The Faculty Lounge

David Yellen Resigns as Marist President

Former Loyola-Chicago and Hofstra law dean, David Yellen, resigned unexpectedly from his position as president of Marist College last year.  He had been in the role since 2016.  The interim president, Dennis Murray,  served as Marist's president  for 37 years before Yellen took the helm.  No doubt Murray was a very tough person to succeed - and presumably there are some people who are very happy to see things return to "normal."

University of Detroit Mercy

University of Detroit Mercy School of Law seeks a proven or aspiring scholar and teacher with an interest in teaching first-year Property Law for a tenured or tenure-track position beginning 2020-2021.  Applicants must have a law degree and strong academic background and must demonstrate either a record of or potential for both teaching excellence and high scholarly achievement in any area of law.  The balance of the teaching package will be determined in conversation with the successful candidate.

Announcement: Property Law Position

University of Detroit Mercy School of Law seeks a proven or aspiring scholar and teacher with an interest in teaching first-year Property Law for a tenured or tenure-track position beginning 2020-2021.  Applicants must have a law degree and strong academic background and must demonstrate either a record of or potential for both teaching excellence and high scholarly achievement in any area of law.  The balance of the teaching package will be determined in conversation with the successful candidate.

To Apply

Applicants should send a cover letter, which should include a brief description of their ideal teaching package and a general indication of their areas of scholarly interest.  Please direct the cover letter, a current CV, additional supporting materials (if any), and any questions you may have to:

Professor Julia Belian, Chair of Faculty Recruitment

University of Detroit Mercy School of Law

651 East Jefferson

Detroit, Michigan 48226

(belianju@udmercy.edu, 313-596-0225)

Materials will be accepted via email or regular mail.  Review of applicants will begin in July 2019 and will continue until the position is filled.

University of Vienna Symposium on Polyamory in the Media and Personal Poly Identity

I had the honor of travelling to Vienna to comment on Stefan Ossmann’s Ph.D. project on polyamory at a symposium at the University of Vienna earlier this month.  My co-presenters were Christian Klesse of Manchester Metropolitan University and Elisabeth Sheff, formerly of Georgia State University.  Stefan, a Communications Ph.D. candidate, undertook an ambitious project in which he conducted content analyses of media articles on polyamory spanning from 2007 to 2017 and interviews of thirty-three people who are part of the polyamory community in Vienna. His work is being supervised by Franz Eder, a Professor of Social and Economic History.  Stefan’s dual approach of examining media articles and undertaking interviews enabled him to compare external perceptions of the polyamory community in the German-speaking world to the self-perception of members of the poly community in Vienna.

 

Copyright: CC BY-NC-ND 4.0: Stefan Ossmann / pictures taken: Vanessa Rosenmayer

Copyright: CC BY-NC-ND 4.0: Stefan Ossmann / pictures taken: Vanessa Rosenmayer

For the media analysis, he focused on one newspaper database of German language articles called WISO online datenbank.  He found 361 relevant articles and also determined that the number of relevant articles is steadily rising every year and that most of the articles were neutral in tone.  In terms of the interviews, Steffan Ossmann tried to interview as many members as possible of each poly relationship, or polycule, he encountered.  The interviews revealed some very interesting information.  For instance, the interviewees tended to want greater societal acceptance of their multiple relationships but, somewhat paradoxically, were reluctant to share the fact of their multiple relationships with family members (especially with parents), with friends other than close friends, and with co-workers.  Additionally, legal recognition appeared to be of only minor importance, though there was some interest in recognition of plural marriage and in recognition of multiple partners’ relationships to children.  Interestingly, several interviewees independently raised the desire to have a right to visit loved ones in the hospital when they were ill.  All in all, this is a fascinating project that will provide invaluable information about Vienna’s poly community, thus adding to the work others, such as Elisabeth Sheff and Hadar Aviram, have done on poly communities in the U.S. and that which Christian Klesse has done on poly communities in England.  Stefan also examined whether polyamory was perceived as a sexual orientation in the media or by poly individuals in Vienna, which dovetails with my previous scholarship on polyamory as a sexual orientation. I very much look forward to reading Stefan Ossmann's final product in book form.

NCCU Law Seeks Dean

This just in:

North Carolina Central University (NCCU) invites applications and nominations for the position of Dean of the School of Law.

As the nation’s first public liberal arts institution founded for African-Americans, NCCU has provided premier education through comprehensive programming at the baccalaureate, masters, professional and doctoral levels for more than a century. NCCU is part of the 17-campus University of North Carolina (UNC) system, and located in Durham, North Carolina’s acclaimed Research Triangle area.

