Brandeis, final exams, and animal crackers

I tossed a quarter this morning on the memorial (at right) for Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, who is buried just outside the front doors of the law school. For years, law students at U of L have placed coins on Brandeis' grave site during exams. If you are feeling really unprepared, or believe in lots of luck, you might place a box of animal crackers on the stone (Brandeis loved animal crackers). Anyway, we have now finished three of our finals, and there are two more to go -- Property this morning, and Civil Procedure on Friday. It's a grueling marathon, but the end is in sight. And when we finish, there will only be one day to go before the Kentucky Derby. Sort of ironic. The fastest two minutes in sports will arrive just after what has to be the longest year of our lives.

Final exams looming

The outside world is once again disappearing as final exams approach. This morning I printed out my outlines -- roughly 20 pages per class -- and hammered staples into each one. For the next 13 days, these stacks of paper will take over my life. They will be scrutinized and memorized. They will join me for coffee in the morning, for study group sessions in the afternoon, and for a few hours in the evening (I draw the line at the bedroom. Nobody but my wife and John Grisham get near the sheets.)

So, what the heck is an outline? For the uninitiated, it's basically a long list of condensed notes from the cases we have read all semester. Black-letter rules are explained. Important cases are noted.  Lots of Roman numerals in between. No two outlines are the same, and what works for one person might seem like total garbage to another. Here's a sample from the first page of my Torts outline (I always put a quote from the professor near the top. I'm still not sure why I do this).

Torts

Leibson, Spring 2010

“If I’m the owner of the Corbin Motor Lodge, I’m standin’ on my head spittin’ wooden nickels.” – Leibson, Feb. 17

* Negligence revisited, elements

            1. Duty owed by defendant to plaintiff

            2. Breach of duty

            3. Causation between duty breached and injury

            4. Injury

I. Intervening causes

A. Definition: an act, by a third party, that occurs after the original negligent act, and before the injury inflicted on the plaintiff.

1. Consequences that follow in unbroken sequence, without intervening cause, from original negligent act, are natural and proximate.

2. Recovery or not?

a. Complete lack of foreseeability of result = no recovery

b. No foreseeability of manner in which result happens = recovery.

c. Leibson: so long as some damage can be foreseen and you are negligent, any damage traceable to negligence can be recovered.

B. Moral element: factors such as imputable knowledge, justifiable ignorance, and D’s intent are often taken into account, but when injury is intentional, courts often stretch to find causation. If injury not intentional, courts often stop at earlier stage of causation.

            C. Palsgraf

1. Leibson: in order for negligent D to have to pay injured P, there must be a foreseeable risk to the plaintiff that establishes a relationship between D and P. Relationship is established by a duty, which is created by foreseeability.

2. Leibson: one word that drives liability in negligence: foreseeability, for both duty and proximate causation.

3. Dissenting judge: we owe a duty to everyone in world, not just particular Ps .

4. Mother of all nuggets: The risk reasonably to be perceived defines the duty to be obeyed, and risk imports relation. AKA, the foreseeable risk defines the duty to be obeyed within the zone of danger/range of apprehension. (aka, you must have a relationship to have a duty)

5. Negligence is not actionable unless it involves invasion of legally protected interest or the violation of a right.

II. Superseding causes

A. A superseding force is not foreseeable by the party that creates the original negligence. A person must foresee the “normal consequences” of his conduct, but is not responsible for extraordinarily negligent intervening acts of third persons (or entities)

B. Leibson: the risk reasonably to be perceived drives the foreseeability, and therefore the issue of whether the cause is superseding.

C. Criminal acts: in Watson v. Ky, court says bridge company could not have foreseen malicious and criminal act (of lighting match) and therefore act of third party criminal is superseding cause, cutting off liability for bridge company that spilled fuel. Ky has since overruled stance, now says criminal act doesn’t always cut off chain of causation.

D. Suicide – in general, court may allow recovery for suicide based on irresistible impulse, but not for “considered and rational” decision. Other courts disagree, say even when there is mental disorder, suicide is a new and independent cause of death.

1. Leibson: under comparative fault argument, victim’s suicide might be tied to failure to seek medical treatment for seizures.

