Epps is a nationally recognized expert on the Supreme Court who is regularly quoted in the media. He has particular expertise in Supreme Court reform, where his work is influencing major policy debates.
A pioneering legal podcaster, he currently co-hosts (with William Baude) DividedArgument, a podcast that analyzes the Court’s decisions.
Epps is also an experienced Supreme Court litigator; his notable practice experience includes serving as co-counsel for the defendant in Ocasio v. United States, which addressed the scope of criminal conspiracy liability for public-sector extortion, and the successful petition for certiorari and merits briefing in Walden v. Fiore. He also served as co-counsel on the brief of Prof. Stephen E. Sachs as amicus curiae in Atlantic Marine Construction Co. v. U.S. District Court, which The Green Bag Almanac & Reader included on its list of “Exemplary Legal Writing” for 2013.
He clerked for Justice Anthony M. Kennedy of the Supreme Court of the United States.
The School of Law’s Dan Epps, along with his colleague Will Baude at the University of Chicago, discuss in a Q&A the new Supreme Court term and “Divided Argument,” their podcast analyzing the nation’s highest court.
If juries knew the consequences of their decisions, they’d deliberate more carefully — and could serve as a check on punitive laws, writes the School of Law’s Dan Epps.
Even small Supreme Court reforms could have larger benefits, writes Dan Epps, the Treiman Professor of Law. They put the justices on notice that elected officials are paying attention — and that those officials have the power to rein in a court that goes astray. In our democracy, that’s a healthy reminder for unelected Supreme Court justices to hear.
As President Biden announced plans to study reforms to the Supreme Court, School of Law faculty Dan Epps and Kyle Rozema discuss their academic article, Designing Supreme Court Term Limits, which examines how term limits might play out in practice.
The best argument for eliminating qualified immunity is less about deterrence and more about symbolism. Qualified immunity routinely requires courts to say that there will be no penalty for a police officer who has violated the Constitution. That sends the message — to officers and the public — that the police are above the law, writes Daniel Epps.
Reformers have rightly focused attention on many aspects of American criminal justice that are broken, writes Dan Epps. Some reforms are easier than others. Creating a defender general is an unusually simple one, with the potential to provide large benefits for millions of people.
Imposing term limits on justices who sit on the U.S. Supreme Court could bring significant changes to the nation’s highest court, suggests a forthcoming paper from two Washington University in St. Louis law professors.
Bad faith partisan arguments about state legislatures and election law may sound reasoned and eloquent, but they chip away at the rule of law — laying the groundwork for future strained arguments restricting the right to vote, banning democracy-enhancing initiatives such as voter-initiated redistricting commissions and (ultimately) overturning the results of free and fair elections.
Faculty experts from across Washington University in St. Louis draw upon their research, their instruction, their experience and their thought leadership to proffer insight and ideas for the new administration, the new beginning.
As Donald Trump prepares to leave the presidency Jan. 20 in the wake of being accused of fomenting the riot at the U.S. Capitol, he is reportedly considering an unprecedented move: the self-pardon. While no president has ever pardoned himself, the act might be more trouble than its worth for Trump, notes Dan Epps, a law professor at Washington University in St. Louis.
Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died Sept. 18, visited Washington University in St. Louis twice during her career — in 1979 and 2001. She met with students and faculty, lectured and even contributed journal articles to the Washington University Law Quarterly and Washington University Journal of Law & Policy. Faculty from the School of Law reflect on her long and influential career.
Daniel Epps, associate professor in the School of Law at Washington University in St. Louis, and Steven Smith, Kate M. Gregg Distinguished Professor of Social Science, weigh in on who has the most to lose before the election if a nomination is completed, how this situation differs from the Senate-stalled Merrick Garland nomination in 2016 and why the nomination system needs to change.
There are steps Congress might take that would strike an appropriate balance between victim’s interests, the need to protect essential services acting reasonably, and federalism values. Instead, this bill gives businesses a free pass at the expense of COVID-19’s victims. If passed into law, the bill would make it anything but safe for the country to go back to work.
There is no reason to be distraught about Supreme Court leaks. If anything, we should welcome the chance for the public to better understand how those who govern us — including judges — make their decisions.
In the end, the best argument for eliminating qualified immunity is less about deterrence and more about symbolism. Qualified immunity routinely requires courts to say that there will be no penalty for a police officer who has violated the Constitution. That is the wrong message.
Some reforms are easier than others. Creating a defender general is an unusually simple one, with the potential to provide large benefits for millions of people, given that it involves establishing only an office with two dozen employees.
The United States needs a “Defender General” — a public official charged with representing the collective interests of criminal defendants before the Supreme Court of the United States, argues a new article co-authored by Daniel Epps, professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis School of Law.
During the July 30 Democratic presidential debate, candidate Pete Buttigieg renewed his calls to “depoliticize the Supreme Court with structural reform.” Buttigieg has endorsed a Supreme Court reform proposal offered by Daniel Epps, associate professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis.
If Judge Brett Kavanaugh is confirmed to the Supreme Court, Republicans will have succeeded in a decades-long effort to take the courts in a more conservative direction. While they will surely celebrate this victory, the real loser in this partisan battle is not the other side — it’s the Supreme Court. And without radical reforms to save its legitimacy, the Court may never recover from its transformation into a nakedly partisan institution.
The city where I live and work has been roiled by protests after the acquittal of former city police officer Jason Stockley on first-degree murder charges for his 2011 shooting of Anthony Lamar Smith. Again, to many of us, the justice system seems unwilling to hold law-enforcement officers to account for violence against people of color.
Neil Gorsuch, President Donald Trump’s nominee to fill the vacant seat on the U.S. Supreme Court, has a strong commitment to rule of law values and is the best possible choice among the potential nominees that Trump circulated before the election, says a Supreme Court scholar at Washington University in St. Louis.
