot be such a thing as legal or moral responsibility. But consider these two questions and their potential …