Law Professors

Morning Docket: 02.25.13

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* The horror! The horror! Sacrilege! Constitutional law nerds nationwide will weep at the very thought of someone suggesting that our country’s governing document be amended to abolish life tenure for Supreme Court justices. [Los Angeles Times]

* Quite frankly, it’s pretty amazing how quickly the preclearance section of the Voting Rights Act went from being seen by states as something that wasn’t “onerous” to being “arbitrary and burdensome.” That’s politics for you. [It's All Politics / NPR]

* Jim Woolery, an M&A superstar formerly of J.P. Morgan, has made the jump to Cadwalader after only two years at the bank. Upgrade or downgrade from his Cravath partnership? [Wall Street Journal (sub. req.)]

* Some law professors stop teaching classes to tend to their divorce proceedings, but other law professors teach classes from their hospital beds so their students aren’t thrown to the wolves. [Tex Parte / Texas Lawyer]

* It you want to be employed, make damn sure you nail your interview because “[t]he stakes are higher than ever” — fewer than 13 percent of permanent law jobs were obtained from OCI in 2011. [National Law Journal]

* Greenlight Capital’s case against Apple might have been perceived as a “silly sideshow” by some, but it looks like Judge Richard Sullivan of the S.D.N.Y. purchased front row tickets. [DealBook / New York Times]

* Speaking of silly sideshows, the DOJ recently joined the fray with Floyd Landis and his False Claims Act suit against Lance Armstrong. Perhaps it’s time for the disgraced biker to take his ball and go home. [Bloomberg]

* Alan Westin, privacy law scholar and professor emeritus of public law at Columbia, RIP. [New York Times]

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Non-Sequiturs: 02.22.13

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* In the E.D.N.Y., Pitbull prevailed over lovable, legal loser Lindsay Lohan. Lohan’s knack for the epic legal fail carried over to her attorney, Stephanie Ovadia, who was fined $750 for plagiarism by Judge Denis Hurley. [Billboard]

* Charles Fried is pretty sure Senator Ted Cruz is crazy for saying there was only one Republican on the Harvard Law faculty. But the joke’s on Fried… no one considers a Reagan appointee a Republican anymore, you silly goose! [New Yorker]

* Here are some outtakes from Michelle Olsen’s coverage of the D.C. Circuit (the main event, if you will, was published here). Sadly, unlike some outtake reels, the D.C. panel did not address the problem of snow blindness in cats. [Appellate Daily]

* Brian Leiter and Paul Campos had a little dispute. This article sums it up and has some interesting thoughts on just how little law professors care now about their own teaching methods. Don’t read this if you’re averse to honesty. [The Faculty Lounge]

* Fisticuffs erupt over messing with the thermostat. This is an official warning to the other ATL editors if that office is too hot next week… [LegalJuice]

* The whole “publish or perish” racket is rough. Bill Araiza needs a hug. [PrawfsBlawg]

* The ideological center of the U.S. House of Representatives is Staten Island. Woe to the Republic. [New York Daily News]

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The Dean’s Office: Three Questions About Legal Education

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Ed. note: This is the latest installment of The Dean’s Office, a series of posts on legal education by Dean David Yellen of the Loyola University Chicago School of Law. You can read the first post here.

The winds of change are swirling around legal education. Many of the critical challenges we are facing today involve the following three factors: capacity, cost, and quality. Are there too many law students, law schools, or both? Why is law school so expensive? Are law schools doing an adequate job of preparing students for their careers? (Note: I have explored these issues in a little more detail in recent posts at The Faculty Lounge.)

The first decade of this century was a boom time for law schools. From 2000 – 2010, first year law school enrollment increased around 20%, from 43,000 to 52,000. The number of ABA accredited schools went from 183 to 200. Jobs seemed plentiful in the first half of the decade, there were strategic advantages to growth and many universities felt it was prestigious to add a law school. Since 2010, the number of applicants has tumbled about 40%. First year enrollment dropped to 44,000 this year. In the fall of 2013, as few as 40,000 students will enroll, representing the smallest number since the 1970’s.

This decline in enrollment is a good thing, given the job market. Fewer than 60% of the class of 2011 had permanent, full-time jobs requiring a JD nine months after graduation. The Bureau of Labor Statistics is projecting around 22,000-25,000 lawyer jobs per year, counting growth and attrition.

