The Faculty Lounge

Addictive Junk Foods

The New York Times has a very provocative article coming out in tomorrow's magazine about the junk food industry.  It is definitely worth a read.  The author draws parallels between the big food industry tactics and big tobacco.  This is an analogy made earlier by Kelly Brownell  Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesityand his co-author Kenneth Warner in this article "The Perils of Ignoring History: Big Tobacco Played Dirty and Millions Died. How Similar is Big Food"? The Perils of Ignoring History.  One aspect of this story that may be a revelation to many people is the degree to which food has been deliberately engineered to engender what the article calls "the bliss" point.  What should be apparent is that the industry has spent, and continues to spend, billions of dollars on engineering these foods and fine-tuning their marketing pitches. And data mining allows them to be more fine-tuned than ever, as this article from Advertising Age suggests. Facebook to Partner with Acxiom.

A good deal of the advertising dollars spent by advertisers or these products are spent directing ads at children and teens, which, when one considers what is being pitched, doesn't make the analogy between tobacco and junk food seem that far fetched. See for example this quote from the AdAge article: "The targeting would hypothetically enable Coca-Cola to target to teenagers who've bought soda in the last month..."

I have long wondered why it doesn't bother people more than it seems to that so much money is spent pitching directly to kids,  since no one thinks children or teenagers are fully rational choosers (even if we pretend for sake of argument that adults are). So why is it okay to train this battery of persuasive efforts at them? And in many cases marketing efforts are clearly aimed at very young children. The figure of Ronald McDonald is an example.  Is Ronald McDonald the New Joe Camel?

However, just as this issue is getting more attention (again - it saw a good run in the 1970s in the FTC's ill-fated  "Kid-Vid" investigation),  the commercial speech doctrine has become so much more protective of advertising that any proposed restriction on advertising, even if it is to apply only to the most vulnerable group, children, is likely to fail First Amendment scrutiny. Indeed, some academics argued that even the mere proposal by an Interagency Working Group see here formed to try to propose industry self-regulatory guidelines on marketing of junk food to children, would fail the First Amendment because mere publication of such suggestions which did not have the force of law, might have a "chilling effect."  See here and here . It appears it was the government not the marketers, which was "chilled." FTC weakens proposals.  The irony is that given the state of the law, it might be easier to ban certain products, as mayor Bloomberg did, than it is to regulate the marketing of those same products. Yet, for those worried about the "Nanny state" a ban is arguably far more intrusive on liberty than a ban on marketing -- except the marketers' liberty. But the whole idea in protecting commercial speech was that it was supposed to further consumers' liberty, not advertisers. So this is a bit of a puzzle. 

The Ex Ante/Ex Post distinction

Lawrence Solum over at the Legal Theory Blog has this excellent discussion of the ex ante and ex post question as it comes up in analyzing best legal rules and depending on the orientation of the analyst as to whether we care most about outcomes (regardless of fault) or fault (regardless of outcomes). Ex Ante and Ex Post.  (These would be extreme ends of the spectrum).

But the ex ante/ex post problem also extend to the analysis of any issue where you are not sure what the right distribution of resources and investments are.  Ex post, when you know how a particular decision has come out, that decision tends to look inevitable and thus it is easy to criticize the choices made or not made as ones which ignore the "obvious" likely outcome. This is often termed hindsight bias (or Monday morning quarterbacking) and can make decisions seem easier than they were at the time they were made.

In contrast,  a lot of decisions require us to make assessments ex ante - before we know how it is going to "turn out."  And that is one of the problems raised in an earlier post on the value of  scholarship.  How can you calibrate the right amount to invest (even assuming you could come up with an accurate assessment of its cost, a proposition I am skeptical about), if you don't know how much of the "bad" stuff you have to support in order to get the "good" stuff.  And that also omits the even more problematic question about assigning labels like "good" and "bad" to something which  may defy easy calculation in market terms. 

There is an analog to this problem in advertising circles. The old joke goes:  "I know that 50 % of my advertising budget is wasted. I just don't know which half!"  For advertisers the ROI problem (return on investment) is both ex ante and ex post since, although they can track dollar returns from investments in certain advertising campaigns, they can never be sure that they know why a given campaign seemed to drive sales so successfully.  The annals of advertising lore are littered with examples of an advertiser trying to take a proven formula only to have it bomb. Hence the joke. But advertisers have one advantage over academics in any field - they are marketing a product which is sold in the market, not in the so-called "marketplace of ideas," one with a price in dollars (which of course may have little or not connection to its intrinsic worth in some other system of valuation) and advertisers can measure the sales number before and after a campaign. They may not be able to say for sure that it was the campaign that made the difference, but it is often a reasonable inference.