Established in 1939, North Carolina Central University’s School of Law offers two programs leading to the Juris Doctor degree: a full-time day program and a part-time evening program. The School of Law provides an opportunity for an outstanding legal education to those who continue to be underrepresented in the legal profession.

The successful candidate will have an entrepreneurial and innovative mindset, tenacious drive and service-oriented heart. It is important that the next Dean be an advocate for the Law School’s founding mission: to provide a high quality, personalized, practice-oriented and affordable legal education to
historically underrepresented students from diverse backgrounds in order to help diversify the legal profession. The Dean will work closely with the Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, and other deans and academic leaders, under the overall University leadership of Chancellor Dr. Johnson O. Akinleye.

More information about the position requirements, the leadership agenda, and the application process can be found in the position profile here.  The NCCU School of Law web site is here and the University’s web site is here. 

The search is being assisted by Academic Search, Inc. For a confidential discussion of this position prior to applying or nominating, please contact John Garland, Senior Consultant, jwg@academic-search.com or William F. Howard, Vice President and Senior Consultant, wfh@academic-search.com. The position will remain open until filled, but only applications received by August 26, 2019 can be assured full consideration. Materials should include a letter of interest, a curriculum vitae, and a list of at least five professional references. Materials may be sent to NCCULawDean@academic-search.com.

North Carolina Central University values diversity and is committed to equal opportunity for all persons regardless of age, color, disability, ethnicity, marital status, national origin, race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, veteran status or any other status protected by law. Moreover, North Carolina Central University is open to people of all races.

Why History Favors Trump's Reelection

Like all Democrats, I am hopeful that Donald Trump will be a one-term president, and I will vote for anyone nominated to run against him in 2020. But I have to admit that the historical precedents favor Trump’s reelection. There have been just seven times in U.S. history when an incumbent political party (party, not individual president) failed to hold the White House for at least two terms, only one of which was in the past 120 years. Of course, that was Jimmy Carter’s loss in 1980.

All of the other one-term episodes were in the 19^th Century, and three of them were in odd situations. The Whigs failed twice to hold the presidency for consecutive terms, but that was largely because both of their elected presidents died in office – William Henry Harrison and Zachary Taylor – to be succeeded by less popular vice presidents, one of whom (John Tyler) was actually expelled from the party after becoming president.

The Democrats failed to hold the presidency twice in the late 19^th Century, both times following an administration of Grover Cleveland, who did win two non-consecutive terms. Benjamin Harrison was elected in between, resulting in the Republicans’ one and only failure to win at least two terms in a row (in 1892). The single other time a party failed to win consecutive terms was Democrat James K. Polk’s presidency, which was sandwiched between the two Whigs, Harrison and Taylor. (I am counting George Washington as a proto-Federalist, who was succeeded by fellow Federalist John Adams.)

There have been quite a few one-term presidents, from John Quincy Adams to George H.W. Bush. There were once six single terms in a row, as no president was reelected between Andrew Jackson in 1832, and Abraham Lincoln in 1864. The Republicans went on to win the next six elections – still a record – followed by the Cleveland-Harrison-Cleveland pas de deux, which ended with the election of William McKinley in 1896. Since then, with the exception of poor Jimmy Carter’s crushing defeat by Ronald Reagan, neither Democrats nor Republicans have been bounced from the White House after a single term.

If you are keeping score, the Whigs failed to hold the presidency twice, the Democrats failed four times, and the Republicans just once.

None of this bodes well for defeating the Trump-led Republicans in 2020. Mitch McConnell’s determination to make Barack Obama a one-term president failed badly, despite his shrewd control of the Senate agenda, as Americans seem very much inclined to give presidents, or at least their parties, a second chance at fulfilling their promises.

Although President Trump has experienced historically poor approval ratings, political parties – and especially the Republicans – have a long tradition of holding on to the presidency for at least two terms. Trump, of course, has trashed almost every other tradition, so there is hope that he and the Republicans will defy this one as well.

(Doo Wah) Diddy Wah Diddy

Among African Americans in the early twentieth century, Diddy Wah Diddy was known as a mythical town in the South where food was plentiful and no one had to work -- sort of like the hobo's Big Rock Candy Mountain (where the "cops have wooden legs" and "the hens lay soft-boiled eggs"). Zora Neale Hurston used "Diddy-Wah-Diddy" as the title of a collection of folk tales, published in 1938 by the WPA Writers' Project. In the title story, Hurston explained that Diddy Wah Diddy could only be "reached by a road that curves so much that a mule pulling a wagonload of fodder can eat off the back of the wagon as he goes.” Upon arrival, a traveler could find a sweet potato pie that kept growing larger as it was eaten: "Nobody can ever eat it all up. No matter how much you eat it grows just that much faster.”

The words have become song lyrics in various iterations, not always referring to the town.