These numbers are certainly not the whole story….

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Non-Sequiturs: 02.20.13

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* Palestinian prisoners are smuggling spooge out of prison to make babies on the outside. The article raises some fascinating legal and ethical questions, but thankfully fails to explain the logistics of the scheme. [Bill of Health / Harvard Law Petrie-Flom Center]

* Florida is looking into the question of whether judges and attorneys can be Facebook friends. But it’s so useful to have real-time feedback of which arguments that judge is going to “Like.” [IT-Lex]

* The government has indicted a lawyer on charges of bankrolling a synthetic marijuana operation. So real-life Kentucky is just like Justified Kentucky. [USA Today]

* The defense of Oscar Pistorius springs back and has a good day. [Deadspin]

* This article about KU Law Professor Stephen Ware’s arrest on domestic abuse charges sounds bad, but he’s actually a hero for putting together an elaborate and interactive issue-spotting exam for his final. [6 News Lawrence]

* This will be fun. What are the weirdest constitutional arguments ever asserted in court? [Volokh Conspiracy]

* Former Senator Pete Dominici admits that he’s the father of Vegas lawyer Adam Laxalt of Lewis and Roca. While a Senator for New Mexico, Dominici was nailing the daughter of Nevada Senator Paul Laxalt… just to be neighborly. [Reno Gazette-Journal]

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Morning Docket: 02.15.13

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* What to do when your federal agency’s website has been hacked by Anonymous and you’re unable to post a major report online for public dissemination? Well, just ask a law professor to do it for you on his blog; that’s not embarrassing, not at all. [WSJ Law Blog]

* The many victims of the Deepwater Horizon disaster can now rejoice, because yesterday, Transocean pleaded guilty to violating the Clean Water Act, and will pay the second-largest environmental fine in United States history to the tune of $400 million. [CNN]

* Money takes flight: eleventy billion Biglaw firms are behind the beast that is this awful airline merger, but taking the lead are lawyers from Weil Gotshal for AMR and Latham & Watkins for US Airways. [Am Law Daily]

* After questioning the validity of one of the NBA players union’s contracts, Paul Weiss is withholding details about it thanks to the government’s intrusion. Way to block nepotism’s alleged slam dunk. [New York Times]

* “When is the last time you took the biggest financial institutions on Wall Street to trial?” Elizabeth Warren took the Socratic method to the Senate Banking Committee and she was applauded for it. [National Law Journal]

* If you liked it, then perhaps you should’ve put a ring on it, but not a Tiffany’s diamond engagement ring that you’ve purchased from Costco, because according to this trademark lawsuit, it may be a knockoff. [Bloomberg]

* “We feel very badly for Megan Thode.” A Pennsylvania judge ruled against the Lehigh student who sued over her grade of C+ because let’s be serious, did ANYONE AT ALL really think he wouldn’t do that?! [Morning Call]

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Non-Sequiturs: 02.14.13

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* Sadly, Ronald Dworkin has died at 81. [The Faculty Lounge]

* Oracle really really hopes the Federal Circuit has read Harry Potter. But of course they have, because… nerds. [Groklaw]

* A 16-year-old is suing her parents to keep her unborn baby, claiming her parents are forcing her to have an abortion. I’m sure she’s just hoping to get on the next season of Teen Mom. [KPLR 11]

* Snake-handling pastor has his snakes confiscated by Tennessee cops. I had to read this twice because I assumed it was a recap from last night’s Justified. [WSJ Law Blog]

* An interesting look at the false dichotomy between teaching and practice. It’s probably unfair, but all I kept thinking was, “those that can, do; those that can’t…” [PrawfsBlawg]

* Jeff Kurzon is taking a break from suing law schools to run for Congress. If elected, Staci expects an invitation to the next State of the Union. [Jeff Kurzon Blog]

* Overlawyered cites, presumably with disdain, a school district banning the use of a piece of playground equipment. I’m sympathetic to the school for two reasons: (1) when I was a kid, I broke my arm on a piece of playground equipment; and (2) take a look at the death trap of a machine they’re banning. [Overlawyered]

* TestMasters claims that individual posters have been sharing their materials for free. This case sounds an awful lot like what brought down Litchfield Law School. [Courthouse News Service]

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Behemoth Constitutional Law Class To Have Two Curves

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Are there no volunteers on the Columbia Law faculty?

