Blind Prophecy

Even though the university hasn’t officially called a snow day, my Constitutional Law professor lives in Jersey and has school-age children, and Con Law is my only class today. So, because they have a snow day, we get a snow day.

This would be more exciting news if my plans weren’t already to spend 8 hours or more working on my appellate brief writing project. Now I just get to start earlier.

The snow that is falling is big and fluffy, but doesn’t seem to be sticking yet. Looking out from my window really does feel like I’m inside a NYC snow globe.

Yesterday I went to see Alec Baldwin speak at the Fordham Law Forum on Law, Culture & Society. Last semester, when Mario Cuomo spoke, the place was not quite filled. Last night I ended up sitting in one of the overflow rooms watching it on closed circuit TV. Still, I did see him in the flesh because we both entered the building at the same time. He quickly got ushered backstage while I had to stand in line, but it totally counts.

Anyway, he had some really fascinating things to say. His impassioned commentary on nuclear energy, and specifically the argument that there is nothing clean about the mining and production of uranium, gave me a lot of food for thought. His criticism of the family court system regarding “deep pocket litigants” and the “a la carte” menu of motions, procedures and laws that keep wealthy families spending millions to fight over custody was an interesting perspective. Say whatever you want about Hollywood culture and liberal elite, its simply not true to claim that Baldwin doesn’t know what he’s talking about on any number of political issues.

I have no comment on Stephen Baldwin.

I also attended a really moving panel discussion yesterday on American Indian law. Like so many issues, I was generally aware of the big systemic problems there, but the panel really opened my eyes to some of the most egregious and specific problems faced by Native Americans. For example, despite being nominally considered a sovereign nation, the tribes are unable to obtain basic legal jurisdiction in criminal or many civil matters involving a person who is not a tribal citizen. Under certain circumstances different states, territories, foreign governments, even foreign governments we have shunned (e.g. Cuba) can obtain jurisdiction to resolve criminal and civil matters involving American citizens, but we deny the sovereign nations of American Indians that ability. It’s absurd and utterly disenfranchising. And it’s not some relic of the deep racist past, it’s the result of recent decisions of the Supreme Court and inaction on the part of the current political government.

Anyway, I guess it’s time to get back to arguing that the police are a bunch of incompetent racists who can’t tell the difference between a Latino man and a black woman, therefore my hypothetical client should walk free despite the 12 envelopes of PCP they found on her.

But just because it’s fun…

Filed under: law school by Jere Keys