The Faculty Lounge

Harrison and Mashburn Ask the Meaning of Citations And Suggest Reform

Jeff Harrison and Amy Mashburn of the University of Florida have a paper up on ssrn, "Citations, Justifications, and the Troubled State of Legal Scholarship: An Empirical Study."  It asks the uses that authors and courts make of legal scholarship.  The ask whether scholarship is worth the cost, which they estimate at $240 million per year.  Cribbing now from their abstract:

Recent pedagogical, economic and technological changes require law schools to reevaluate their resource allocations. Although typically viewed in terms of curricular changes, it is important also to focus on the very significant investment in legal scholarship and its impact. Typically this has been determined by some version of citation counting with little regard for what it means to be cited. This Article discusses why this is a deeply flawed measure of impact. Much of that discussion is based on an empirical study the authors conducted. The investigation found that citation by other authors is highly influenced by the rank of the review in which a work is published and the school from which the author graduated. Courts, on the other hand, are less sensitive to these markers of institutional authority. Perhaps more importantly, when the purpose of the citation is examined, a very small handful of those citing a work do so for anything related to the ideas, reasoning, methodology, or conclusions found in the cited work. This is slightly less true for judicial citation compared to citations by other authors. Given the level of current investment in legal scholarship and findings that reliance on it is far lower than citation counts would suggest, the authors offer a number of recommendation designed to increase accountability of legal scholars and the utility of what they produce.

I'm guessing there's going to be a lot of talk about this paper.

Yamamoto et al on Jeju

Eric Yamamoto, Miyoko Pettit, and Sara Lee have posted on ssrn an extensive paper on the Jeju massacre, in which perhaps as many as 30,000 South Korean citizens were killed.  Their paper is called "Unfinished Business: A Joint South Korea and United States Jeju 4.3 Tragedy Task Force to Further Implement Recommendations and Foster Comprehensive and Enduring Social Healing Through Justice."  This is yet another sign that literature on reparations is making a comeback and is increasing in sophistication.

In Memoriam: John Murray

I let this one fall off my radar.  John Murray, a former dean of both Pittsburgh Law and Villanova Law, and President of Duquesne,  passed away February 11.  He was 82.  Murray joined the Duquesne Law faculty in 1959. 

In Memoriam: Monroe Freedman

The noted legal ethicist, Monroe Freedman, passed away on Wednesday.  He was 86.  For the last 42 years, he had been a member of the Hofstra Law faculty and he served as the school's second dean.  Among criminal defense attorneys, he was widely recognized for his support of zealous advocacy of criminal defendants.  

For Fans

Live long and prosper.

Non-Contiguous Law School Mergers

The recent news out of Saint Paul, Minnesota that William Mitchell and Hamline are merging their law schools was intriguing in many ways, not least because of the ways that this announcement fueled speculation that Mitchell/Hamline was just the first in a series of soon-to-be-made announcements as to forthcoming law school mergers.  In this ongoing speculation, I have been struck how the focus is usually on certain states and/or metropolitan areas—Illinois/Chicago; Pennsylvania/Philadelphia; Massachusetts/Boston are often mentioned—as if mergers have to happen, or would be most advantageous to all stakeholders, if they happened in contiguous areas.  Part of my scholarship is focused on non-territorial forms of governance, and I was also born and raised in one part of the non-contiguous state of Michigan, so I have been interested for some time in the continuing power of Westphalian ideas of (territorial) imagining and belonging.  Relatedly, I wonder (in the context of legal education):  Why not have the next wave of law school mergers happen in an inter-urban, inter-stitial, and/or inter-national manner?

Indeed, in some ‘local’ contexts, mergers of existing law schools may be especially difficult or impossible.  At the very least, familiarity can breed contempt, especially if one is overly familiar with the historical patterns of student recruitment/raiding/free markets operating in one’s local law school market.  Alternatively, local merger options may not be attractive (for either party) because of serious differences in law schools' finances, mission, good governance, and/or student and faculty diversity.

What might the (ostensibly) oncoming wave of mergers look like instead?  Might there be a New York law school looking for a Los Angeles mate?  Can the Jesuit mission extend from San Francisco to Saint Louis, or would such a match fall the way of East and West Pakistan?  Are there candidates for a more intense U.S.-Canadian partnership than that found between Detroit and Windsor?  Wouldn’t every budding common-lawyer like a New Orleans outpost in the civil jurisdiction of Louisiana?

