The Faculty Lounge

The Lost Highway

"The Lost Highway" was written by the blind country music singer-songwriter Leon Payne in 1948, when he was stranded hitchhiking from California to Texas. The iconic version was recorded by Hank Williams in 1949. It was observed in a 2004 biography that the combination of "perdition and misogyny" sounds like "pages torn from his diary." Although the lament seems to be about longing for salvation, it is notable that there is little actual mention of religion and none of Christianity. There have been dozens of covers (and the title has been appropriated for films, books, and a Bon Jovi song unrelated to the original).

Tom Mayo Named Interim Dean of SMU Law

Senior Associate Dean and Professor of Law Tom Mayo has been named interim dean of SMU Law beginning on July 1, stepping in for Jennifer Collins who will be come President of Rhodes College.  Mayo joined SMU in 1984 and holds a JD from Syracuse.

Drexel Kline Law Seeks Law & Technology Postdoctoral Fellow

The Drexel University Kline School of Law’s Center for Law and Transformational Technology invites applications for a two-year postdoctoral fellow, beginning September 1, 2022, with an emphasis on sociotechnical research in the areas of law, regulation, and governance at the intersection of law and technology, and the development of new technologies. Applicants from all disciplines and methodological approaches are welcome to apply.

The Center for Law and Transformational Technology was created in 2021 with a seed grant from the Green Family Foundation to bring together key stakeholders, including legal and technological scholars, industry leaders, activists, regulators, and other experts from across the country and the world. The Center supports concrete efforts to gauge the legal impact of transformational technology, promote critical conversations about the role of law in technological change and bring legal experts into interdisciplinary conversations with researchers and developers at all stages of design and development. Working across industries, the Center helps educate lawyers to play a positive role navigating a technological landscape we cannot yet imagine. By facilitating international and multi-disciplinary partnerships, the Center seeks to contribute to a future in which technology moves forward hand-in-hand with society.

The Fellow will also have the opportunity to collaborate with faculty and participate in workshops and symposia from across the University. Situated in the heart of Philadelphia, Kline Law and the Center for Law and Transformational Technology offer exciting opportunities to engage with the region’s intellectual and innovation communities.

The Fellow will work with law faculty and faculty in cognate disciplines who work with the Center. The Fellow is expected to conduct original research, teach at least one class each year (for JD students or undergraduates studying in the Law School’s newly established B.A. in Law program), and support Center activities including symposia, outreach to scholars in varied disciplines, and a student research fellow program. The Fellow is expected to participate fully in the intellectual life of the Center and of Kline Law.

The successful candidate will have obtained a Ph.D in a related field, a JD or an SJD.  Applicants should have experience and an active scholarly agenda centering on the intersection of regulation, law and/or governance with respect to emerging technologies. Preference will be given to applicants who have published in this field. 

Details and application instructions are here. 

Touro Law Seeks Legal Research and Writing Faculty

This just in:

The Touro University Jacob D. Fuchsberg Law Center is pleased to announce that it is currently seeking applicants for an appointment to its Legal Process (Legal Research and Writing) faculty starting in August 2022. Legal Process is a six-credit, first-year course. Students receive three credits in the fall semester and three credits in the spring semester. In addition to the standard focus on predictive writing in the fall and persuasive writing in the spring, students are introduced to client interviewing. They are also introduced to client counseling and/or negotiation.

After two successive one-year contracts, Legal Process professors can apply for presumptively renewable three-year contracts. Following a successful three-year contract, LP professors with a record of scholarly publications and/or substantial service outside of the law school may apply for renewable five-year contracts. Legal Process is a directorless program; professors enjoy the same level of autonomy as the doctrinal faculty, as well as the same access to travel, scholarship, and other professional development funds.

Legal Process professors are involved in all aspects of law school life, including chairing and serving on major committees and serving as advisors to student organizations. Legal Process professors attend faculty meetings and vote on all matters other than tenure, promotion, and retention.

A candidate must have a J.D. degree from an ABA-accredited law school and a commitment to teaching in an environment dedicated to excellence in teaching and mentoring of students. We look for innovative faculty with a preference for both practice and teaching experience. Applicants must demonstrate a commitment to service to legal education and to the wider community as well as a desire to engage in the intellectual life of the Law Center. With one of the most diverse student bodies in the country, Touro Law Center is dedicated to the aims of diversity and strongly encourages applications from women and minorities.