Manfred Mann:

2nd Annual Women's Leadership in Legal Academia Conference

This just in:

The University of Virginia School of Law is proud to host the second annual Women’s Leadership in Academia Conference with the goal of advancing women professors, librarians and clinicians in leadership positions in the legal academy. Conference programming is focused on building skills and providing tools and information that are directly applicable to women aspiring to be leaders in legal education. The conference will address the unique perspectives and challenges of women and provide programming that will be useful to developing leaders.  The conference will be held July 18-19.  Details here.

8th Annual Promoting Diversity in Law School Leadership Workshop

The Eighth Annual Promoting Diversity in Law School Leadership Workshop, co-hosted by Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law and Seattle University School of Law, is coming to the Philly area this summer.  Villanova will be home turf this year, and it's scheduled for August 12-13.   The workshop is designed  to encourage and assist members of underrepresented groups to pursue deanships and other university and law school leadership positions. It will help participants to: determine whether to pursue a deanship and the right time; understand the nuts and bolts of the dean's role; prepare to be a successful candidate; learn how to negotiate appointment terms and ensure a successful transition; and, determine what other forms of university and law school leadership roles may be a good fit.  Register and find more details here.

Wayne Law - Levin Center Seeks Director

This just in:

The Levin Center at Wayne State University Law School seeks a new Director. The Levin Center seeks to encourage and facilitate fact-based, bipartisan oversight and civil discourse on matters of public policy. It educates future attorneys, business leaders, legislators and public servants on their role overseeing public and private institutions and using oversight as an instrument of change.

The Director will be part of the Levin Center’s executive leadership team and will provide strategic, operational and financial leadership for the Levin Center. The Director will also be expected to teach Wayne Law courses on an adjunct basis on subjects related to the Levin Center’s mission, including legislation, oversight, lobbying, public policy, and related subjects. A successful candidate may have experience working in a legislative office, government agency or as part of a legislative oversight team or experience researching legislative oversight and public policy. Successful candidates will also have experience in faculty or high-level administrative positions in an academic or functionally-equivalent organization.

Interested individuals should visit jobs.wayne.edu, select “Search Postings",  enter 044259 as the posting number; and search.

Elena Langan Named Dean of Touro Law

The Touro College and University System has announced that Elena B. Langan has been appointed dean of its law school.  Langan, who is currently the dean of Concordia Law, in Boise, will assume her new position in August.  She holds a JD from the University of Maryland.

Today Is Juneteenth

Here is an article I wrote on this day last year for CNN.com. Some things have changed since then, including personnel, but have they gotten much better?

And please take note that tomorrow is World Refugee Day.

On Juneteenth, let's commit to ending separation of parents and children at the border

By Steven Lubet

Updated 8:08 AM ET, Tue June 19, 2018

(CNN) On this day in 1865 -- commemorated now as Juneteenth -- news of emancipation reached the enslaved people of Texas. The complete abolition of slavery, which became irrevocable later that year with the ratification of the 13th Amendment, meant the end of involuntary servitude and the beatings, assaults and torture that often accompanied it.

It also meant the end of forced family separation, in which children were wrenched away from their parents for the profit and convenience of the slaveholding authorities. We know from the surviving slave narratives that the legalized seizure of children was among the most dreaded incidents of American slavery. As one memoirist put it, the "bitter and cruel punishments ... were as nothing to the sufferings I experienced by being separated from my mother."

It is likely that no one celebrating the original Juneteenth could have imagined that family separation would again become officially authorized -- in fact, required -- by the United States government over 150 years later.

Why Reducing Law School Debt Will Not Increase Public Interest Work

Deans and administrators often say that reducing student debt will allow more graduates to take public interest jobs. That is not really so, however, as I explain in this post on the Academe Blog:

Why Reducing Law School Debt Will Not Increase Public Interest Work

BY STEVEN LUBET

When the University of Alabama returned over $21 million to its largest-ever single donor, and removed his name from its law school, it either was or wasn’t because of his outspoken opposition to the state’s ultra-restrictive new abortion law. According to Hugh Culverhouse, Jr., “the administrators at the university [chose] zealotry over the well-being of its own students” in retribution for his support for an ACLU lawsuit against the state, and especially his call for a student boycott as long as the abortion statute remained on the books. The university tells a different story, stating that the dispute had instead been over Culverhouse’s attempted interference in academic matters, including “numerous demands about the operations of the University of Alabama School of Law.”

Writing recently in the Washington Post, University of Alabama law professor Ronald Krotoszynski provided some details. Without taking sides in the larger dispute, Krotoszynski confirms that Culverhouse “was insisting on Alabama significantly increasing the law school’s entering class size,” which, Krotoszynski explains, would have been a very bad idea.