Black Originalism, Part 1

In prior posts I wrote about two speeches/dialogues from 1865: Henry Garnett’s speech and sermon in the House (here and here), and the exchange between William Sherman and Garrison Frazier in Savannah.   As I mentioned, these are two sources that I am looking at in my project of exploring African-American writings, speeches, and actions from the period to help think about the possible meanings of the Reconstruction Amendments.  I'll now take a break from my 150-year anniversary posts to give an overview of the project.

By the 1860s African Americans had built a well-established discourse and activist community in the North.  It developed with the abolitionist movement, but it also functioned as a support network for building African-American civil society in the Jim Crow culture of the North.  With the end of slavery, southern black communities immediately engaged in public discussions and debates about the meaning and implementation of freedom and citizenship.  And with Reconstruction, black representation in local, state, and national government was brief but substantial. The ideas discussed and advanced within the black public sphere provide an important source for how freedom and citizenship were being thought about at the time by the people for whom it meant the most.  And while historians have been exploring black history from this period for a number of years, very little of this has made its way into legal or constitutional analysis.

The main exception to this has been the use of African-American sources in the Second Amendment cases, Heller and McDonald, relying in part on work by scholars (Akhil Amar, Robert Cottrol & Raymond Diamond, and others), and in Justice Thomas’s opinions on affirmative action (e.g. Grutter).  Both the majority opinion and Justice Thomas’s concurrence in McDonald cite black newspapers and black conventions to support an individual rights reading of the amendment as incorporated through the Fourteenth Amendment.  I don’t know about you, but this struck me as odd. 

Prof. Brant Hellwig Named Dean at W&L Law

 
Yesterday, W&L announced that Dean Nora Demleitner would be stepping down June 30 after three years at the helm.  Today, W&L announced her replacement and he is already in Lexington:  Prof. Brant Hellwig.

Cribbing from the announcement:

"Hellwig joined the W&L law school faculty in 2012. He teaches a variety of tax courses, including Federal Income Taxation of Individuals, Partnership Taxation, Corporate Taxation, and Estate and Gift Taxation. ...

"At W&L Law, Hellwig has served on a number of critical committees, including two years as chair of the Faculty Appointments Committee. He also was a member of the Board of Trustees task force working group that developed the recently announced strategic transition plan, which positions the law school to maintain its distinctive mission while adapting to the changing environment of both legal education and the legal profession.

* * *

"Hellwig received his B.S. summa cum laude and J.D. magna cum laude from Wake Forest University. After practicing with the firm of Bell, Davis & Pitt, P.A. in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, he pursued his LL.M. in taxation at New York University School of Law, where he received the Harry J. Rudick Memorial Award for distinction in the tax program.

"After serving as law clerk to the Hon. Juan F. Vasquez of the U.S. Tax Court, Hellwig began his academic career at NYU as an acting assistant professor. He then accepted a permanent appointment to the University of South Carolina School of Law, where he was a member of the faculty for 10 years. During his tenure at South Carolina and W&L, Hellwig has received a number of institutional awards recognizing both his teaching and his scholarship.

* * *

A hearty CONGRATULATIONS to Brant!

While I am slightly surprised at the rapidity of Brant's appointment as Dean, it looks to be a great call.  Although I don't know Brant, I have heard great things from colleagues at both W&L and South Carolina.

As a W&L Law alum, I am (of course) very interested in the goings on in Lexington.  I [literally] commented to a colleague earlier today that I thought W&L should look internally for its next Dean given the wonderful folks on the faculty there.  Brant certainly fits the bill and obviously appreciates what a special and unique place W&L Law is. 

I gave a talk on Monday at W&L on mental health issues and loved being back in Lewis Hall (although I was bummed I missed Al's talk at the Journal of Civil Rights symposium). 

[The photo is of W&L's iconic Washington Hall and Colonnade with the roof of Lee Chapel in the foreground and the snowy Alleghenies in the background.  Lexington is truly one of the most beautiful and wonderful towns in America.]

Florida Law Dean Search

The usual State of Florida public disclosure data is here.  For a prior post on this issue of public disclosure of applications, look here.

Call for Papers: Natural Resources Journal

From an email message that I received in recent days:

The Natural Resources Journal (NRJ) at the University of New Mexico School of Law seeks proposals for academic articles on law and policy issues surrounding the National Park Service.  The NRJ’s fall 2015 issue, Number 56.1, will honor the agency’s 100th year in pursuit of its mission to “conserve the scenery, the natural and historic objects, and the wildlife” in the United States’ national parks, and to “provide for the public's enjoyment of these features in a manner that will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.”  With more than 400 parks across the country and annual visitation by 275 million people, America’s national parks have grown into a staple of American life and a model of conservation for the world.  We invite proposals for papers that explore all aspects of the national parks, although preference will be given to topics with legal and ecological implications.  Suggested topics including National Park Service history, wildlife conservation, legal developments affecting parks, parks’ water acquisitions, innovative modes of park management, efforts to designate new parks, and interfaces between national parks, Native American tribes and other neighboring communities. 

