What I don't understand is, why is the Chemerinsky episode atracting so much attention, whereas, when the UC faculty shout down Lawrence Summers and prevent him from speaking, no one says boo? Every day, the blogosphere reminds of what hypocrites academics are, and why I don't respond to those fund raising appeals from the University of California.

The point about Larry Summers is appropriate. Will we see as much outrage on the Left about the Summers non-invitation as there was on the Right about UCI's Law Dean? And will the LA Times notice in the same way?

Darryl,
As a Cal alumnus, I must take umbrage at you giving our business school to Irvine. There's is Paul Merage.

Other than that, I agree that the last thing we need is another law school spewing out liberal clones.

Oops, sorry about Haas :-(

But UCI does have a business school.

The most startling revelation is that California Supreme Court Chief Justice George communicated his and apparently the court's displeasure over the death penalty habeas corpus article appearing in the Los Angeles Times by way of a letter to Chancellor Drake.

The story reported:

Drake acknowledged that Chemerinsky had attracted significant opposition from conservatives, but he would not name the people who had contacted him. He said that their complaints were not the cause for his decision to terminate the dean.The criticism included a letter from the California Supreme Court criticizing a Chemerinsky opinion piece in The Times.

In an interview Friday, George said Chemerinsky made a "gross error" that was "very troubling" to the court in an Aug. 16 article that criticized U.S. Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales. Drake offered him the job that same day.

George, an appointee of Gov. Pete Wilson, said that Chemerinsky wrote incorrectly that only one state, Arizona, provided lawyers for death row inmates who want to file a constitutional challenge, known as a habeas corpus petition, to have their sentences or convictions overturned.

George said he was surprised Chemerinsky would make such a mistake. The court asked Court Clerk Frederick K. Ohlrich to write a letter to the editor to The Times to correct the piece.

"None of us could understand how somebody, let alone someone who is very bright and a fine legal scholar, could get that wrong," George said. "It had nothing to do with his philosophy. I certainly feel he is an outstanding legal scholar and a fine advocate."

The Times has no record of the letter being received as a letter to the editor or as a request for correction.

George gave a copy of the letter to Malcolm.

Malcolm said he gave the letter to Drake. "It disturbed him, but I don't think it was the reason for his decision."

Chemerinsky was angered by the letter when told about it by The Times.

"If the justices sent a letter to UC Irvine with the goal of influencing the dean process, that's inappropriate," he said.

He also stood by his article. "My op-ed was accurate in saying California does not comply with the federal standards for providing counsel to those on death row in their post-conviction proceedings, and Arizona is the only state deemed in federal district court to have met the federal standards."

Michael Schroeder, one of Orange County's most powerful GOP political players, said a group of 20 prominent Republicans organized against Chemerinsky in recent weeks, believing him to be a "longtime partisan gunslinger" and too "polarizing" for the job.

Another member of the group, who asked not to be identified, said Drake's cellphone number was distributed so the protesters could call the chancellor.

Antonovich said he too worked to derail the appointment by sending an e-mail to a small group of supporters and urging them to contact the university.

UC President Robert C. Dynes issued a statement Friday to The Times praising Drake's integrity and saying that the chancellor has assured him that he was not influenced by political pressure when he rescinded the offer to Chemerinsky.

I note also that September's California Bar Journal, the monthly newspaper mailed to all California lawyers, contains several letters vehemently criticizing Chemerinsky's August story recounting the last U.S. Supreme Court term.

What business the California Supreme Court and its chief justice have in spending taxpayer money to contact Chemerinsky's prospective employer is beyond me. It's a disgrace. Chief Justice George appears to be part of the right-wing cult that was bent on denying Chemerinsky the deanship.

Bombast, the op ed piece on the death penalty was written and accepted prior to his receiving the offer at Irvine.

Michael Antonovich is a term-limited out, ultraconservative, not particularly impressive Supervisor in a different county. If the Chancellor of UC Irvine was influenced by his campaign to smear Erwin, that Chancellor is beyond mad.

At this point, Professor Chemerinsky is no longer a good choice to be dean of the UCI law school. The most important role of a dean is funneling funds into his law school. To avoid turning off potential donors, the dean has to be bland and inoffensive, not a polarizing force. No matter when written, publishing opeds that appear to have been inadequately fact-checked breeds opposition. Moreover, a dean is an administrator in an administrative hierarchy who has to win his boss's approval, not publicly challenge him in the newspaper.

Bombast,

I don't dispute anything you just wrote. Though, your comments raise a few questions in my mind.

1. He didn't say anything about the Duke Lacrosse case. Isn't that a good thing? There was a rush to judgment, and although it was pretty clear to those privy to the evidence at the beginning that they were innocent, Isn't nonetheless a good thing that he didn't "take sides". His activism, if my understanding is correct, is generally limited to - although touching upon politically sensitive issues - interpretation of Constitutional Law, of which, he is considered a foremost expert. I only know of Chemerinsky b/c of his Aspen Series ConLaw Book, which helped me get an A in class, I didn't know he was a big liberal activist until this little controversy broke.

I didn't know that he trashed UNC in the news and all that... could you send a link, b/c every google news search just gets me stuff about UCI.

2. Who the fuck is Drake? And why is this guy in any position to tell Chemerinsky to "cool it". We are talking about a new law school - albeit a UC, so there'll be a lot of money and resources behind it - which will undoubtedly start as a Tier 4. Shouldn't Drake already be aware of the reputation of his new Dean? I mean, it's that reputation which probably got him hired in the first place?

UCI fucked this up...

THIS IS THE ISSUE: Does Chemerinsky's liberal slant (like 90% of all law profs) means that he would engage in liberal biased in his hiring/administration of the Law School?

OR - and I think this is the case at my Law School, which also has a liberal rep - would his personal liberal slant cause him to be even more welcoming of a diverse community of ideas and ideologies, because he has to compensate for his personal liberalism.

also, he never "trashed" UNC, he simply talked about the lack of adequate financial commitment, which is a problem at many state schools. Natty B, I have no doubt that Erwin would reach across the spectrum to hire professors. As evidenced by the reasonable conservative voices (Kmiec for eg) being liberal has never precluded him getting along, respecting and being respected by conservatives. Moreover, he has worked in administrative positions with all sorts before and succeeded admirably.