  We argue through a combination of slave boson mean field theory and the Bethe
ansatz that the ground state of closely spaced double quantum dots in parallel
coupled to a single effective channel are Fermi liquids. We do so by studying
the dots' conductance, impurity entropy, and spin correlation. In particularly
we find that the zero temperature conductance is characterized by the Friedel
sum rule, a hallmark of Fermi liquid physics, and that the impurity entropy
vanishes in the limit of zero temperature, indicating the ground state is a
singlet. This conclusion is in opposition to a number of numerical
renormalization group studies. We suggest a possible reason for the
discrepancy.