For the hapless evaluator of legal scholarship there are no such clear metrics for tracking the dollar value of scholarship and such metrics as exist (citation counts, downloads, US News peer reputation scores) are, as I observed previously, incomplete at best and woefully inadequate at worst. It may be that investments in scholarship are maldistributed, although I have yet to see an argument for this proposition that doesn't rely on generalizations about legal academics and law schools that I don't think apply as widely as some argue.  Maybe the expenditures on scholarship should be reduced. But deciding on the "which half" part of that question is surely part of the problem presented by any such proposal. 

 

Women and Men in Competitive Environments

A friend yesterday forwarded me this story from Salon magazine which contains some interesting recent studies on the kinds of competitive situations in which women versus men tend to thrive.  It suggests that women are less competitive and choose to take risks which are more likely to pay off than men, while men often take greater risk if there's a chance of greater reward.  There are also suggestions about the optimal schooling environments for girls versus boys.  Food for thought ...

David Rabban's Law's History

Brian Tamanaha and I have a couple of takes on David Rabban's Law's History in the February issue of the Texas Law Review.  First, though a little bit about Rabban's important book.  Cribbing now from the Cambridge University Press website:

 Law's History is a study of the central role of history in late nineteenth-century American legal thought.  In the decades following the Civil War, the founding generation of professional legal scholars in the United States drew from the evolutionary social thought that pervaded Western intellectual life on both sides of the Atlantic.  Their historical analysis of law as an inductive science rejected deductive theories and supported moderate legal reform, conclusions that challenge conventional accounts of legal formalism. Unprecedented in its coverage and its innovative conclusions about major American legal thinkers from the Civil War to the present, the book combines transatlantic intellectual history, legal history, the history of legal thought, historiography, jurisprudence, constitutional theory and the history of higher education.

This long-awaited study is a very important work in the intellectual history of law, which goes back and reconstructs in detail the historical jurisprudence of the late-nineteenth century.  It locates the turn to historicism in European thought, then traces the migration of those ideas across the Atlantic and it also traces the shift away from historical jurisprudence to Progressive-era sociological jurisprudence and legal realism.

Among the many things that interest me are how different Brian Tamanaha and my takes are. For instance, I call my essay "When History Mattered" -- which suggests that historical jurisprudence was once important but is not so much now.  By contrast, Brian calls his review, "The Unrecognized Triumph of Historical Jurisprudence," which suggests that the historical jurisprudence continues to the present.  Pretty interesting how two people who've thought a lot about this book and this subject can have divergent takes.  I think part of our divergence is explained by our disciplines (history in my case, jurisprudence in Brian's), but also in our vantages.  Brian is taking a big picture view and sees -- as does David Rabban -- more connections between historical jurisprudence and sociological jurisprudence (and later legal realism) than I do.  This is something I hope I'll have the chance to talk about in depth sometime down the road -- and maybe I'll have the chance to bring Brian's Beyond the Formalist-Realist Divide into that discussion.  There are some parallels in interpretation between Beyond the Formalist-Realist Divide and Law's History, though they look at different sets of data and also I think Tamanaha finds more similarites than Rabban between Gilded Age and Progressive era jurisprudence.

Crowdfunding JOBS

Crowdfunding, a variation on crowdsourcing, is an Internet-driven way to raise money apart from the traditional capital markets. Since the late naughts its use has increased from $530 million in 2009 to $2.8 billion in 2012. Thus far, however, crowdfunders have not been able to receive a stake in the object of their largesse. Thus, notwithstanding increasing crowdfunding revenues, most contributors are still driven by sympathy or personal interest and receive nothing more tangible than free T-shirts, movie tickets, and the like.

That should have changed a month ago. On April 15, 2012, President Obama signed the Jumpstart Our Business Startups (JOBS) Act that added a new exemption to the application of the Securities Act of 1933 for issuers that raise money through crowdfunding. The JOBS Act directed the SEC to issue regulations by the end of January but so far none have been forthcoming.  One of these days, however, the regs will be issued and crowdfunding will add investment for profit to its current hipster image.

