The next time you read about Israel’s awful inhumanity in not immediately waving Palestinians with medical problems through checkpoints, consider this: According to a gag order lifted Sunday by Shin Bet Security Service, Islamic Jihad militants [terrorists] involved in planning attacks within Israel were arrested earlier this month. One of the militants [terrorists], a resident […]
Author Archive | David Bernstein
Bleg for Help Finding Sixth Circuit Fourth Amendment Case:
I’ve been looking for, but can’t seem to find, a Sixth Circuit en banc case from approximately 1991 upholding a search and seizure under the Fourth Amendment. I’m specifically interested in the dissenting opinion, which, as I recall, went through a devastating list of contradictory testimony given by federal officers in various cases as to […]
Harsh Critique of Diversity Hiring in Law Schools:
Professor Michael Livingston has published a harsh critique of diversity hiring of faculty. Agree or disagree with Livingston, my experience is that he is expressing views that many professors, including many liberals, agree with, but rarely express publicly for fear of career-related repercussions (as Livingston discusses). For example, I remember once having lunch with a […]
Why I’m not Here this Week:
Because I’m guest-blogging at Overlawyered.com, filling in for Walter Olson. Comments are welcome over there, although the site is set up so that each comment needs to be reviewed by the post’s author, so the comments don’t appear instantaneously.
Justice Ginsburg on Foreign Law and the U.S. Constitution:
I haven’t followed the debate over the use of foreign precedents, international treaties, etc., to interpret U.S. law as closely as I should. Thus, I was, but perhaps shouldn’t have been, surprised and rather horrified to read this speech by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. For example, she writes: Interpreting U.S. Supreme Court precedent, a divided […]
London Review of Books Article on the Israel Lobby:
The London Review of Books has a lengthy article by Professors John Mearsheimer of University of Chicago and Stephen Walt of Harvard, arguing that given that Israel is such a malevolent country that acts in so many ways contrary to U.S. interets, support for Israel in the U.S. must be primarily, perhaps solely, a result […]
Housing Warning from Federal Reserve Board Governor:
Via The Housing Bubble Blog: “The Federal Reserve has no intention of preserving all of the recent gains in home price values, said Federal Reserve board governor Donald Kohn on Thursday. If real estate prices begin to erode, homeowners should not expect to see all the gains of recent years preserved by monetary policy actions,’ […]
Is African American Enrollment in Law School Down?:
One frequently hears that the enrollment of African American students in law school has “declined,” calling for desperate measures such as the ABA’s new “diversity” standard. [See, e.g., a statement from Marian M. Yim, Chairperson, Education Subcommittee, ABA Council on Racial and Ethnic Justice, stating that there is a “growing crising [sic] in declining enrollment […]
House Resolution Overwhelmingly Supports the Solomon Amendment:
TaxProf has the details.
Surrender of Jericho Terrorists:
“Our prison is surrounded on all sides by Israelis. They are asking us over loudspeaker to come out,” Ahed Abu Ghoulmi, one of the targeted prisoners. “We will not come out under any circumstances.” “We are not going to surrender. We are going to face our destiny with courage,” Sa’adat later told the Arab satellite […]
Why Did the Law Professors Lose So Badly in the Solomon Amendment Case?:
N.Y. Times: Others offered their own theories. There is the reactionary Supreme Court hypothesis. William N. Eskridge Jr., a Yale law professor who helped shape the losing side’s arguments, said the defeat demonstrates the “ridiculously obvious” point that the Supreme Court is “a justificatory instrument” for military policy. Then there is the clueless law professor […]
Update on the ABA’s New “Diversity” Standard:
The Michigan Daily has an informative (albeit, as you might expect, rather Michigan-centric) story on the standard, noting criticism by me that the standard is intended to and will have the effect of requiring some law schools [the author says “small”; I tried to get across “resource poor” and “non-elite”] to break the law. The […]
ETrade Bank Customer Service:
I’m having trouble with a new CD account I tried to open with ETrade Bank via the Internet. I called customer service, and, after getting a message that my wait time would be five minutes, I’ve now been on hold for forty-seven minutes. An individual I spoke to previously at ETrade financial said there is […]
Congratulations to Nate Oman:
Nate Oman, who has been associated with various legal blogs, will join the William & Mary Law School faculty in the Fall. Among other claims to fame, while still in college Nate spent the Summer of 1998 as my research assistant for You Can’t Say That! Welcome to the world of legal academia, Nate!
Lund and Lerner on Humility and the Supreme Court:
My GMU colleagues Nelson Lund and Craig Lerner have a provocative piece over at National Review online suggesting how we can move the Supreme Court away from the current nine cults of personality that prevail to a more truly conservative Court: Take away their law clerks…. We propose to leave the justices free to decide […]