Yesterday, we told you about a sticky situation at Columbia Law School. Professor Christina Duffy Ponsa, a constitutional law scholar, is going through divorce proceedings that have caused her to miss a number of classes. The school responded by dumping all of Professor Ponsa’s students into Professor Trevor Morrison’s Con Law class, creating a huge 200-person Con Law experience that bothered many students.

The Columbia Student Senate formally requested that Columbia replace Ponsa with another qualified professor instead of merging sections.

It seems that no Columbia Law professor was willing to step up and alleviate the overcrowded situation, but after our story went up, the administration did make some concessions to student concerns. And while it seems to me that the administration is fumbling the ball here by not finding one faculty member (or Justice Ginsburg) willing to step in and help out a colleague with some personal issues, students and tipsters have heaped a whole lot of blame on Professor Ponsa’s allegedly wild personal life for putting herself (and her students) in this situation in the first place….

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Conservative Law Professor Who Sued School Busted For Drinking And Idling

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Personally, I think it would be more dangerous for Teresa Wagner to get drunk and file a lawsuit than it is for her to do what she’s charged with doing a couple of days ago.

Wagner has sued Iowa Law School for First and Fourteenth Amendment violations. We’ve talked about her because she argues that Iowa Law didn’t hire her as a faculty member because of her conservative views.

Iowa Law claims that she wasn’t hired because she wasn’t qualified.

Iowa City Police allege that she wasn’t very conservative when it came to drinking and then driving a few blocks from her home….

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Columbia Con Law Debacle Creates 200-Person Class That Angers Students

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This is what a Con Law class at Columbia Law looks like.

In our Above the Law Career Center, Columbia Law School boasts a 9.2:1 student faculty ratio. That’s a bit high, but fairly average, but there’s no denying that Columbia is a big school in a big city. It still manages to sport a 94 percent employment rate, according to Law School Transparency. In general, the school does well by its students.

But the administration is not doing a great job right now. One of the school’s Constitutional Law professors cannot perform her duties three weeks into the semester. The school’s solution has been to create one behemoth Con Law class that seems to help no one.

It’s kind of amazing that a school that is widely thought to be one of the top five law schools in the nation doesn’t have one spare Constitutional Law professor on hand who can step up in a pinch….

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Morning Docket: 02.13.13

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‘That’s just our special sauce!’

* Six Supreme Court justices attended last night’s State of the Union address, and although it was all hugs and kisses and handshakes to start off with, some looked as if they were due for naptime by its end (coughRBGcough). [Blog of Legal Times]

* It’s a clash of the Biglaw titans! In a face off between legal heavyweights, the Second Circuit has set aside time to hear arguments from Ted Olson and David Boies in the Argentine bondholder case. [Thomson Reuters News & Insight]

* Dewey know if this document specialist’s Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act lawsuit has got any legs to it? It certainly must, because Judge Martin Glenn very recently denied the failed firm’s motion to dismiss it. [Am Law Daily]

* Congratulations to Paulette Brown of Edwards Wildman Palmer. This Jersey girl is the uncontested nominee for ABA president in 2015, making her the first minority woman to hold the title. [New Jersey Law Journal]

* Send in the clowns (or loads of O’Melveny and Akin lawyers): Apple’s CEO, Tim Cook, has a low opinion of David Einhorn’s Greenlight Capital lawsuit, referring to it as nothing more than a “silly sideshow.” [Reuters]

* “It is up to us in the academy to prepare our students for the future no matter what it holds.” Dean Frank Wu of UC Hastings seems to be on the right track when it comes to necessary law firm reforms. [Huffington Post]

* Poor, poor Teresa Wagner. She was allegedly denied a job because of her conservative views, and her case ended in a mistrial. That kind of a thing could drive a woman to drink… and drive. [Iowa City Press Citizen]

* Not only does Lehigh University ruin every college basketball bracket in the nation, but it also provides great “I’m suing you because of my crappy grades” fodder. Oh my God, I really miss you, Lehigh! [Morning Call]

* Thanks to the wisdom of the Ninth Circuit, we now know that, at least in Washington, a spit-laden hamburger from Burger King is grounds for emotional distress damages. Ugh, that’s nasty! [WSJ Law Blog (sub. req.)]

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