Applicants are expected to be willing and capable of teaching in-person and remotely, and familiar with best practices in both modalities.

 

CFP: Kentucky Law Journal Symposium on Redistricting

The Kentucky Law Journal is pleased to invite proposals for its annual symposium, which will be held on October 14, 2022.  The KLJ symposium is entitled Drawing the Lines: Redistricting After the 2020 Census and will focus on the legal issues and policy implications of the 2020 Census and redistricting cycle. From policy arguments regarding who should draw the lines to legal disputes on new maps all across the country, a fundamental question remains: does the redistricting process give us the democracy we deserve?

The KLJ will host this symposium in person in beautiful Lexington, Kentucky, on October 14, 2022, with a pre-symposium dinner held on the evening of October 13.  In addition to presentations at the symposium event, presenters will publish pieces in Volume 111 of the Kentucky Law Journal.  The editors are particularly interested in publications serving as one of two feature articles in the range of 15,000–20,000-words.  In order to apply for the symposium, please submit an abstract of no more than 1,000 words.  In addition, please submit a current CV. 

Submissions are due by June 3, 2021, at editors@kentuckylawjournal.org.  Please send any questions to KLJ Special Features Editor, Holly Couch, at holly.couch@uky.edu, KLJ Editor-in-Chief, Jackson Sanders, at jackson.sanders1@uky.edu, or KLJ’s faculty advisor, Joshua Douglas, at joshuadouglas@uky.edu. 

Virgil E. Earp on the $64,000 Question in 1958

Virgil E. was Wyatt's nephew, the son of his half-brother Newton. He was named after Virgil W. Earp, oldest of the fighting Earp brothers (and the man who was actually in charge on October 26, 1881). Uncle Wyatt lived until 1929, so young Virgil would have been able to get to know him pretty well.

This episode was in 1958, the last season before the show was canceled in the rigging scandal. I have not been able to determine whether Virgil was fed the questions ahead of time, but they actually weren't that hard for anyone well read on the Old West.

Beat Me Daddy, Eight to the Bar

"Beat Me Daddy, Eight to the Bar" was written in 1940 by Don Raye, Hughie Prince, and Ray McKinley. It was released that year by the Will Bradley Orchestra, with McKinley on drums a vocals (see audio clip at bottom of this post). The title phrase is a request for the drummer to set a boogie woogie rhythm, and the "best piano player by far" has been thought to be a reference to John "Peck" Kelly, who was the leader of "Peck's Bad Boys." It has since become a classic number for piano players to show off their chops. The Andrews Sisters also turned it into a signature trio act.

Sarah Lipton-Lubet on Court Expansion

 

 

What Justice Thomas Doesn't Understand about Respect for the Supreme Court

Here is the gist of my new column for The Hill:

Clarence Thomas is right about declining respect for the Supreme Court — but wrong about its cause

Speaking at a conference sponsored by three conservative think tanks, Thomas blamed the leak on either a clerk or fellow justice. In the old days, he said, nobody would have leaked a single line of an opinion, let alone an entire draft. There was “belief in the court” that made confidentiality sacrosanct. Now, alas, the court has experienced a sort of “infidelity.” You “begin to look over your shoulder,” he explained, which risks “destroying the institutions that are required for a free society.”

Almost nobody is in favor of disclosing confidences or disturbing the peace in residential neighborhoods, but those phenomena are at best symptoms of declining respect for the Supreme Court. The root causes are more profound, some of which can be traced to the justices’ open disregard for the ethical norms applicable to every other American judge.

Congressional attempts to remedy the crisis of confidence have lately broken down on political lines. Democrats have proposed reform legislation to address pressing institutional issues, with little or no support from Republicans.

Just last week, the House Judiciary Committee passed the Supreme Court Ethics, Recusal, and Transparency Act (SCERTA), which would enact the most comprehensive ethics reforms in many decades. The 22-16 vote was along strict party lines, with every Democrat voting in favor of the legislation and every Republican voting against it.

Perhaps congressional Republicans believe they must defend the court’s 6-3 conservative majority at every turn, but that is a mistake. Waning public confidence hurts the majority most of all, as it is their decisions that must meet the test of widespread acceptance.

[Thomas] is oblivious to the true nature of the court’s legitimacy problem, which has almost nothing to do with its internal dynamics (about which nobody else much cares, other than wannabe insiders) and far more to do with its haughty attitude toward public transparency.

You can read the entire piece here.