“Saint George and the Dragon”: Courts and the Development of the Administrative State in Twentieth-Century America

In January 1938, James Landis, Dean of Harvard Law School, author of much of the New Deal's securities legislation, and a former member of the Securities and Exchange Commission, traveled to New Haven, Connecticut, to deliver the prestigious Storrs Lectures at Yale Law School. His subject was “The Administrative Process.” Of particular interest to Landis was defining the correct relationship between courts and the administrative state. According to Landis, the interaction between agencies and courts “gives a sense of battle.”1 He continued: “Here one is presented with decisions that speak of contest between two agencies of government— one, like St. George, eternally refreshing its vigor from the stream of democratic desires, the other majestically girding itself with the wisdom of the ages.”2