2. Eggshell plaintiff: take victim as you find him.

U of L rankings drop confirmed

I have confirmed the accuracy of the US News numbers posted earlier today. So, what does this mean? For many students, it won't mean much at all. Especially if U of L returns to the Top 100 a year from now or two years from now. Critics of the rankings system also say they are largely meaningless, and do not reflect the quality of the education provided by a specific school. But especially for students who plan to practice outside Louisville, a prolonged hiatus from the Top 100 will make it more difficult to find jobs. For better or worse, some employers value a law degree from a Top 100 school more than they do for a so-called Tier 3 institution. Louisville is one of seven schools that dropped out of the Top 100 this year.

We took a hit because the 1L class, of which I am a member, posted a slightly lower median LSAT score compared to the previous year. The school's student-to-faculty ratio also increased a bit, although our employment rate and bar passage results remained very solid. I have already spoken with two students in our class who said they would seriously consider the new ranking as a factor in whether they will transfer schools this summer. I hope that doesn't happen.

U of L dropping out of Top 100?

Several online sources are reporting today that U of L Law has fallen out of the Top 100 laws schools in the 2011 edition of the annual US News rankings. I don't know how credible this information is, but you can check out what appear to be photocopies of the magazine's rankings here. The official rankings are to be released tomorrow. I am gathering reactions from faculty and students to this (possible) development. Stay tuned.

Survey: majority of 1Ls have summer jobs

Fifty-seven percent of the 1L students in our class who filled out a recent survey reported that they have some kind of summer job. That makes our employment picture better than last year's 1L class, but not as good as a typical year before the nation went into a recession, according to Dean Kathy Urbach, of the school's Career Services Office. Urbach (at right) shared the survey results with me this afternoon. 

"The climate is less robust than previous years," she told me. "Fewer students have paying jobs." 

A total of 67 students filled out the surveys, or roughly half of the class. Of that number, 20 reported that they will be paid. Fifteen will volunteer. I figured that the students who didn't fill out surveys probably don't have jobs, but Urbach said that's not necessarily true. Some students are still negotiating with prospective employers, she said, and others want to keep their job situations private. There also are plenty of students who will find paid jobs in coming weeks. Between now and June, Urbach expects to hear from at least one employer each week who is seeking a paid intern or clerk. And she said a student who is willing to volunteer is pretty much guaranteed to find something, partly due to the connections generated by the school's Public Service Program. Urbach also stressed the importance of contacting her office or at least sending her a resume if you want to find work. 
"We're here all summer," she said. "If we don't know about you, we can't help you."

Signs you attend law school in Kentucky

The law library is a wondrous place, filled with some of the most obscure and esoteric volumes in the legal world. Actually, almost everything in the legal world is obscure and esoteric. Anyway, a friend and I tripped across these volumes of the Black Lung Reporter after a study session in the library's basement, which, by the way, is my favorite place to prepare for exams. It's quiet, clean, well-lit, and the perfect place to catch up on all the latest developments in black lung, which, by the way, is a nasty affliction suffered by coal miners.

From real world, a sign of hope for U of L grads

Pop quiz: what percentage of U of L Law students from the class of 2009 were gainfully employed nine months after graduation?

• A) 85 percent
  
• B) 60 percent
  
• C) 50 percent
  
• D) 35 percent

The answer, actually, is none of the above. It's 98.1 percent, according to the results of a survey that the school recently conducted, and which will be compiled here with results from other schools. The local numbers (I got a sneak peak at them) are up from previous years, and they reflect, in part, U of L's position as a small school in a relatively large city with a solid number of law jobs.

But aren't these surveys voluntary, and isn't it true that the students without jobs typically are less likely to respond? Perhaps, but out of 113 students, the data in this year's survey include results from 109 students. The other four, I am told, did not pass the bar. Also true, however, is that the survey does not chart job satisfaction. It's a fair statement that not all of these students will be earning $97,000 a year at firms like this one. In fact, of the 107 students who reported having jobs as of this winter, more than half were at firms with two to ten attorneys.

