Iowa Judges Will Start Going Outdoors

Because Iowa has one of those screwy judicial retention measures that means judges who interpret the state constitution to let gay people marry will be hitting the bread line, the judiciary is now reaching out to Iowa's vast, slick P.R. industry:

At one point, Paul asked the crowd for a show of hands. How many drive Volvos and drink lattes?

Two or three. Maybe four.

"Trade the Volvo for a pickup truck with a gun rack."

The line drew a laugh, but Paul wasn't being totally facetious about charges of elitism. The message: Take off the robe and get out into the community. Talk to people. Show them who you are.

Being apolitical isn't the same as being a hermit, so I'm a bit lost as to why Iowa's judges need to be told to participate in the community. I'm a bit concerned that active judges going out of their way to meet-and-greet the scary proletarian class will wind up making the state judiciaries more overtly political than they already are.

For example, I think this is extremely misguided:

"To a limited extent, the response has to be political. Whether we like it or not, the office has been politicized by people who wanted to have our judges not retained. We need to be more engaged. But any campaign should be educational. Get to the civics behind it."

Okay - so on one hand you're telling judges not to be elitist, but on the other, you're telling them to become educational and tell people how things work? How do you think the average blue-collar conservative will take a mini-lecture on constitutional interpretation?

I'm all for encouraging judges and justices to be active members of the community, the same as any public servant. But active judges have no business going on political education campaigns that are nothing more than thinly-veiled political campaigns to retain themselves. The average person will see right through the difference, and as a result public confidence in the judiciary will be weakened because it will become just another political branch similar to the governor's office or the legislature.

To the Iowa judges, I'm sorry that you live and work in a state with a flawed constitution and an ignorant public that's made your offices outposts of political fervor. It could be worse; you could be a 1L at Drake or Creighton. But the answer is not for you to become more political in response if you believe in the principles underlying an independent judiciary. Sorry if it costs you your jobs, but I happen to think the prestige and integrity of the legal system is more important than you setting a precedent of active judges campaigning to keep their present gig on a retention vote. It's bad enough judges and would-be judges have to campaign in general elections.

Will Local Bar Associations Put Westlaw Out of Business?

Local bar association membership is dropping nationwide. Although we have a glut of lawyers in this country, tightening budgets mean that many experienced lawyers find no need justifying the membership cost and young lawyers don't have resources or the cause to join.

When this sort of thing happens to local organizations in America, do they just roll over and bend under systemic pressures? No, of course not! They develop gimmicks to draw renewed interest. And the Philadelphia Bar Association is doing just that:

...the bar association also will launch a legal database of Pennsylvania case law and statutes available free to members, with the hope of getting more dues-paying lawyers.
...
[Bar Association Chancellor Rudy] Garcia, 59, says the centerpiece of the membership drive will be the new legal database, offered as a free service to firms with 100 percent membership. The bar association projects that of the 25 largest firms in Philadelphia, each will be able to save at least $35,000 a year on top of new membership costs by using the service in place of other commercial legal databases.

Watch out, Westlaw.

All hints of sarcasm aside, I actually quite like this. Justice is an important public commodity in any democracy, and it bothers me that in our common law system the case law, especially for lower-level courts, is ultimately the province of two monolithic media companies, one Canadian and the other European. Legal opinions are in the public domain and there's no reason our courts and/or local bar associations could not keep databases of their own opinions.

And to get really crazy, it would be nice if there was maybe a national organization that represented attorneys that could run something similar. One of the biggest bars to entry (and high prices) in the legal field in research costs. For a young attorney starting out, it either takes prohibitive time (going to a law library) or cost (subscribing to a commercial service) to ensure that he or she is relying on good law. Given modern database technology, it's absurd that a simple search through the application of a particular state statute could cost hundreds of dollars.

If local bar associations (or even a national one) take back our case law from the foreign capitalist oligarchs, the cost to the associations shouldn't even be that high. I would think it would be a productive way to earn CLE credit to volunteer on such a system, and if volunteers can fill a site like wikipedia (or even a site like gutenberg.org), I think a comprehensive system of case law would be feasible.

