The Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995¹ (PRA) seeks to “minimize the paperwork burden … resulting from the collection of information by or for the Federal Government,” and “ensure the greatest possible public benefit from and maximize the utility of information created, collected, maintained, used, shared and disseminated by or for the Federal Government.”² Other purposes of the act include coordinating government information resources, improving the “quality and use of Federal information to strengthen decision-making, accountability, and openness in Government and society,” minimizing costs to government of gathering, maintaining and using information, and ensuring that information is handled in ways consistent with federal laws related to privacy, security and access.

The Federalist Society's Administrative Law & Regulation Practice Group hosted this panel discussion on the Breakdown of the Public-Private Distinction: Implications for the Administrative State at the 2009 National Lawyers Convention on Saturday, November 14, 2009. Panelists included Mr. David Berenbaum, Executive Vice President of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition; Mr. David G. Leitch, Group Vice President and General Counsel for Ford Motor Company; Prof. J.W. Verret, Assistant Professor of Law at George Mason University School of Law; Prof. David Zaring, Assistant Professor of Legal Studies and Business Ethics at The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania; and Hon. Ronald A. Cass, President of Cass & Associates, PC, as the moderator.

In a 1992 case, Quill v. North Dakota, that dealt with a catalog mail-order company, the Supreme Court held that vendors cannot be required to collect sales taxes in states where they have no physical presence.  The Court explained that to require these companies to comply with various state and local sales tax rules and regulations would create a burden on interstate commerce, and since then the ruling has been applied to all remote vendors.  Although the Court did recognize that Congress has the authority to enact legislation that would require all retailers to collect state and local sales taxes, Congress has refused to extend sales tax collection to online retailers.  Should Congress enact uniform sales tax rules and definitions that would require online and catalog retailers to collect sales taxes?  Can existing state efforts to coordinate and minimize the burdens of sales tax laws (known as the Streamlined Sales and Use Tax Agreement project) effectively eliminate the Court’s concerns and persuade Congress to act?  Our speakers address these and other issues.

Senators Charles Grassley and Max Baucus began the current debate over college and university endowments in May 2007 with a letter to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulsen.  The letter raised a simple but profound issue: when should a school or other charity have to spend more of its endowment in order to remain tax-exempt?  By merely raising this issue, the senators challenged long-standing laws that had left this decision to the discretion of colleges and universities.  Leading institutions with large endowments such as Harvard, Stanford, and Yale responded quickly by expanding their financial aid programs.  Even the current economic downturn, which hit endowments particularly hard, did not deter members of Congress from holding a public roundtable in fall 2008 to address this issue, nor did it deter congressional proposals to standardize reporting of financial aid, impose stricter disclosure requirements in federal tax filings for schools, and require annual university endowment payout rates.  Although none of these proposals became law, members of Congress continue to pressure colleges and universities to justify their endowment spending rates, and the Internal Revenue Service has launched a detailed study of endowment investment and spending practices.  Prof. Lloyd Mayer of Notre Dame Law School addresses these and other issues.