One of the perks of being ABI Resident Scholar is the opportunity to do smashups. So listen here if you like as I discuss using crowdfunding as a tool for businesses in financial distress. My conversationalist is David McGrail who has some interesting ideas about using crowdfunding to finance a Chapter 11 reorganization.

In short, the $1 million limit on a single issuer's use of crowdfunding will limit its utility to small cases. But even that's a plus because financially distressed small business debtors have a very hard time getting new capital. More important are changes the JOBS Act made to the exemptions from registration under Regulation D and Rule 144A of the Securities Act.

I don't need to pretend that I know next to nothing about securities law but McGrail knows more than a bit. I learned a lot talking with him and I think our conversation should interest many folks.

Update on the ABA Standards

Yesterday, I wrote critically of the ABA Standards.  Coincidentally, today the Council of the Section of Legal Education released for Notice and Comment, proposed revisions to the chapters of the Standards dealing with libraries and facilities.  The Council has apparently rejected the proposal of the Standards Review Committee that the Standards require an individual faculty office;  instead, the Council would simply require that office space for faculty research, class preparation and meetings with students be "suitable and sufficient."  I am glad that they have avoided the embarassment of requiring individual offices.

More importantly, the proposed revisions to the library chapter would give law school much needed flexibility.  The Standards Review Committee has proposed shifting from concern with law school ownership of materials, to a focus on "access".  If adopted, this will enable schools to rely more on databases and electronic materials, and will facilitate schools sharing resources.  This could lead to major savings in library budgets.  The SRC and the Council should be applauded for this.

Faculty Hiring: Touro

From an email message that I received earlier today:

Touro College Jacob D. Fuchsberg Law Center invites applications from experienced health law teachers and scholars for the Kermit Gitenstein Distinguished Visiting Chair in Health Law and Policy. Touro is seeking a nationally-known professor in the field of health law and policy to fill the chair for the spring semester in 2014. The Gitenstein visiting professor will teach at least one course at the law school, deliver public lectures, and participate fully in faculty and student life. Touro Law Center is part of Touro College, which includes New York Medical College—one of the largest private health sciences universities in the nation. The visiting chair will have the opportunity to develop collaborative initiatives with the medical profession in general and New York Medical College in particular. Women, members of minority groups and others whose background will contribute to the diversity of the faculty are encouraged to apply.

Touro Law Center is a dynamic institution that is at the forefront of legal education in this country, dedicated to producing practice-ready graduates. Touro’s students have the unique opportunity to take advantage of the first-ever law campus in the United States—a law school adjacent to and working with both a federal courthouse and a state courthouse. The law school is located in Suffolk County, Long Island, approximately an hour outside of New York City.

Interested candidates should send a cover letter and resume at the earliest possible date for full consideration. Contact: Fabio Arcila, Jr., Appointments Committee Chair and Associate Dean for Research and Scholarship, at farcila@tourolaw.edu<mailto:farcila@tourolaw.edu>.

Touro College is committed to the principles of equal employment opportunity. Our practices and employment decisions regarding employment, hiring, assignment, promotion, compensation, and other terms and conditions of employment are not to be based on an employee's race, color, sex, age, religion, national origin, disability, ancestry, military discharge status, sexual orientation, marital status, genetic predisposition, housing status, or any other protected status, in accordance with applicable law. Our policies are in conformance with Title IX, 1972 Education Amendments.

Jennifer Brown Named New Quinnipiac Law Dean

Jennifer Gerarda Brown, who has served on the Quinnipiac Law faculty since 1994, has been named the school's new dean.  She is a graduate of the University of Illinois College of Law and was previously a permanent member of the Emory Law faculty.  She has also visited at Santa Clara, Illinois, Georgetown, Harvard, and Yale.

A powerhouse couple has just gotten a little more powerhousey; her husband is Ian Ayers.

Call For Papers: Green Bag Micro-Symposium On Judicial Activism

Authors are asked to comment on Suzanne Sherry's Why We Need More Judicial Activism.  Details here.  You have til June 1 to get 500 words together.  Hurry up.  

Racial Disparity And Sex Offenders

The New York Times is doing a "Room for Debate" feature on the issue: Too Many Restrictions on Sex Offenders, or Too Few? Alejandro Leguízamo, a psychology professor, worries that that enforcement of sex offender regulations may vary by race.  He is particularly concerned that the risk assessment process will yield racially disparate outcomes because the most common tool - Static-99 - may not work well with non-whites.  