I don't mean to suggest that the Philadelphia Bar Association is the first to do this. They aren't. I just think it's a welcome trend for which a national collective project would greatly aid all parties save the Canadians and the British.

A Minor Victory Of Common Sense

The ABA has put off its decision on the possible accreditation of foreign law schools:

The Council of the ABA’s Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar on Saturday put off a decision on whether to accredit foreign law schools, saying the matter needs more study.

The unanimous vote by the council, meeting at the Bayfront Hilton in San Diego, came after a 20-minute discussion, and called for a complete vetting of the issue with potential stakeholders. No time limit was set for completion of the study.

If only they could halt the accreditation of domestic law schools to do "more study" on the potential ramifications.

First Thing We Do: Kill All the Harvard Students

For those who haven't heard, two idiotic Harvard students have filed a suit against the TSA for their invasive airport screening practices. JJD rightly points out that these two are attention whores who are wasting everyone's time.

I wholeheartedly agree with that, but I have bigger concerns. This lawsuit, first of all, isn't necessary; there are already numerous other lawsuits filed and I have to believe the ACLU is poking around for a choice test case if they haven't already filed one, especially since they had a good outcome against the TSA the last time they filed. Even if it were necessary, law students are in no way capable of expertly litigating this thing. It's hubris to think otherwise. That type of hubris destroys the public image of lawyers and lawsuits in general as people who would rather have fifteen minutes of fame than doing what is proper in the name of justice.

Most importantly, based on samples articles that I've seen, I don't think these regulations comply with the Fourth Amendment. Generally, there's two rationales given as to why these invasive things would be Constitutional: (1) the airline passenger consents and (2) they're reasonable as proper administrative searches. I think both of these views are faulty.

Consent is restrained by scope. It'd be very hard to argue that individuals consent to the more advanced applications of these screenings, such as what happened in this case. If we remember consent also has a "time" component and the argument is destroyed; the consent is to a brief check, not a 30+ minutes detainment on less than reasonable suspicion.

Traditionally, these are upheld as administrative searches (indeed that's the TSA's justification), similar to a roadside DUI check or an inventory search at a jail or police station. The problem is that the only reason suspicionless detainment is allowed is because police officer discretion is extremely low and the invasion of the stop is de minimis. But here, we have a high amount of invasion (both in terms of invading privacy and in the length of detainment) and the risk of discretionary enforcement is extremely high.

This type of situation is exactly what the Fourth Amendment was designed to protect against, as if a writ of assistance has been given to TSA agents to track down terrorist instrumentalities at any cost. The only difference is this silly argument that one can choose not to fly. In a world where multinational commerce is a way of life and Americans have to fly to get to all but 2 countries (and one of our states is only readily accessible by airplane), I find this explanation unsatisfactory. We have a right to travel. Given our modern reality, subjecting someone to suspicionless groping to fly seems unreasonable.

Before anyone goes spouting off on how it's necessary to catch the evil terrorists, I'd like to direct you all to read Kyllo v. U.S. The Supreme Court has been crystal clear in protecting the most intimate spheres of privacy from warrantless searches. There, the police couldn't turn a thermal imager on a drug dealer's house. Here, non-police are turning an x-ray on people's crotches and sticking their hands on people's privates, all so someone can sit on the next plane to Tulsa. If 5 justices didn't want to budge to stop large-scale drug trafficking, I would be shocked if they suddenly bought the argument that one terrorist attack gives government administrators the power to probe.

But I have no faith that the Harvard students can navigate that by themselves. And because most people see attention-grabbing suits like this as meritless by default, I'm worried their suit will harm public sentiment against people who are filing legitimate lawsuits; after all, there are people who think these searches are acceptable in the name of safety, Constitution be damned, and the government itself is going gestapo on people who speak out against them.

