Aaron Landau

@[email protected]
203 Followers
229 Following
52 Posts
I'm a civil appellate attorney in Oregon. I'm also an instructor at the University of Oregon School of Law, and I post a regular series of "Appellate Nibs" about legal writing and oral argument.
Firm Websitehttps://harrang.com/person/j-aaron-landau/
Aaron LandauJan 4, 2023
If you’re following the House Speaker snafu, this is fun: Under Art. IV, incoming members can’t vote until sworn in—which the Speaker does. But there’s no Speaker until members vote to select one, and no House rules until they vote to adopt some—which, until sworn in, they can’t do. So how can anything happen at all? Here's Matt Tait's (@Pwnallthethings) outstanding, short dive into what’s basically governmental assembly code. So nerdy, so good. https://www.pwnallthethings.com/p/the-house-has-no-members-and-the
The House has No Members and the Bootstrapping of Power

Over at Dog Shirt Daily—the awfully named, but otherwise great daily publication by Ben Wittes—Ben has a really interesting question that he proceeds quickly to not answer: does the House have any Representatives? The motivation for his question is this post by Adam Kinzinger

PwnAllTheThings
Aaron LandauJan 1, 2023
@agiletortoise The best kind of list to find: half stuff I already know and like, half I’ve never heard of.
Aaron LandauJan 1, 2023
@marcelias Good work. Glad not to see Oregon on that list! Turns out it works to make registration and voting easy and accessible.
Show threadAaron LandauDec 29, 2022
@RMFifthcircuit That looks really clever—and a lot simpler than the counter-mount systems I’ve seen advertised everywhere this year. I’m intrigued.
Aaron LandauDec 28, 2022
I’m really impressed with the work @marcelias’s firm has done in voting rights litigation. Partisan stuff aside, I think it’ll have a lasting positive impact on election mechanics. (And as a lawyer who gets to play in the #electionlaw sandbox in Oregon, it’s especially interesting. Our vote-by-mail is universal and registration is all but automatic, so we avoid lots of the problems other states face, and most disputes concern what’s on the ballot.) Good work, all. https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/12/21/democrats-elias-elections-00073595
Why Marc Elias Wants to ‘Babysit’ the Republican Party

After Trump attempted to use the courts to change the results of the 2020 election, many Republicans borrowed a page from that playbook. Now Democrats — with the aid of one powerful D.C. law firm — are mounting a counteroffensive.

POLITICO
Aaron LandauDec 26, 2022
@MattHodges Me too. Ever since QTs began on Twitter, I wanted a keyword filter that would block only those posts in which the first word is “Imagine”.
Aaron LandauDec 23, 2022

One more #FollowFriday rec, in line with “tell me one person and why”:

If you dig tech policy issues (privacy, IP, programming, cultural geekery, etc) but not how seriously tech policy folks tend to take themselves, Parker Higgins (@xor) is a great follow. Insights and dad-jokes of the highest order. He’s also the brains behind the delightful @pomological, my all-time fav bot account. (And he’s a stellar crossword constructor to boot.)

Aaron LandauDec 23, 2022

For #FollowFriday, long handle-lists can be a blur. I love to see folks describe the “why” behind who they recommend. Here’s one of mine:

James Emmons (@IntlLawGnome) is a sharp attorney and an active booster of interesting content, but who still makes time for thoughtful commentary of his own. If you drink up law and public policy, James’ feed is a firehose. If I had to slim my feed to 10 people, he’d probably be among them.

Show threadAaron LandauDec 21, 2022
@rohan As someone with no dog in this fight at all: Is there not a good-faith argument that the “coin” is outside the agencies’ lawful authority? Seems like even the proponents of the idea are comfortable acknowledging that it isn’t what congress had in mind.
Aaron LandauDec 19, 2022

#Appellate Nibs No. 4: Oral argument is a listening exercise.

You’re writing a brief. How amazing would it be to magically peek inside your judges’ minds and learn what they really think of your arguments? To know which issues they see as problematic? To learn where they’re already persuaded, so you can focus on what matters?

You can! …at the podium. That’s why, at argument, it's so important to listen. To inquire. To treat it as a conversation. And to never say, “I’ll get there, but first…”