If true, you can stack this disparity on top of the racial skew I documented several years ago with respect to people subject to sexual offender community notification.  It should be no surprise that a justice system displaying wildly disparate outcomes by race in all other respects would yield no different result when it comes to sex offenders.

Sometimes the Emperor Is Indeed Scantily Clad, Even If Paul Campos Is the Observer

Brian Leiter here takes Paul Campos to task for admitting that he doesn't "know] what it means" to think like a lawyer.  I read Campos as admitting something slightly different -- that he doesn't know what it means to "teach students" how to think like lawyers.

The difference is significant.  In my view, Campos is saying a few things that, however embarrassing, are true for most of us in law teaching:  as a group, we don't really know why we do what we do in the classroom or how effective our methods are.  

These questions he asks seem to me pretty much unanswerable by reference to the way we usually do things:

"*Does legal education produce significant improvements in reading and writing skills?  If so, how?  Is the claim here that legal academics teach people how to read and write like lawyers? Again, how are these skills different than reading and writing in general, and why are law professors, given their backgrounds, qualified to impart these skills?

"*More generally, how is it that law professors are particularly qualified to teach anybody anything? It’s one of the curiosities of the American educational system that, as one ascends in the hierarchy of teaching, one needs less formal training in being a teacher. Elementary and secondary school teachers are required to study educational theory and to undergo formal apprenticeships.  Most university faculty have no formal training in education per se, but at least they usually acquire practical experience in teaching as graduate students, before they become full-fledged faculty members.  By contrast, it’s not unusual for legal academics to have literally no teaching background of any kind before they are unleashed on their students."

I would add these observations:

* Once in a faculty position, most law professors receive no training in teaching and are slow to seek out development resources from teaching centers on their campuses.  (Count me among the slow, at least until I started running one of those centers.)

* Mentoring efforts for junior faculty are much likelier to focus on scholarship than teaching.

* Most law faculty members (of all levels of seniority) generally receive no more peer feedback on their teaching than they absolutely must.

* The more prestigious the institution, the more teaching is seen as a hindrance to research, the less time people spend in the classroom, the more a reduced teaching load is dangled as a hiring or retention incentive, and the harder faculty members work to find ways of getting release time from teaching.  (As with all rules, there are exceptions, but who could deny that this is the rule?)

To be sure, there are people in legal education (in all areas -- "podium" people, clinical people, and legal writing people) who devote a lot of time to understanding how good teaching works and to measuring the effectiveness of varying teaching methods. 

But most of us aren't those people.  Right?

Loosening the ABA's Grip on Law Schools

The ABA Standards and Rules of Procedure for Approval of Law Schools establish the basic framework within which almost all law schools operate.  Many aspects of the Standards are appropriate and unobjectionable.  However, in too many respects the Standards operate as a significant impediment to the kind of experimentation and change that is needed in legal education.  

First some background.  It is not the American Bar Association itself, but rather the Council and Accreditation Committee of the ABA Section of Legal Education that is authorized by the U.S. Department of Education to accredit law schools.  Department of Education rules require an accreditor to be separate and independent from a trade association such as the ABA, so the Section operates essentially autonomously. 

The Standards are the rules with which schools must fully comply to receive or retain accreditation.  The
Council is the governing body of the Section.  The Council is assisted in its work by a number of committees, the most important of which are the Accreditation Committee (which makes determinations about whether schools are in compliance with the Standards) and the Standards Review Committee (which recommends changes in the Standards to the Council).

All members of the Council and the committees are volunteers.  The Section has a rather small professional staff that aids in the processes, but all of the policy decisions are made by the volunteers.  No more than half of the members of the Council and each major committee can be deans, professors, or other current full time employees of law schools.  The remaining members are judges, lawyers, and at least one public (i.e., nonlawyer) member (it is not uncommon, though, for some of these members to be former professors).  Contrary to what one often hears, the legal academics involved represent a diverse range of law schools, although deans and faculty from the most elite handful of schools infrequently participate.  The vast majority of the Section volunteers I have worked with or observed are sincere and conscientious, although often very conservative in thinking about change.