Another 24 percent were working for the government, and 17 percent were in the "business and industry" category. Students also reported working in 15 states, up from 13 for the previous year's class. For a more detailed look at salary and other information from the survey in previous years, click here.

1L exclusive: interview with Josh Porter

There are plenty of impressive students at U of L Law. In fact, one of the things I most enjoy about being here is the energy and intellect of the people around me. I met Josh Porter (at right) for the first time a week ago, when he trounced me in the quarterfinal round of our 1L oral advocacy competition. Mr. Porter went on to win the competition, which made me feel slightly better, and prompted some curiosity about his road to victory. Mr. Porter was kind enough to participate in an exclusive interview via email, in which he shared his thoughts about law school, success, and life in general.



Name: Josh Porter
Age: 27
Hometown: Jackson, TN
Undergrad: University of Tennessee at Martin 
Before law school: Army Officer

1L at U of L: congratulations on winning this year's 1L oral advocacy competition. Do you have any tips on what worked well and what you learned from the experience?

Porter: Thanks, I think the best advice I could relay would be the same I heard from my Professor and Moot Court Board members which is to practice as often as possible.  After writing out a general outline, I practiced as many times as I could and the more I spoke the words out loud the better I was able to process possible questions or pitfalls I might run into.

I learned so much from the experience it is difficult to list it all, I was very fortunate to argue against some amazing public speakers (Robert May, Hunter Brown, Alex Davis, Thomas Stevens, and Jenn Siewertsen) and be able to emulate some of their styles and approaches to the case.  I was also privileged to hear questions from practicing attorneys, law school professors, and sitting appellate judges, each of whom offered insights into the case that we all had been studying since January, but that I had never remotely thought of. I also gained a lot of respect for people who were forced to argue "off brief".  I was very fortunate to be able to stay "on brief" for the whole competition, and I know that played a big role in me making it as far as I did.

1L at U of L: What was the toughest part of the competition?

Porter: It is a toss up between the second and third rounds.  The second round showcased the most intimidating questions, in that they were from practicing attorneys, and came at such a rapid pace it was very difficult to stay on track.  The third round had arguably the trickiest questions.  Profs Abramson, Powell, and Milligan were not as "confrontational" as were the attorneys, but their questions demanded very careful answers.

1L at U of L: What are your plans for this summer? 


Answer: I will be working as a summer law intern with the Kentucky Dept of Public Advocacy's Post Conviction Office in La Grange, KY.

1L at U of L: Do you have ideas about what you want to do when you finish law school at U of L? Litigation?


Porter: I'm still not 100% sure yet. I do have a strong leaning toward Govt service be it Public Defense or Prosecution, and based on this experience I am very interested in the litigation side of the profession.

1L at U of L: What's the biggest or most important lesson you have learned in law school so far? How has it measured up to your expectations? 
Porter: That's very difficult to narrow down, but I think the most important lesson I have learned so far is that very rarely is there a "black letter law", that instead reasonable people can apply the same law to the same facts and arrive at different conclusions.  That is what makes the study of law, especially the study of persuasive writing and speaking, so fascinating to me. It really is an art.

Law school has more than lived up to my expectations, I really cannot say enough about not just the oral advocacy competition, but the first year as a whole. It has been difficult and challenging but I am definitely glad I made the decision to come here.

U of L class of 2013 breaks the ice

It's hard to believe that in a few short weeks we will be "rising" 2Ls at Louisville Law. I was reminded of this at lunch today when I filled out a course registration card for next fall. And I was reminded again a moment ago when I ran across this "icebreaker" discussion thread on Facebook for the entering Class of 2013. It honestly seems like just a few weeks ago that I was poking around on a similar icebreaker thread for our own class. It appears that next year's 1Ls have many of the same diverse stories and backgrounds that have made our classes interesting this year. Here are a few of their introductory posts:

• I am 28. I am from Nimes, a beautiful city from the south of France. I arrived in the USA almost 4 years ago to be with my husband (who is from Panama, Latin America). I graduated from a French law school a few years ago. 
  