It's a problem, for sure, but random Harvard idiots filing lawsuits on generic standing is not the answer. Furthermore, even though I think these violate the Fourth Amendment, the courts shouldn't even be the first-choice response. Quotations like this annoy the heck out of me:
“I see the lawsuits as part of a genuine citizen rebellion against invasive and ineffective airport screening,’’ said John Verdi, senior counsel at the privacy information center.
"Genuine citizen rebellion" is not something the Courts are really best at answering. They're much better at solving problems of specific individual rights being violated. If you have widespread citizen rebellion, why don't you take it to Congress? Better yet, why don't you work to amend the Constitution?

But these Harvard students would rather file a lawsuit. If I were God of Harvard, I would expel them to prevent Harvard's reputation from being damaged by association. Unfortunately, they likely will graduate from there and find it easier to find work than lower-ranked students who lack their misguided hubris, understand their own limitations, and respect proper legal and political processes against advancing their sense of inflated self-worth.

Best Value Law Schools - Does Such a Thing Exist?

Something called preLaw magazine (no, really, that's how they capitalize it) has come with a list of 60 of the "best value" law schools in the United States. I think it's odd that there's 60 of them in a pool of only 200 or so, but for purposes of this blog I want to look only at the top of the list:

If I'm reading this correctly, the average student leaves the University of North Dakota Law School with $67k in debt and the median salary of employed private sector people is only 48k. Furthermore, only 81% of the graduates actually find work. As the median numbers for public and private are very similar, let's set the median salary at $47.5k.

These numbers mean that out of 100 graduates from the UND Law, at the nine-month period 41 will be making 47.5k or more. 41 will be making less than 47.5k, and 18 will be up a creek without a paddle. For the 41 making more, a debt load of $67k is probably manageable, but for the 59 who are making what is likely considerably less, the 67k in average debt doesn't seem to be justified. At best, it's a very risky proposition given such low reported salaries (imagine how low the actual long-term salaries are?).

10-year payback on a 67k loan @ 7% requires a monthly payment of about $800.00. That's $9,600 a year, which is a really high debt-to-income ratio for someone making under $45k (the government calculator I just checked claims that debt is only sustainable at 60k+). I suppose it's manageable for someone who's single in the low-rent areas of North Dakota, but try doing that with a family or dependents or other burdens (want a decent car?) and good luck.

And that's the 19th "best value" in the country. To be fair to UND, its tuition is very reasonable. The problem is that at such a low tuition, it seems as though the average student borrows the entire cost of attendance to have that much debt. You would think people living at home or working prior to school or getting scholarships would offset this, but somehow their average student has borrowed the entire cost. That's not entirely the school's fault.

And I have to give credit to a school like BYU, which keeps tuition low despite a fairly good reputation and being a private school.

But when you have a list like this, and four of your top nineteen "values" provide no return on investment information, you know there's a problem. How is that even responsible journalism? Northern Illinois is a "value" but you have no idea what graduates are actually making? Could you imagine other investments working this way? Of course not.

And if the median University of Georgia grad is really making $130k a year, I'll eat Burger King every day for a month and suffer the consequences.

The grand point in this exercise is that if the "A"-graded "values" are this flawed, how much of a non-"value" must the other 180 schools in the country be? If a place like UND is a "bargain" when odds are that over half its students graduate looking uphill at difficult debt repayments, what does that say about places like Cooley or New England or Golden Gate?

Perusing this list should remind one that in some situations there is no such thing as a "value." Home mortgages in rich suburbs in 2005 come to mind. When fairly-priced schools like Kentucky, Tennessee, Mississsippi, etc. are considered "values," I think a rational economist would have to move law schools into the same category good, where almost nothing nothing is a genuine "value."

2nd Highest Number of LSAT Takers Ever

Saw it on my newsfeed today that people continue to take the LSAT in droves:

October 2010 saw the second highest annual number of LSAT takers in the history of the LSAT, which began in 1987.

What's the first highest annual LSAT year in terms of the number of takers? That would be the 2009-2010 adminitrations (sic) of the exam.