The Standards are intended to identify minimum requirements necessary to ensure a high quality legal education.  This is not an easy task.  Reasonable people will disagree on which elements of legal education are essential.  Almost no individual standard, in isolation, will probably be truly essential.  The Standards as a whole should promote excellence in legal education without overly restricting the ability of schools to choose their own appropriate paths.  Unfortunately, the Standards go well beyond any reasonable measure of minimum requirements.  In doing so, they unfairly limit flexibility and experimentaton.

One problem is that the Standards are too law faculty-centric.  They reflect too much of what deans and professors think legal education should be, rather than what is truly necessary to ensure quality.  To some extent, this is probably an inevitable consequence of self-regulation.  However, the Standards are more protective of faculty prerogatives than the rules of any other accreditor.   

For example, the Standards require that full time faculty teach substantially all of the first-year curriculum and a "major portion" of the entire curriculum.  Although the language of the rules is murky, there is an expectation that a large percentage of the faculty will be on tenure-track or have long term contracts.  Every school must have a scholarly mission and devote resources to that undertaking.  To give you one of my favorite examples, when I was on the Standards Review Committee, I was thoroughly rebuffed in my effort to have removed from a draft standard a requirement that each full time faculty member have an individual office.  Office sharing exists throughout the economy today.  Do law professors really have a right to insist on an individual office as a precondition for a school's existence?

Please don't misunderstand me.  I am not in favor of "abolishing" tenure and I believe that legal scholarship has great value - even if Chief Justic Roberts doesn't think so (I also think that individual faculty offices are a good idea).   But I think it takes a great deal of self-interest and rationalization to conclude that only a school following this model can provide an adequate legal education. 

Similarly, the Standards are overly specific about certain aspects of legal education instruction.  Each student must receive at least 58,000 minutes of instruction, of which 45,000 must be classroom-based (although time spent in a law school clinic counts).  Distance learning is currently limited to 12 credit hours.   Full time students may not work more than 20 hours per week in outside jobs (although there are no limits on part time students). 

Some of these requirements are just silly (schools must require regular and punctual attendance).  The limits on field placements and externships is serious.  Why is a school prohibited from making much greater use of properly supervised experiential learning outside of the classroom?

I am not advocating complete deregulation by any means.  The ABA should insist on rigorous instruction and successful outcomes.  But the basic regulatory structure should take a much lighter touch.  Each standard or group of standards should be examined to determine if change or deletion would have a seriously negative impact on the core educational mission of law schools.  This could lead to much less expensive, but still high quality, legal education options.  As an example, Dean Roger Dennis has examined what a $20,000 tuition private law school might look like.  I should also add that although the ABA Standards should take a minimalistic approach, there is nothing wrong with a membership organization like the AALS having more rigorous requirements.

After six years on the Standards Review Committee, I recognize than my views on many of these questions are in the minority of those involved in law school accreditation.  I would prefer to see more reform-minded membership on the Council and Standards Review Committee.  Perhaps the climate will change, or perhaps outside forces such as the Department of Education or the state Supreme Courts will force the Section to liberalize the Standards. 

Another path to reform might be drawn from the charter school movement.  Charter schools receive significant relief from regulatory rules in exchange for being closely evaluated based upon a set of agreed-upon goals.   The ABA Standards have an infrequently used (and nontransparent) variance mechanism.  The Section should consider allowing a small number of existing or newly created schools to propose a detailed plan for operating a quality law school without being governed by many of the more onerous Standards.  The success or failure of these schools could be monitored and studied, and sensible reforms to the Standards could emerge.

Are We Sustaining A VAP Trap?

Tim's mention of a recent call for VAP applications got me thinking:  There's been a lot of discussion about what the collapse of the job market for law school graduates ought to mean for the law school curriculum and the size of law school faculties.  Everyone now acknowledges a basic change in the environment, and the debate seems to be about whether it's coming from a five-hundred-year flood event or a permanent change in the sea level.  Nobody can seriously argue for expansion of legal education; the debate is about how much it should contract and what an altered version should look like.  People seem to agree that it's not ethical to prepare vast numbers of students for considerably-less-than-vast numbers of jobs.

Because I'm at a law school that does not have a VAP program, I am not hearing discussion about the proliferation of these programs in recent years and whether it's ethical to sustain them in an environment where open faculty positions are, and will likely remain, fewer than in the past.

Are such discussions taking place?

