Law Schools

Roy Moore Was A Complete Joke In Law School Too

If you're confused how Roy Moore could ever graduate from law school, his professors and classmates are with you.

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“He was Looney Tunes from the beginning….” So says Crawford Melton, an Alabama attorney who went to law school with Alabama senatorial candidate Roy Moore. That’s a ringing endorsement! Moore, the judge twice removed from the bench for his inability to see an established ethical code he can’t breach, is likely to win that Senate seat soon.

In the New Yorker, Charles Bethea has a fantastic oral history of Roy Moore’s years at the University of Alabama School of Law, speaking to multiple classmates and professors about Moore. The big takeaway? Not a single person Bethea spoke to — including the Republicans — are voting for Moore.

But of all the universally embarrassing stories Bethea collects — phrases like “doofus” get used — the best is the merciless treatment Moore received from his criminal law professor:

Early in the class, McGee called on one of Wilson’s classmates, a United States Military Academy graduate named Roy Moore. “And, for the entire hour, McGee kept him standing and talking, standing and talking,” Wilson told me recently. “Finally, at the end of the hour, McGee said to him, ‘Mr. Moore, I have been teaching in this school for thirty years, and in all of that time you’re the most mixed-up person I’ve ever taught. I’m going to call you Fruit Salad.”

If you’re hoping this nickname stuck and dogged Moore for the rest of his life, well, you’re in luck!

[Civil rights attorney John] Saxon added, “Years later, I’m watching the ten-o’clock news with my wife and there’s this circuit judge up in Etowah County with this little plaque with the Ten Commandments on the wall behind him, and I said to her, ‘Look, there’s Fruit Salad.’”

Senator Fruit Salad. That’s your likely future Alabama. How can any state embarrass itself further?

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Your move, Mississippi.

Why Roy Moore’s Law-School Professor Nicknamed Him Fruit Salad [New Yorker]

HeadshotJoe Patrice is an editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news.

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