Cornell Law professor Michael C. Dorf explores the legality and implications of prosecutors repeatedly presenting the same charges to multiple grand juries, in the context of the weak and potentially politically motivated prosecution of James Comey. Professor Dorf argues that the current legal framework undermines the Fifth Amendment’s Grand Jury Clause by allowing endless prosecutorial attempts to secure an indictment, and urges the Supreme Court to limit such practices unless new evidence is discovered, in order to preserve the grand jury’s function as a safeguard against governmental abuse.
Cornell law professor Michael C. Dorf discusses the double jeopardy question raised in Gamble v. United States, in which the US Supreme Court heard oral arguments last week, and explains how the extraordinary nature of the Trump presidency should inform judicial decision making. Building upon a point made in a 1985 Columbia Law Review article by Professor Vincent Blasi, Dorf argues that judges construing the Constitution and other legal texts in perilous times such as these should keep in mind that the rules they adopt will also operate in normal times.