This, by the way, is no criticism specifically of the VAP program that Tim mentioned, or of any other particular VAP program.  It's a question about our field as a whole.

Hiring Announcement: Arizona Seeks VAP Apps

From our friends in Tucson comes this announcement:

The University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law welcomes applications for the position of Visiting Assistant Professor (VAP) beginning July 1, 2013. VAPs will enjoy a two-year appointment to the faculty of the College of Law. They will teach one course per semester, with institutional and financial support for scholarly research and writing. VAPs will benefit from training and mentoring by faculty members as they develop their courses and begin classroom teaching. Areas of particular interest include the following: Intellectual Property, Criminal Law, Health Law, Criminal Procedure, Torts, and Complex Litigation. The College expects that VAPs will write and publish, in a scholarly journal, an article of original research and analysis during their first year. It is expected that VAPs will seek a tenure-track position at a law school, with the full support of the College, in the fall of their second year.

Additional info here.

UNC Joins Coursera with an Environmental Law MOOC

UNC Chapel Hill today announced that we're partnering with Coursera to offer MOOCs (mass open online courses). One of our first four courses is an offering by my law school colleague Don Hornstein entitled "Environmental Law and Policy."

As best I can tell, Don is the first member of a law school faculty to offer an American law course in the MOOC format.  (And if I am mistaken about that, then surely he is one of a very small group of trailblazers.)

It's a new world out there.

Jay Conison Leaving Valparaiso Deanship To Lead Charlotte

Valparaiso University School of Law Dean Jay Conison is moving to Charlotte School of Law where he will serve as its new dean.  He will be leaving Valparaiso on April 15, which is remarkably abrupt turn for a man who has served as Valpo's dean since 1998.  Charlotte is a for-profit law school, which will presumably be a somewhat different experience for Conison.  

Conison holds his JD from the University of Minnesota.  He has been very active in ABA law school accreditation circles, serving on the Accreditation Committee of the group's Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar for six years, including a year as its co-chair.

The New Originalism

Long-time readers of the faculty lounge may recall my interest in public conceptions of the Constitution (and here) in the old South.  One of the things that interests me is how though they sometimes had versions of originalism, they more frequently relied on other modes of interpretation.   When they made appeals to history, it was more to frame general principles than to provide an interpretation of a particular constitutional provision.  In fact, they tended to frame the constitutional interpretation in terms of general principles, whether drawn from history or from observations of political philosophy.  They saw the Constitution as not just a document but as a set of principles -- such as adherence to Union, expansion, and economic development -- that helped propel and united the country.

Sometimes antebellum southerners went so far as to suggest that they reject older principles of  constitutional interpretation.  James Bruce, for instance, one of the wealthiest Southerners of the antebellum era and a supporter of federal and state spending on internal improvements -- like transportation -- criticized the narrow construction of the Constitution in a graduation address at UNC in 1841.

It is high time that the South was giving up its old prejudices and antiquated modes of thinking—that it was breaking the ties which unite it to a departed age, and bind together the living and the dead. Our ancestors used the lights of their age, why should we reject the brighter ones of our own? They ran ahead of their times, why should we lag behind ours? They were dissatisfied with their condition, and improved it, let us do likewise; they were wise in their generation, let us be wise in ours.

I am hoping that there will be increasing talk of how public ideas of the Constitution related to political and judicial behavior in the old South.  The scholarship on public constitutionalism runs alongside recent talk of the new originalism -- that is, recent literature on original intent and constitutional interpretation (and I think to applied legal history, too.)  Next week the Fordham Law Review is hosting a conference on the new constitutional originalism.  Cribbing now from the conference website:

Originalism—the thesis that legitimate constitutional interpretation is bound by original meaning or intent—has emerged as an influential and controversial approach to how we interpret our Constitution. While some claim that constitutional interpretation and legitimacy require unearthing original meaning or intent, others assert that tethering current citizens and interpreters to the comprehension of long-dead people is the antithesis of good and proper democratic government. 

The Fordham Law Review is proud to present a symposium gathering a remarkable group of legal scholars, historians, and philosophers to discuss if, how, and why Originalism should inform constitutional analysis. 

Property Takings Poetry Slam Wednesday: Oi Antonin, My Antonin

Up in the middle of the night and what to do?  Compose a poem paying tribute to the demise of Lucas v. South Carolina Coastal Commission.  