First published in 1961, NRJ is an international, interdisciplinary journal devoted to the study of law and policy issues surrounding natural resources. The NRJ's contributors come from various disciplines and provide diverse perspectives on the complex issues raised when resource development and environmental concerns intersect. The NRJ does not endorse any particular viewpoint, but seeks to highlight the best scholarship from a wide range of perspectives on law and policy topics.

Email your proposal to NRJsubmissions@gmail.com. Please include the following documents:  1) an abstract of 300 – 500 words; 2) proposed sources; and 3) an author CV.  Abstracts are due by April 1, 2015, and notification of selected authors will occur shortly thereafter.  Manuscripts will be due July 15, 2015.

Finished articles will generally be 5,000 to 15,000 words in length (15 to 50 double-spaced pages) with citations for all statements of fact.   NRJ prefers articles with a clear thesis or argument that can materially advance the academic and policy-making discussion surrounding national parks.

For additional details, please refer to the Natural Resources Journal submission guidelines at http://lawschool.unm.edu/nrj/article-submission.php. For more information about the NRJ or to see past issues, go to http://lawschool.unm.edu/nrj/. Please direct questions to Submissions Editor Anne Minard at NRJsubmissions@gmail.com. 

Berkeley Law Fellowship

From our friends at Berkeley Law comes the following announcement:

The Berkeley Center for Law, Business and the Economy is seeking to hire a Research Fellow with an anticipated start date of August 1, 2015.

The Berkeley Center for Law, Business and the Economy (BCLBE) is Berkeley Law’s hub for rigorous, relevant, empirically based research and education on the interrelationships of law, business, and the economy. BCLBE informs students, policymakers and the public of the implications of this innovative work to promote positive outcomes on business operations, economic growth, and market efficiency. BCLBE’s interdisciplinary approach to basic research, timely policy research, curriculum innovation, and public education empowers current and future leaders in business, law and policy to tackle the most pressing problems of today and tomorrow.

For more information about the position, including required qualifications and application materials, please visit: https://aprecruit.berkeley.edu/apply/JPF00669

The final deadline for applications is April 30, 2015. If you have questions about the position, contact academicpositions@law.berkeley.edu.

The University of California, Berkeley is an AA/EEO employer. 

I've also uploaded a fuller description of the fellowship opportunity here:  Download BCLBE_Fellow_job_announcment_long 02_20_15

LSAC Data and Predicting Number of Applicants for Fall 2015, Part 9

The LSAC is now reporting that "As of 2/20/15, there are 233,706 fall 2015 applications submitted by 34,054 applicants. Applicants are down 4.8% and applications are down 7.5% from 2014.  Last year at this time, we had 66% of the preliminary final applicant count."  If this year's applicants follow last year's pattern, then we will have about about 51,507 total applicants for the fall 2015.  The last post in this series is here.

Law Clerks, Confidentiality, and David Lat's "Supreme Ambitions"

Out here in the great Pacific NW, the Portland outpost of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals just had a fantastic book club discussion of David Lat's new novel, "Supreme Ambitions," hosted by none other than Judge Susan Graber.  As the Washington Post noted, "Supreme Ambitions" is "an engrossing page-turner that focuses on the ... subject of federal judges and their law clerks."  It's also a thriller, a love story, and tale about an ethical quandry--all wrapped up in one extremely diverting novel!

Among his other pursuits, Lat is founder and managing editor of Above the Law, and thus tightly plugged into the sturm und drung of being a newly graduated lawyer in the 21st century.    This, combined with a tremendous variety of ages and experience at the book club luncheon (ranging from fresh-faced law clerks to almost 30 years on the federal bench), made for a fascinating and wide-ranging discussion about the topics in the book.

So as not to give away the plot of the book (which I highly recommend), I wanted to focus on one topic that sparked a good discussion at the book club meeting:  the question of confidentiality.  Judicial clerkships are an interesting beast, yoking the appointed or elected judges to brand new law graduates, and giving these law clerks unprecedented access to confidential information and influence over how cases are decided.  How strong is the ethos of confidentiality in this atmosphere?   If there is potential wrongdoing by a judge, is it the law clerk's duty to report it?  Or are law clerks simply extensions of the judge, not authorized in their own right to do anything without the imprimatur of the court?

