We are, once again, in the middle of a battle over the legitimacy of the administrative state. An increasingly vocal band of scholars criticizes administrative agencies as unaccountable, elitist, captured, and implementing bad policy. The more populist elements of the Trump Administration’s rhetoric have taken this critique to a broader audience, to great political effect. Though the picture is complex, the Roberts Court has appeared sympathetic to important aspects of the critique. Agencies enforcing civil rights laws — and particularly the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) — have been a principal target of the critics of the administrative state. With The Transformation of Title IX, R. Shep Melnick steps into this fight — and he takes the side of those who find OCR’s actions illegitimate. Melnick focuses particularly on three especially controversial contexts in which the courts and OCR have applied the statute: intercollegiate athletics, campus sexual harassment and assault, and the treatment of transgender students in elementary and secondary schools. He argues that OCR and the courts have, through a process of “institutional leapfrogging,” steadily adopted more and more intrusive rules governing educational entities. He contends that these rules are highly contestable and neither specifically required by the statutory text nor envisioned by the statute’s drafters. But, he argues, the leapfrogging process — in which the agency pushes forward, then the courts go a bit farther than the agency, then the agency goes even a bit farther, and so on — has enabled these massive innovations in the law to fly under the radar and evade democratic checks or debate. This piece reviews The Transformation of Title IX. The book offers an important take on some issues of high public salience. It reflects a detailed immersion in the operations of OCR, as well as a strong understanding of the legal-doctrinal issues. But the book’s thesis is fundamentally misguided. OCR has not subverted or evaded democracy. Rather, the agency has served as a catalyst for democratic debate, a forum in which that debate has played out, and an implementer of the will of the people. The Title IX experience rather supports the claim made by some scholars that administrative agencies can be a key locus of democratic deliberation over the scope of basic rights.

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这就是民主的样子：第九条和行政国家的合法性

我们再次陷入了对行政国家合法性的争夺之中。越来越多的学者批评行政机构不负责任、精英主义、被俘虏并执行糟糕的政策。特朗普政府言辞中更多的民粹主义元素将这种批评传播给了更广泛的受众，产生了巨大的政治影响。尽管情况复杂，罗伯茨法院似乎对批评的重要方面表示同情。执行民权法的机构——尤其是教育部民权办公室 (OCR)——一直是行政国家批评者的主要目标。随着 Title IX 的转变，R. Shep Melnick 加入了这场斗争——他站在那些认为 OCR 的行为不合法的人一边。梅尔尼克特别关注法院和 OCR 应用该法规的三个特别有争议的背景：校际体育、校园性骚扰和攻击，以及中小学跨性别学生的待遇。他认为，OCR 和法院通过“制度跨越”的过程，稳步采用了越来越多的侵入性规则来管理教育实体。他争辩说，这些规则具有很强的争议性，既不是法定文本的具体要求，也不是立法起草者所设想的。但是，他认为，跨越式的过程——机构向前推进，然后法院比机构走得更远，然后机构走得更远，等等 - 使这些大规模的法律创新能够在雷达下飞行并逃避民主检查或辩论。这篇文章回顾了第九条的转变。这本书对一些公众高度关注的问题提供了重要的看法。它反映了对 OCR 操作的详细沉浸，以及对法律理论问题的深刻理解。但是这本书的论点从根本上被误导了。OCR 并没有颠覆或逃避民主。相反，该机构充当了民主辩论的催化剂、辩论进行的论坛以及人民意志的执行者。第九条的经验反而支持了一些学者的主张，即行政机构可以成为对基本权利范围进行民主审议的关键场所。这篇文章回顾了第九条的转变。这本书对一些公众高度关注的问题提供了重要的看法。它反映了对 OCR 操作的详细沉浸，以及对法律理论问题的深刻理解。但是这本书的论点从根本上被误导了。OCR 并没有颠覆或逃避民主。相反，该机构充当了民主辩论的催化剂、辩论进行的论坛以及人民意志的执行者。第九条的经验反而支持了一些学者的主张，即行政机构可以成为对基本权利范围进行民主审议的关键场所。这篇文章回顾了第九条的转变。这本书对一些公众高度关注的问题提供了重要的看法。它反映了对 OCR 操作的详细沉浸，以及对法律理论问题的深刻理解。但是这本书的论点从根本上被误导了。OCR 并没有颠覆或逃避民主。相反，该机构充当了民主辩论的催化剂、辩论进行的论坛以及人民意志的执行者。第九条的经验反而支持了一些学者的主张，即行政机构可以成为对基本权利范围进行民主审议的关键场所。以及对法律理论问题的深刻理解。但是这本书的论点从根本上被误导了。OCR 并没有颠覆或逃避民主。相反，该机构充当了民主辩论的催化剂、辩论进行的论坛以及人民意志的执行者。第九条的经验反而支持了一些学者的主张，即行政机构可以成为对基本权利范围进行民主审议的关键场所。以及对法律理论问题的深刻理解。但是这本书的论点从根本上被误导了。OCR 并没有颠覆或逃避民主。相反，该机构充当了民主辩论的催化剂、辩论进行的论坛以及人民意志的执行者。第九条的经验反而支持了一些学者的主张，即行政机构可以成为对基本权利范围进行民主审议的关键场所。