“Class size has a direct, and inverse, relationship to employment outcomes for graduates,” Krotoszysnki explained, and the current job market – only now recovering from the crash of 2008 – dictates that Alabama keep its entering classes relatively small. And there are further obvious benefits such as fostering an intimate learning atmosphere and, of course, maintaining student quality.

Krotoszysnki makes an additional point, however, which I think is mistaken:

Rather than pushing for law schools to enroll more students, it would be better if would-be donors facilitated public-interest career paths by making it possible for current law students to graduate with lower debt loads. Taking this step would permit more newly minted lawyers to take positions that involve providing legal services to chronically underserved communities desperately in need of them.

I am all in favor of reducing student debt loads. But that is not likely to result in more students taking “lower-paying jobs as prosecutors and public defenders, and with state and federal agencies,” simply because the number of such jobs is relatively fixed and there are already more applicants than slots. So even if more graduates are able to enter public interest work, the number of jobs is not going to expand to accommodate them.

CFP: Gender Equity in Law Schools

This just in:

VILLANOVA UNIVERSITY CHARLES WIDGER SCHOOL OF LAW
ANNUAL NORMAN J. SHACHOY SYMPOSIUM, OCTOBER 25, 2019
VILLANOVA LAW REVIEW

“GENDER EQUITY IN LAW SCHOOLS”

Call for Papers: The Villanova Law Review invites proposals from faculty to present and/or publish at the upcoming annual symposium, which will focus on gender equity in law schools. Accepted presenters will have the opportunity to participate in the symposium at the Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law in Villanova, Pennsylvania, on Friday, October 25, 2019. In addition, their papers will be published in the symposium issue of the Villanova Law Review, volume 65.

Deadline for Proposals: July 15, 2019

Submission Requirements: Submissions should include contact information, a CV, and an abstract (up to 500 words) of the proposed presentation. Preference will be given to submitters who intend to write an article for the symposium issue. Submissions should be forwarded to Professor Cathy Lanctot, lanctot@law.villanova.edu, and to Alexandra Rice, arice4@law.villanova.edu. Managing Editor of Operations for the Villanova Law Review.

Selected presenters will be notified by August 1, 2019. The Villanova Law Review will cover reasonable travel expenses for presenters.

Scope of Topic: Despite the significant demographic change in the gender composition of law faculty during the last 25 years, persistent questions of unequal treatment and unconscious bias continue to hamper the ability of female faculty to achieve full equality in law schools.

The symposium will examine a broad variety of issues relating to gender equity in law schools, such as: teaching issues (e.g., whether excellent teaching is valued in law schools, whether women faculty have a disproportionate teaching load, whether women are disproportionately present/absent in particular substantive courses, whether women are evaluated differently by students); scholarly issues (e.g., whether areas of particular interest to women are undervalued, whether the work of women is given equal weight by law reviews, and whether female faculty bring a different voice to legal scholarship); service issues (whether non-scholarly tasks performed by female faculty disproportionately disadvantage them with respect to status and compensation); the gender disparity in legal writing and in clinical education, which also produces substantial pay disparities that fall disproportionately on women in legal education; intersections with issues of race, class, gender, and sexual identity; and the effect of gender inequity on law students. The symposium will also examine recent pay discrimination litigation at Denver Law School and focus on best practices for law schools that want to avoid similar litigation in the future.

The Importance of ROTC on University Campuses [UPDATED]

My old friend and colleague Jeff Rice has an oped in today's Chicago Tribune, explaining why he has reconsidered his 1960s-era opposition to ROTC. It's not so much that times have changed since the Vietnam War, but rather that he has come to a greater understanding of the military. I strongly agree with him.

He did not write the headline -- editors do that on daily papers -- and he tells me that he does not care for it, so I am not including it on the blog. Here are the opening paragraphs of the piece:

On Friday, I will attend the solemn ceremony at Northwestern University in which Naval Reserve Officer Training Corps students will take the oath to become members of the United States Navy and Marine Corps. As both a faculty member and graduate of Northwestern, I try to attend each year as these outstanding young people commit themselves to a life fraught with potential danger in service to our country. They have earned and deserve our solidarity and support.

Almost 50 years ago, as a Northwestern undergraduate, I was arrested for damaging the NROTC offices during an anti-Vietnam War demonstration. At the time, many of us believed that NROTC contributed to the war effort, and therefore had to be removed from campus.

As a leftist then and now, I have no qualms about admitting to my errors, one of which was a wholesale misunderstanding of the importance of the ROTC program — Army, Navy and Marine Corps and Air Force — on college campuses.

You can read Jeff's powerful and moving essay here.

UPDATE: Inside Higher Ed picked up the story, here, with some interesting comments.