• I am a 40-year-old single mom who should have gone to law school 18 years ago. I am so thrilled to finally be pursuing my dream. My boys, ages 12 and 6, are so proud of me. I live in Floyds Knobs, Indiana. I obtained my B.A. in History (with a minor in Political Science) from IU in Bloomington. I can't wait to get started at UofL Brandeis!
  
• I'm 26, from Dayton, Ohio, and I graduated from Miami University in 2008. I majored in Psychology and minored in Political Science. I have been working for a custom home builder since graduating doing just about everything involved in building houses. I am really looking forward to returning to school and hanging up the tool belt.
  
• I am 22 years old and currently living in Birmingham, AL, but I am originally from the small country of Costa Rica. I am graduating with a B.A. in Foreign Language with a double major in Philosophy from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. I must admit I have little knowledge of Louisville, and the Cardinals for that matter, but I am excited to get to know you guys and the city for the next three years!
  
• I'm 31, from North Carolina, and currently living in Seoul, South Korea. I graduated from UNC-Chapel Hill in 2000 with a BA in poli sci, and i spent quite a few years in the rat race in Washington DC. i gave it all up to come to Korea and teach English as a Second Language to kids here 4 years ago and have loved living abroad.

1L year filled with victories, losses, and lessons

I'm sitting on a couch in the lobby of the law library, waiting to find out if I will be one of eight 1Ls selected to advance to the second round of our oral argument competition. I would be thrilled to advance, but I won't be upset if I don't. I already know that arguing before a judge, a professor, or another student is one of the things in law school that I do well. I'm confident and calm in the heat of the moment, and several attorneys have given me really great feedback about this in recent weeks. I mention this not because I intend to brag, but rather to illustrate one of the lessons that many of us are learning at U of L Law: almost everyone in our class has notched a few victories this year, and almost everyone has been humbled at some point.

For me, the victories have affirmed my decision to leave a solid job after 11 years and throw all of my poker chips into law. I earned solid grades in my first semester, recently found a summer job, and got hooked on the art of oral argument. There also have been plenty of brutally humbling experiences. My first two grades in law school -- a midterm in Torts and a writing assignment -- came back with C-minus written on them. I've also said things in class that came back to smack me in the face -- arguments that were not well-reasoned, questions that I could not field, jumbled up nonsense that somehow came spilling out of my mouth. Even last week, I received a score on a Spring Break quiz in Contracts that was laughably low, i.e., less than half of what some other students scored.

The lesson in all of this, I think, is that being a 1L requires you to try as hard as you can to keep your head above water and achieve, and at the same time to accept the fact that you will not always be at the very top (or even in the middle!). But there are enough opportunities and niches in the field of law that each of us has room to carve out our own place, and eventually turn it into a career. At least that's my argument for the moment.

Kenneth Starr extols free speech in U of L lecture

Freedom of speech and religion was the central theme in a lecture at the law school yesterday by Kenneth Starr, the former independent counsel from the Bill Clinton era. About 100 students, faculty members, and local attorneys attended the inaugural William Marshall Bullitt Lecture in the school's Allen Courtroom. A story about the lecture also made the front of the Metro section in today's Courier-Journal. Starr is perhaps best known for his hard-nosed probe of the Monica Lewinsky affair, but he also is a former Solicitor General and U.S. Court of Appeals judge for the District of Columbia. And he made several comments yesterday that showed me he can't be easily painted into a single political corner. For example, he defended lawyers representing accused Al-Quada terrorists, and said a few nice things about President Obama. He also stressed the importance of civility in politics, and talked about the importance of freedom of speech for all groups, including corporations. Image, above right, from Pepperdine Law.

Buy a house, get free law books for a year

The Class of 2013 is taking shape, giving way to a new crop of 1Ls at U of L Law. For those of you who will be looking for housing for the next three years, I have a shameless promotion: buy my house in the wonderful Highlands neighborhood and I'll give you free law books and course outlines for your entire 1L year. I'll also throw in hornbooks and flash cards for each of your core classes, and exam-taking tips. If you haven't purchased a home before, you also may qualify for an $8,000 tax credit if you are under contract by April 30. The house has two large bedrooms, an office, new stainless steel appliances, and seven skylights. Check out the listing here. Lots of law students live in the Highlands, which offers an eclectic mix of local shops, bars, art galleries and restaurants. It's sort of the Haight-Ashbury of Louisville, and sits about four miles from the law school.