Oi Antonin, My Antonin!

Oi Antonin! my Antonin! That beach from hell recede;

Upon a Riviera, where meet a most red hued cervix adorned breed

As sand replanted, an Accretion imparted—but by law, the avulsion

there legally be. 

The owners of littoral rights do decry;

                         Here Antonin! dear Antonin!

                            Our land was taken, the law forsaken!

                               And the State Court Decides

                                 The high tide line, lie cold and dead.

 

Oi Antonin, Lucas’ raison de’tat can’t amass,

Who decides what makes a place – deference to economic loss is also a moral morass

No, a Rancher from the Lazy B once said, refuting dear Lucas’s mar

“Penn Central remains our pole star;”

                         Takings with harm do not arise arise!

                            Whether total, partial or any compromise,

                               But when legislative acts for morals protect

                                The public from acts dereft 

                                And Lucas, may lie Fallen, cold and dead.

 

Oi Antonin, My Antonin, 

The Lucas zenith nearly finished

Harm and Nuisance remain a heartbeat, for legislative prerogative,

But remember! Remember Oh Antonin, the once strong Lucas mast;

                         Total Economic Loss

                            Titled interests caveated dross,

                                Now upon the imported sand, your Lucas

                                  Lies, fallen cold and nearly dead.

 

 

2013 Law School Admissions Update: A Few More Applicants

The newest voume summary from LSAC is out and it indicates that, as of February 15, 2013, applications have increased to the point that law schools are now down a mere 18.9% in total applicants and 22% in total applications.   A total of 39,351 people have applied to law school.   If this pace continues, we would expect to see just short of 55,000 applicants this cycle.  

140 law schools are down over 20% in applications; 73 are down over 30%.    There are always outliers, but this year not so many.  2 schools are up 10% or more; a mere 6 are up any number at all.

Prior admissions data posts are here and here.

Faculty Hiring: Texas Tech

From an email message that I received earlier today:

Texas Tech University School of Law seeks applications from exceptional individuals to fill two tenured or tenure-track positions for the 2013–2014 or 2014–2015 academic years. 

For the first position (requisition number 88012), we are seeking a professor who, if a tenured candidate, also will serve as Director for the Law School’s Center for Water Law and Policy and George W. McCleskey Professor of Water Law (a tenure-track candidate would be able to serve as Acting Director).  The Center's mission is to contribute to the understanding, development, teaching, and study of water law and policy.  The Center is part of the Texas Tech University’s interdisciplinary water initiative, which involves faculty and students representing the disciplines of law, public policy, economics, agriculture, geosciences, engineering, biological sciences, and health sciences.  In addition to serving as the Center’s Director, responsibilities would include teaching Water Rights and related courses.    

The curricular needs for the second position (requisition number 88013) are flexible, although our greatest needs are in the areas of Texas Procedure, Professional Responsibility, skills courses, and immigration law.

Applicants for both positions must possess a J.D. degree or an advanced degree in a relevant field and have relevant experience such as teaching, legal practice, or judicial clerkship.  Entry-level candidates must show scholarly promise, as evidenced by publications in scholarly journals, scholarly works in progress or a scholarly agenda.  For any lateral applicant with tenure, a distinguished record of teaching and scholarship is required. Once hired, faculty members are evaluated and advancement is determined by contributions in teaching, research, and service.

Texas Tech University, located in Lubbock, Texas, is a state-supported National Research University with an enrollment that exceeds 32,000 students.  The law school has approximately 660 students and 40 full-time faculty members.  The law school is an integral part of the University and offers 12 dual-degree programs with other Texas Tech schools and colleges.  The Lubbock metropolitan area is home to 250,000 people, enjoys affordable housing, abundant sunshine, friendly people, and offers easy access to other parts of the country.  For more information, visit our website at http://www.law.ttu.edu/.

Texas Tech is an affirmative action/Equal Opportunity Employer.  We strongly encourage applications from women, minorities, persons with disabilities, and veterans, and we consider the needs of dual-career couples.  Please submit your cover letter, resume, and contact information for three professional references electronically to the Attention of Professor John L. Watts, Chair, Personnel Committee, at the Texas Tech Jobs website https://jobs.texastech.edu or www.workattexastech.com.   You can contact Professor Watts at john.watts@ttu.edu.  Resume review will begin immediately and continue until the positions are filled.