Professor Power was granted emeritus status in 2007. He continues as an active teacher and scholar teaching courses in constitutional law and legal history. The constitutional law course considers the provisions of the U.S. Constitution found in the Bill of Rights, the Fourteenth Amendment and Commerce Power that limit land use controls, environmental regulations and governmental exactions. The legal history seminar considers salient legal precedents affecting Baltimore and Maryland. The focus changes from year to year. Among the recent topics are The Administration of Justice in Baltimore during the Civil War, and Maryland Prize Court Decisions in the U.S. Supreme Court--1789-1856. The seminar has worked closely with the Maryland State Archives to make primary legal records (dockets, transcripts, depositions, etc.), accessible for historical study in a digital environment.

Throughout his career Professor Power has maintained an active research interest in the public regulation of water and land resources. During his early work while concentrating on the environmental law he prepared the first comprehensive legal study of the Chesapeake Bay and the first draft of the Maryland wetland law. This effort culminated in his co-authorship of the book Chesapeake Waters in 1983.

Professor Power’s more recent scholarship has considered both constitutional law and legal history. He has prepared both teaching materials and articles considering the constitutional limitations on governmental power. His historical work has resulted in a series of monographs considering the origins of the land system in Maryland and development of the City of Baltimore.

As President of Westminster Preservation Trust, Power directs the stewardship of the historic Westminster Burying Ground (the site of Edgar Allan Poe’s grave) and the operation of the restored 19th century Westminster Hall.

Books

Constitutional Limitations on Sovereignty (2014). Abstract

Constitutional Limitations on Land Use Controls, Environmental Regulations and Governmental Exactions (2d ed. 2013). Abstract

Constitutional Limitations on Land Use Controls, Environmental Regulations and Governmental Exactions (2008). Abstract

Chesapeake Waters: Pollution, Public Health and Public Opinion, 1607-1972 (1984; 2d ed. 1998) (with J. Capper & F. Shivers). Abstract

Book Chapters

Philip Perlman, in Yale Biographical Dictionary of American Law 423 (Roger K. Newman ed., 2009).

Regulatory Takings, in Encyclopedia of the Supreme Court of the United States (David S. Tanenhouse ed., 2008). Abstract

Deconstructing the Slums of Baltimore, in From Mobtown to Charm City: New Perspectives on Baltimore's Past 47 (Jessica I. Elfenbein et al. ed., 2002). Abstract

Chesapeake Bay Oysters: Legal Theses on Exotic Species, in Exotic Species in Mariculture 265 (Roger Mann ed., 1979) (with T. Lewis). Abstract

Articles

Requiem for Regulation, 44 Environmental Law Reporter 10923 (2014). Abstract

Legal History Seminar: Leading Maryland Cases, 53 American Journal of Legal History 454 (2013) (with Edward C. Papenfuse). Abstract

Property Rights, the "Gang of Four" and the Fifth Vote: Stop the Beach Renourishment, Inc. v. Florida Department of Environmental Protection (U.S. Supreme Court 2010), 21 Widener Law Journal 627 (2012). Abstract

Baltimore After the War of 1812: Where Robert Mills Met His Waterloo and When James A. Buchanan Broke the Bank (working paper, 2012). Abstract

Regulatory Takings: A Chronicle of the Construction of a Constitutional Concept, 23 Brigham Young University Journal of Public Law 221 (2009). Abstract

Calvert versus Carroll: The Quit-rent Controversy between Maryland's Founding Families (2005). Abstract

Meade v. Dennistone: The NAACP's Test Case to ". . . Sue Jim Crow Out of Maryland with the Fourteenth Amendment," 63 Maryland Law Review 773 (2004). Abstract

Palazzolo v. Rhode Island: Regulatory Takings, Investment-Backed Expectations, and Slander of Title, 34 Urban Lawyer 313 (2002). Abstract

Advocates at Cross-Purposes: The Briefs on Behalf of Zoning in the Supreme Court, 2 Journal of Supreme Court History 79 (1997). Abstract

The Residential Segregation of Baltimore's Jews: Restrictive Covenants or Gentlemen's Agreement?, 1996 Generations 5. Abstract

The Carpenter and the Crocodile, 91 Maryland Historical Magazine 4 (1996). Abstract

Public Service and Private Interests: A Chronicle of the Professional Life of Philip B. Perlman, 4 Journal of Southern Legal History 61 (1995-1996). Abstract

The Case of the 1989 Bordeaux, 44 Journal of Legal Education 434 (1994). Abstract

Parceling Out Land in the Vicinity of Baltimore: 1632-1796, Part I, 87 Maryland Historical Magazine 453 (1992); Part II, 88 Maryland Historical Magazine 150 (1993). Abstract

Apartheid Baltimore Style: The Residential Segregation Ordinances of 1910-1913, 42 Maryland Law Review 289 (1983), reprinted in A Property Anthology 161 (Richard Chused ed., 1993). Abstract

Multiple Permits, Temporary Takings and Just Compensation, 23 Urban Lawyer 449 (1991), reprinted in Zoning and Planning Law Handbook 233 (Kenneth Young ed., 1992). Abstract

Entail in Two Cities: A Comparative Study of Long Term Leases in Birmingham, England and Baltimore, Maryland 1700-1900, 9 Journal of Architecture and Planning Research 315 (1992). Abstract

The Advent of Zoning, 4 Planning Perspectives 1 (1989). Abstract

The Unwisdom of Allowing City Growth to Work Out Its Own Destiny, 47 Maryland Law Review 626 (1988). Abstract

Pyrrhic Victory: Daniel Goldman's Defeat of Zoning in the Maryland Court of Appeals, 82 Maryland Historical Magazine 275 (1987). Abstract

High Society: The Building Height Limitation on Baltimore's Mr. Vernon Place, 79 Maryland Historical Magazine 197 (1984). Abstract

The Fox in the Chicken Coop: The Regulatory Program of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, 63 Virginia Law Review 503 (1977). Abstract

The Federal Role in Coastal Development, in Federal Environmental Law (1974).

More about Oysters Than You Wanted to Know, 30 Maryland Law Review 199 (1970). Abstract

Estate Taxation of Charitable Remainders Subject to Powers of Diversion, 26 Maryland Law Review 304 (1966). Abstract

• Legal History Seminar: the Marshall Court 1801 - 1835