Black Judge Said Diversity Is Good, So Her Colleagues Launched Disciplinary Probe
There's something rotten in the state of North Carolina.
You’re Supposed To Bang Your Gavel, Not Flash Your Gun, Former Judge
The fewer cowards in black robes, the better.
Meet Me At ILTACON: Opus 2 And AI Workbench
Swing by Booth 800 for a look at the latest in AI-powered case management.
Stephen Miller Takes Break From Suing Gay Pop-Tarts To Sue NYU Law Review
America First Legal accuses NYU Law Review of discriminating against white man who hasn't even tried to apply yet.
Former SCOTUS Clerk Wants Americans To ‘Arm Up’ Against ‘Black Underclass’
Former Senate aide who complained about making judicial nominees testify that they oppose segregation thinks... exactly what you'd expect based on that preface.
It Was Only A Matter Of Time Before We Had To Talk About This Again
This week we chat about the First Amendment, sexual harassment, and, yet again, Blackface in the legal community.
Morning Docket: 09.22.23
* Somehow they've managed to find even more undisclosed private air travel. This time taking Clarence Thomas to a Koch brothers event in a level of impropriety that a former W. Bush judge said, "takes my breath away, frankly." [ProPublica] * Clifford Chance opts for permanent hybrid work model while other firms choose alienation and extortion. [RollonFriday] * Second Circuit decides Sam Bankman-Fried can wait in jail. [Law360] * North Carolina Supreme Court justice Anita Earls spoke publicly about implicit bias in the legal system. After the judiciary commission ordered her to pre-clear future statements with them, she sued over the prior restraint and the federal judge chastised her for making the justice system look bad by talking about bias out loud. [Balls and Strikes] * Having toppled admissions, right-wingers take aim at scholarships that might possibly help non-white people go to school. [Reuters] * Judge upholds the right of private investors to put their money toward companies that match their environmental and social goals. [Bloomberg Law News] * Profiling the folks chronicling the opaque Google antitrust case. [Wired]
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Morning Docket: 09.20.23
* Federal courts have two weeks of funding if the government shuts down. So there's a silver lining to a shutdown? [Reuters] * Joshua Wright's accusers respond to his massive defamation suit against them noting that the complaint fails to include any defamatory statements and... kind of admits to everything. [Law360] * Former Obama administration officials tell FCC not to pursue net neutrality because conservatives in the judiciary might strike it down. At that rate, just go ahead and preemptively stop enforcing all laws because Sam Alito once read a medieval scroll that he thinks applies to the Chevron doctrine. [Bloomberg Law News] * Sid and Cheesy get to interview grand jury members who returned their indictments. But with some key conditions. [Fox Atlanta] * Lawrence Lessig is unimpressed by the Fourteenth Amendment case against Donald Trump. Not for the loony "just because the presidency is an office of the United States doesn't make the president an officer of the United States" stuff from Mukasey, but because lowering the bar for insurrection all the way to January 6 would open up a dangerous precedent that bad actors could use to shut down dissent. [Slate] * The Supreme Court specifically excluded military academies from the latest affirmative action cases, reflecting in part the military's stance that national security requires a diverse officer corps capable of managing an increasingly diverse enlisted force. The folks who brought that case have now sued West Point because they care way more about bigotry than national security. [Reuters] * Temple's acting president, former law school dean JoAnne Epps has died after collapsing on stage. [NY Times]
Law Review Creates Blackface Trophy For Bluebooking And It’s As Awful As It Sounds
How did it take over a week for anyone to notice how wildly inappropriate this was?
T14 Law Professor Invites White Supremacist To Campus And You’ll Never… OK, It Was Amy Wax
Amy Wax brings white nationalist back to UPenn's campus because she's nothing if not consistent. And racist.
Morning Docket: 09.13.23
* Sam Bankman-Fried denied pre-trial release after arguing that his alleged witness tampering, not unlike the value of cryptocurrency, wasn't what it looked like on paper. [Reuters] * After opening door a crack to allow some transparency in proceedings during the pandemic, the federal courts look to curtail live audio access. [Law360] * Lawyer informs Texas Senate that Ken Paxton approved every bit of investigation at heart of impeachment. [Texas Tribune] * Trial to begin to decide constitutionality of "America's most extreme gun control law." The law just requires gun owners to get a permit and bans magazines over 10 rounds. Again, this is what passes for the "most extreme" law in the country. [Fox News] * Gibson Dunn alters diversity scholarship criteria as activists ramp up threats to sue law firms for pursuing initiatives to make the profession less white. [Bloomberg Law News] * Meanwhile, two law schools are back in compliance with ABA accreditors after improving faculty diversity and likely putting them out of compliance with these litigious activists (Another law school is back in compliance after improving its finances... which is less controversial). [Law.com] * Governor asks to change state's public records law to keep her travel under wraps. [ABC]
Reasoning, Tool Calling, And Agentic Systems In Legal LLMs
Domain-specific AI provides accuracy and reliable legal reasoning.
Morning Docket: 09.05.23
* The collapse of crypto is paying off for lawyers. [NY Times] * Federal Circuit moves to dismiss Judge Pauline Newman's lawsuit challenging the court deciding to kick her off panels arguing that no court can question their internal affairs. Sounds like the Federal Circuit is taking a lot of lessons from the Supreme Court. [Reuters] * A primer for Ken Paxton's impeachment trial. [Law360] * All-white federal district courts still exist. Because people like this still exist. [Bloomberg Law News] * Dechert facing sanctions over dragging out discovery. [American Lawyer] * NY begins cracking down on Airbnb. [NY Daily News]
Several Law Schools Gave Their Applicants A Chance To Study For Their Spot. Will This Be A New Trend?
Now they get to experience the real magic: Torts!
The Law, The Law! It’s Chock Full Of Clowns. Dubious Lawsuits Up And Productivity’s Down!
A little Broadway for this week's title.
Morning Docket: 08.30.23
* Does the First Amendment protect criticizing a public school softball coach? Yes. Of course it does. How is this case still going? [Law.com] * A study of law students using AI on exams found that low performing students did better, high performing students did worse. [Reuters] * UK judge receives "formal advice" after falling asleep during trial. Presumably the advice was to blame the English accents for lulling him to sleep. I mean... has anyone ever actually finished that Stephen Fry story? [LegalCheek] * There's chutzpah and then there's a company that declared bankruptcy in a dubious bid to avoid liability asking permission to pay its leader a $1.5 million salary. [Bloomberg Law News] * What's the appropriate alternative term for "nonlawyer" that we're supposed to use? Because there's some pretty important ethical reasons to make that distinction clear to firm outsiders. [ABA Journal] * When the Obama DOJ walked away from probing right-wing terror groups, it set the stage for racially motivated attacks like the one in Jacksonville. [Revolving Door Project] * LeClair Ryan founder inching closer to a deal in bankruptcy fight. [Law360]