It's 12:30 p.m., but I think the most dignified response to this news is drinking scotch.

Rising Tuition: UVA as a Case Study

I found this chart on the University of Virginia website, which charts UVa Law tuition over the last 20 years:

This isn't news to anyone who pays attention to law school tuition figures, but I wanted to use it as a starting point to make a simple point: the nationwide rise in tuition rates has NOTHING to do with either (a) rising costs at the Universities or (b) a drop in funding, both of which are reasons I've seen advanced on websites defending higher tuition.

In adjusted 2010 dollars, Virginia's in-state tuition in 1990 would be about $7,700. Out-of-state tuition would be about $17,500. Consequently, the increase in law tuition independent of standard inflation is around 5.03 times for in-state and 4.34 times for out-of-state. Health care costs have simply not increased that much in the last 20 years (as an example, private insurer costs to cover cancer were "only" 137% higher in 2007 than they were in 1987).

More specifically, you can see the relative out-of-whackness of law school tuition if you look at the University of Virginia's budgets. Unfortunately, I cannot find a 1990 operating budget for UVA. But I did find the 2000 budget and the 2010 budget. Some brief comparisons are in order, I believe.

Overall Total Expenditures, 2000: 752 M (in 2010 dollars, 967 M)
Overall Total Expenditures, 2010: 1,326 M
Increase in 2010 dollars: 27%

Student Health Expenditures, 2000: 6.684 M (in 2010 dollars, 8.60 M)
Student Health Expenditures, 2010: 9.507 M
Increase in 2010 dollars: 10.5%

Expenditures on Direct Instruction, 2000: 213.40 M (in 2010 dollars, 274.59 M)
Expenditures on Direct Instruction, 2010: 335.33 M
Increase in 2010 dollars: 22.12%

Revenues from Law School Tuition, 2000: 20.5 M (in 2010 dollars, 26.37 M)
Revenues from Law School Tuition, 2010: 47.6 M
Increase in 2010 dollars: 80.5%

% of Academic Division Operating Funds From General Endowment, 2000: ~15%
% of Academic Division Operating Funds From General Endowment, 2010: ~10%

This last one becomes interesting when you consider that in 1990, the University of Virginia's endowment was $488 million ($844 million in 2010 dollars). In 2009, thanks to a two decades concerted effort (see previous link), Virginia's endowment had risen to $3.58 billion. That is a 324% increase in the real value of their endowment.

Granted, various endowment funds have strings attached, but it should be plainly obvious that there is no outside funding problem at the University of Virginia. Although funds from the state may be more restricted than they used to be, they haven't been decreased enough to require an 80% increase in tuition rates for law students, and one of the driving political motivations for cutting funding at rich public universities is because, well, they're rich. Only 8% of UVa's funding comes from the state.

I readily concede that the numbers herein may not be precise, or the mathematical ability behind their use sound (this should be obvious, as I chose law). I also concede that university budgets are ridiculously complex; I tried to be careful to pick things that would be comparable between the two budgets, but I recognize that might not always produce the best picture.

But even if I am wildly inaccurate on the figures, a few things are obvious to me from perusing the tuition rates and the various budgets:

• Law tuition revenues and rates at UVa have risen at a much higher rate than the university's expenditures.
• There has been no cataclysmic increase in the University's expenditures for health care, technology, or other things tuition defenders often throw out.
• The University's endowment has skyrocketed while the University's willingness to fund general academic projects from that endowment (or their reliance on that endowment) has dropped as the University has actively sought to grow its institutional wealth.

Far from Thomas Jefferson's ideals, the UVa appears more concerned with ballooning its endowment than providing a place for students to pursue knowledge. Its choice to raise law tuition rates 5-fold from 1990 had nothing to do with rising health benefit costs or any drop in funding. It is plainly obvious that places like UVa are no longer educational institutions, but instead complex businesses whose sole purpose is to put more coins in the piggy bank.

Inflation adjustments made using Tom's Inflation Calculator.