Not interested in buying a house? You can rent in the Highlands neighborhood for around $800 to $1,000 for a single-family home with a roommate, or $500-600 for a one-bedroom apartment. If you want to stretch your dollar further, Old Louisville is closer to campus and offers the nation's largest extant collection of Victorian homes. Another solid option is Germantown, where you can rent a shotgun-style home for around $650 a month. Have a question about housing in Louisville? Want to know more about those free law books?

Finished writing, ready to argue

The deadline for one of the year's biggest assignments came and went earlier this week, when 1L students turned in their appellate briefs for Basic Legal Skills. For the unacquainted, appellate briefs are another one of those 1L rites of passage. The finished product is about 20 pages of facts and legal analysis based on a single hypothetical case. Ours dealt with a lawyer who, allegedly, slept during his client's criminal trial. My task: argue that the client's conviction should not be overturned, because the sleeping was not well-documented, substantial, or prejudicial to the outcome of the trial. The briefs became an obsession for many students. I've heard the writing process compared to childbirth. We even had a fake Facebook page for the defendant (74 friends at last count) complete with fake photos, personal info and so forth. The brief itself went fine for most students, although it was a perfect example of how the bad habits of undergrad don't work in law school. A few students stayed up until 6 or 7 a.m. the night before the deadline. I've even heard of students dropping out of law school because they couldn't handle the project.

Now, however, we're moving on to the next thing: oral arguments. Spring break starts tomorrow, and when it ends we will begin preparing to face off in one-on-one speaking competitions in which we argue the merits of our written brief before real lawyers in a real courtroom in downtown Louisville. I'm pretty comfortable speaking in front of people, and the oral arguments are not a graded assignment. Still, they require solid preparation. A panel of lawyers will grill us in front of our peers, poking holes in our opinions and strategies. The video below, from a January session of the Kentucky Court of Appeals, gives you a sense of what the real thing is like. These arguments were held at the law school, and a similar session will be held the week of March 22. 

In addition to practicing for the oral arguments, there is a 1L oral argument competition that will be held at the end of March. Students will compete one on one, with the eventual winner taking home a small cash prize. It's sort of a tune-up for moot court, in which 2Ls and 3Ls travel to other schools to face off in much stiffer competitions. Moot court is one of U of L's strong suits, and we've recently done very well in regional and national competitions. For now, however, I'm focusing on avoiding some of the basic pitfalls of oral arguments (for example, the dreaded "fig leaf clutch" at the podium). And, of course, spring break.

U of L law class profiled in C-J

A few dozen upper-level law students are studying legal issues through the words of Shakespeare, Dante and other authors, and their class is profiled in this story in Sunday's edition of The Courier-Journal. As a first-year law student, I'm looking forward to some of these types of classes, which are only available in the second and third year of law school. For now, we're focused on core classes including torts, contracts, property and civil procedure. Check out the story at the above link while it lasts. The C-J (my former employer) usually does not make online articles available more than a week after publication.

Law firm targeted for 'trading' clients

In our Torts class this morning, our professor gave us an interesting question about damages: if you help a client recover $750,000 in a settlement, but work only two hours on the case, should you still be able to collect one-third of the damages based on a valid contingent fee agreement? His answer, essentially, was that yes, the attorney could collect the full one-third, but that no, the attorney should not try to collect the full amount because it would be bad business. Clients should always walk out of the office satisfied, he argued, and paying $250,000 for two hours of work is typically not a good way to make a customer happy.

Law school teaches us a lot about theory, and a decent amount about practice, but business is something else. Which brings to mind a fascinating story in The Courier-Journal this past Sunday about a law firm and a medical clinic that allegedly have a cozy relationship with each other. The author, Andy Wolfson, is a former colleague and a reporter who some lawyers love to hate. His byline has appeared over some of the most sensational cases of legal malpractice in Kentucky over the last few decades. His articles are required reading for someone planning to practice in Louisville. I'm eager to see how this story plays out over the coming months. Your thoughts?