Post Post, etc.

Hey, we have a new dean! I don't have any deep, Siegelian knowledge of the ways of Post, but he's a powerhouse scholar, and the faculty apparently loves him, so he sounds like a good choice. Some have said he might not be a great fundraiser. Who cares? This is TYLS. We don't need money! Our school runs on justice! In any case, I'm sure it will all be good.

Today was very law-oriented (shockingly enough). There's the dean news, the "what do you mean I voted to grant cert?" SCOTUS decision on the VRA, and the debut of the Constitution in 2020 blog. I used my self-made lunch break to check out some of the inaugural posts. First, there's Tom "I visited 2020, didn't like the Constitution I saw, and came back to transform it via blog" Wolf's substantive welcome defining the Constitution by how we relate to it, written in that tone that only a true labor of love can conjure.

Then there's the first volley in Daniel "Not that Daniel Winnick" Winik v. Jeremy "My birthday suit was tweed" Kessler: A Roaring Cage Match Where Two Law Students Beat Each Other To Death With Branches...OF GOVERNMENT. They're arguing about whether marriage equality should come through the courts or the legislature. I tend to lean toward Jeremy's side on this—the courts are actually the appropriate place—but I'm definitely convinceable, and Dan makes some good points. I'm not sure whether Roe is a better analog than Brown for when courts have stepped in to do the unpopular thing, though...then again, maybe Brown's outcome wasn't ideal, either. It's verboten to stand for segregation today, but our country's also completely unable to discuss race in an intelligent way, and racism is still deeply pervasive. So who knows. And I agree that legislators should be doing their constitutional duty, and that active incrementalism would represent "a democratic embrace of the constitutional mandate for equality," but I find something deeply troubling about the idea of waiting to grant rights until the relevant constituency is ready to see them for what they are. (I should note here that Daniel and Jeremy are taking sides for the sake of argument and may both have mixed feelings about the issue.)

Finally, the great Adam "Donohue doesn't know it yet, but we're co-teaching Empirical Law & Economics next year" Chandler argues for randomized policy changes so we can figure out with some degree of rigor which policies work. I'm, of course, totally for this, especially when it comes to issues where we have no idea what policy is best and there's minimal risk of extreme harm from either the experimental policy or the control. I doubt there would be serious equal protection problems with this plan, especially if states/counties/municipalities consented to be in the experiment. I don't think there's ever been a case where a control group in a government-sponsored medical study has sued (certainly not one where they've sued successfully), so I think that indicates that consent would be good enough. And even if they didn't consent, I think the policy would be rationally related to a legitimate government purpose, namely, complying with the roll of the dice for the sake of a study that would benefit all future Americans.

In any event, I highly recommend checking out the blog: the four students who've blogged thus far are among the most brilliant of my brilliant classmates. They're also, if I'm up-to-date (and I may not be), four of my class's most eligible bachelors. The phrase "most eligible bachelor" always sounded to me like it should be more of an indication of availability than desirability (with six weeks to the wedding, Ray is the law school's LEAST ELIGIBLE BACHELOR), but these dudes are all catches. So, yeah, I never thought I'd say this, but: ladies, visit the unparalleled meat market that is the Constitution in 2020 blog.

And bloggers: Let me know if this is coming up in Google searches and embarrassing you. Or serving you really, really well.