Defense and Deference: Empirically Assessing Judicial Review of Freedom of Information Act s National Security Exemption

No. Panggil :	eja-21-0427
Nama Orang :	Perlin, Paula






Penerbitan :	[Place of publication not identified] : Ebsco - NAtional Security and Crime, 2020

Info Lainnya

Abstrak	Described by some scholars as the crown jewel of transparency, the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) allows the public to request records from executive agencies in order to provide insight into government activities and their legal justifications. To balance competing interests in public disclosure and government secrecy, FOIA also contains nine exemptions under which agencies may withhold requested information. However, FOIA s first exemption, which allows the government to withhold information properly classified by executive order in the interest of national defense or foreign policy, has proven nearly impenetrable. Despite congressional efforts to establish de novo review of withholdings under FOIA, many commentators suspect that courts rubberstamp the government s Exemption 1 arguments. This Article is the first to test that claim empirically. It systematically classifies agencies court submissions by quality and analyzes that quality s effects on case disposition. In this study, courts upheld the government s Exemption 1 claims despite substandard submissions 76.2% of the time, and submission quality did not impact case outcome in any statistically significant way. This finding implicates not only the effectiveness of FOIA, but also key pillars of the American legal tradition, such as the presumption of transparency, democratic principles, the legitimacy of the judicial process, and inter-branch checks on executive authority. The Article finally presents a probability reporting requirement as a novel and practically implementable solution that would not only encourage more meaningful judicial review, but would also incentivize the government to consider more carefully what information merits continued classification.
Entri Tambahan Nama Orang
001 Hak Akses (open/membership)	membership
Kata Kunci
ISSN
Tahun Terbit	2020
No. Induk	eja-21-0427
Entri Sumber Data	Ebsco - NAtional Security and Crime
Entri Utama Nama orang	Perlin, Paula
Volume, Nomor, Tahun dan Hlm.
Barcode	eja-21-0427
Subjek Topik
Judul Utama	Defense and Deference: Empirically Assessing Judicial Review of Freedom of Information Act s National Security Exemption
Kode Bahasa	eng
Sumber Koleksi	Perpustakaan Nasional