We've had law clerk confidentiality leaks before, of course.  Edward Lazarus, a former Blackmun clerk, famously--and controversially-- published an entire book about the "secrets" of the Supreme Court in Closed Chambers.  As the blurb for the book itself notes, this caused a "firestorm of controversy," with an argument about confidentiality and ethical violation pitted against an argument about openness and transparency in the justice system.

This last point, in my opinion, is why both lawyers and laymen have a constant fascination with what goes on inside the judiciary.  Much of American adjudication takes place behind closed doors.  Any  insider account is all the more thrilling because the general public knows so little about the machinations of decision-making.   This is particularly true in criminal justice, where we have gone from a system of jury trials to a system of plea bargains, shifting the adjudications from public to private.   The public simply desires to peer behind the alabaster columns and underneath their robes, whether it's the local judiciary or the Supreme Court (which still refuses to allow cameras for oral arguments!)

In any case, if you want to have a captivating read that also gives you the inside scoop on the exciting life of a 9th Circuit law clerk in glorious Pasadena, CA (home to my beloved judge A. Wallace Tashima) , be sure to pick up Supreme Ambitions!

More on Twitter and Information Sharing

For those who followed my posts on law professor use of Twitter, I thought this recent article, called "The Unbearable Lightness of Tweeting," at The Atlantic was illuminating. The gist of the article was an author's self-study of the rate that users click through to read an article. The results leave a lot of questions about the information sharing value of Twitter, not just for law professors, but for everyone.

Wyoming Law Announces Dean Finalists

And they are: Klint Alexander (Vanderbilt), Donald Judges (Arkansas), Andrew Strauss (Widener-Delaware), and Rodney Smolla (visiting at Georgia.)  

DePaul Law Announces Dean Finalists

And they are: Jennifer Rosato Perea (Northern Illinois), Cynthia Fountaine (Southern Illinois) and Allison Tirres (DePaul). 

West Virginia Law Dean Finalists Announced

And they are: Jennifer Bard (Texas Tech), Gary Simson (Mercer), Greg Bowman (West Virginia), Robert Ackerman (Wayne State), and Beverly Moran (Vanderbilt).  

Williams on Intellectual Manhood

Coming very soon to a bookstore near you is Timothy Williams' Intellectual Manhood: University, Self, and Society in the Antebellum South.  You can read the introduction and part of the first chapter at the UNC Press website right now.  Cribbing now from the UNC Press description: 

In this in-depth and detailed history, Timothy J. Williams reveals that antebellum southern higher education did more than train future secessionists and proslavery ideologues. It also fostered a growing world of intellectualism flexible enough to marry the era’s middle-class value system to the honor-bound worldview of the southern gentry. By focusing on the students’ perspective and drawing from a rich trove of their letters, diaries, essays, speeches, and memoirs, Williams narrates the under examined story of education and manhood at the University of North Carolina, the nation’s first public university.

Every aspect of student life is considered, from the formal classroom and the vibrant curriculum of private literary societies to students’ personal relationships with each other, their families, young women, and college slaves. In each of these areas, Williams sheds new light on the cultural and intellectual history of young southern men, and in the process dispels commonly held misunderstandings of southern history. Williams's fresh perspective reveals that students of this era produced a distinctly southern form of intellectual masculinity and maturity that laid the foundation for the formulation of the post–Civil War South.

This book looks absolutely terrific!

Bioethx Chat on Reverse Transplant Tourism Tonight

Those of you on twitter should feel free to join me tonight as I host a Bioethx chat on Reverse Transplant Tourism. Given that I am a twitter moron, still don't understand hashtags, and find it hard to even understand much tweet shorthand, this could be fun.  

Postdoctoral Research Associate for Princeton and Slavery Project

Here's an extremely exciting position -- for two reasons.  First, it reflects the growing interest in digital humanities (back in the day it used to quantitative history -- but this goes well beyond use of statistics for historical analysis) and second, it's on slavery at Princeton.

Princeton University seeks candidates for an appointment as a postdoctoral research associate housed jointly in the Council for the Humanities and the Center for Digital Humanities. The successful candidate will spend half of their time developing a website for the Princeton and Slavery Project and the remaining half time will be devoted to the candidate's own research project and to participating in the intellectual life of the University. Candidates must have a Ph.D. in History or a closely allied field, with a demonstrated familiarity with 18th and 19th century American history. Appointment is for one year, with expectation of renewal for a second year pending satisfactory performance.

The website development project will require the postdoc to translate existing research into a dynamic visual form, and to collaborate with colleagues in other divisions of the University, including the University Archives, Art Museum and History Department.

Preference will be given to candidates who can create custom themes in Omeka/Neatline, a PHP based content management system, and who have demonstrated skills in PHP, CSS3, and HTML5.