Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

Professor of Law

Office: 3155 Eck Hall of Law
Phone: 574-631-8057
Fax: 574-631-8078
Email: lmayer@nd.edu
Staff Assistant: Alicia Cummins
CV: View
SSRN: View

Mayer's areas of research interest and expertise include advocacy by nonprofit organizations, the intersection of election law and tax law with respect to lobbying and other political activity, federal and state regulation of nonprofits (including churches and other religious organizations), and the role of nonprofits both domestically and internationally. 

Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer joined the faculty as an associate professor of law in 2005 and became a full professor in 2011. He served as the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs from 2011 to 2015. He earned his A.B., with distinction and honors, from Stanford University in 1989 and his J.D. from Yale Law School in 1994. While at Yale, he was a John M. Olin Fellow in Law and Economics and served as business editor of the Yale Law and Policy Review and as an editor of the Yale Journal on Regulation. Following graduation, he clerked for the Honorable Lowell A. Reed, Jr., United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. He then joined Caplin & Drysdale in Washington, D.C., first as an associate and later as a member, where he concentrated on tax issues, particularly for nonprofit organizations. He teaches courses at Notre Dame Law School in not-for-profit organizations, business enterprise taxation, election law, and professional responsibility.

 

Courses Taught

LAW70121, Not-For-Profit Organizations

LAW70369, Election Law

LAW70609, Taxation of Business Enterprises

LAW70808, Professional Responsibility

Scholarship

21st Century Churches and Federal Tax Law University of Illinois Law Review (co-authored with Ellen P. Aprill) (forthcoming 2024)

Charity Law & Blockchain Technology: Using Old Wineskins for New Wine?, 77 The Tax Lawyer (forthcoming 2024)

Nonprofits, Taxes, and Speech, Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review 1291 (2023)

Allocating State Authority Over Charitable Nonprofit Organizations, 70 UCLA L. Rev. Disc. 458 (2023)

Regulating Charitable Crowdfunding, 97 Indiana Law Journal 1375 (2022)

A Critical Problem Needing a Bolder Solution?: A Response to Atinuke O. Adediran's "Nonprofit Board Composition", 83 Ohio State Law Journal Online 74 (2022)

Public Benefit and Charitable Class, in Charity Law: Exploring the Concept of Public Benefit (Routledge 2022)

Searching for the Optimal Legal Limits on Charity Entrepreneurship, in The Cambridge Handbook of Law and Entrepreneurship in the United States (Cambridge University Press 2022)

Tax Exemption Is Not a Subsidy - Except for When It Is (with Ellen P. Aprill), 172 Tax Notes Federal 1887 (Sept. 20, 2021)

What Is Caesar's, What Is God's: Fundamental Public Policy for Churches, (with Zachary B. Pohlman), 44 Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy 145 (2021)

The Promises and Perils of Using Big Data to Regulate Nonprofits, 94 Washington Law Review 1281 (2019)

Fiduciary Principles in Charities and Other Nonprofits, in The Oxford Handbook of Fiduciary Law (Oxford University Press 2019)

When Soft Law Meets Hard Politics: Taming the Wild West of Nonprofit Political Involvement, 45 Journal of Legislation 194 (2019)

Creating a Tax Space for Social Enterprise, in The Cambridge Handbook of Social Enterprise Law (Cambridge University Press 2018). 

A (Partial) Defense of Section 501(c)(4)'s "Catchall" Nature, 21 NYU Journal of Legislation & Public Policy 439 (2018). 

Globalization Without a Safety Net: The Challenge of Protecting Cross-Border Funding of NGOs, 102 Minnesota Law Review 1205 (2018). 

Fragmented Oversight of Nonprofits in the United States: Does It Work? 91 Chicago-Kent Law Review 937 (2016). 

'The Better Part of Valour Is Discretion': Should the IRS Change or Surrender Its Oversight of Tax-Exempt Organizations? 7 Columbia Journal of Tax Law 80 (2016).

Nonprofits, Speech, and Unconstitutional Conditions, 46 Conn. L. Rev. 1045 (2014). 

Politics and the Public’s Right to Know, 13 Election Law Journal 138 (2014).

Taxing Social Enterprise (co-authored with Joseph R. Ganahl), 66 Stanford Law Review 387 (2014). 

Limits On State Regulation Of Religious Organizations: Where We Are And Where We Are Going, Columbia University Academic Commons (2013).

Nonprofits, Politics, and Privacy, 62 Case Western Res. L. Rev. 801 (2012).

The "Independent" Sector: Fee-for-Service Charity and the Limits of Autonomy, 65 VANDERBILT L. REV. 51-122 (2012).

NGO Standing and Influence in International Human Rights Courts, 36 BROOKLYN J. INT'L L. 911 (2011).

Charities and Lobbying: Institutional Rights in the Wake of Citizens United, 10 ELECTION L.J. 407-426 (2011).

Disclosures about Disclosure, 45 INDIANA L. REV. 255 (2010).

Regulating Philanthropy in the 21st Century, (with Brendan M. Wilson), 85 CHICAGO-KENT L. REV. 479 (2010).

Breaching a Leaking Dam?: Corporate Money and Elections, 4 CHARLESTON L. REV. 91 (2009) (Supreme Court Preview issue).

Politics at the Pulpit: Tax Benefits, Substantial Burdens, and Institutional Free Exercise, 89 BOSTON UNIV. L. REV. 1137 (2009).

The Pulpit, the Pew, and Politics, in BOSTON COLLEGE LAW SCHOOL LAW & RELIGION PROGRAM, ELECTING FAITH: THE INTERSECTION OF LAW AND RELIGION IN POLITICS AROUND THE WORLD (2009) (symposium publication)

Serving on a Nonprofit Board: Legal and Ethical Duties in an Age of Accountability, as an appendix in JOHN TROPMAN & THOMAS J. HARVEY, NONPROFIT GOVERNANCE: THE WHY, WHAT, AND HOW OF NONPROFIT BOARDSHIP (Corby Books & University of Scranton Press, 2009)

What Is This "Lobbying" That We are So Worried About?, 26 YALE L. & POL'Y REV. 485 (2008).

Grasping Smoke: Enforcing the Prohibition on Campaign Intervention by Charities, 6 FIRST AMEND. L. REV. 1 (2007).

The Much Maligned 527 and Institutional Choice, 87 BOSTON UNIV. L. REV. 625 (2007).

The Legal Rules for Policy and Civic Impact by Foundations, in POWER IN POLICY: A FUNDER'S GUIDE TO ADVOCACY AND CIVIC PARTICIPATION (David F. Arons ed., 2007): 169-205.

Tax Issues for Private Foundations (with Douglas N. Varley), in COMPLETE GUIDE TO NONPROFIT ORGANIZATIONS (Penina Kessler Leiber and Donald R. Levy eds., 2005): 2-1 to 2-106

Political Activities of Tax-Exempt Organizations: Useful Guidance In Revenue Ruling 2004-6. 100 JOURNAL OF TAXATION 181 (2004).

Areas of Expertise

• Churches & Politics
• Election Law
• Federal Income Taxation
• Institutional Choice Theory
• Non-profit Organizations
• Taxation
• Tax Law & Policy