Legal Industry News

Early African-American Lawyer Inducted into College Football Hall of Fame

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: Marquette University Law School Faculty Blog

Amid the coverage that focused on the induction of former Notre Dame star Tim Brown to the College Football Hall of Fame, the fact that the list of 24 former players and coaches inducted included former Harvard center William H. Lewis has been almost completely overlooked.

Admittedly, Lewis is not exactly a household name in 2010.  His years on the Harvard football team were 1891 and 1892, and he was a lineman.   However, the Virginia-born Lewis compiled an impressive list of accomplishments in his career, both as a football player and as a lawyer, which deserve to be better known.  For example:

(a) Lewis was the first African-American to play American college football.  This happened when he transferred to Amherst College from the all black Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institute (now Virginia State College) at the urging of his mentor, John Mercer Langston, the institution’s president.  (Langston was also one of the first half dozen black lawyers in American history and was the first dean of the Howard Law School.)  Lewis, who had never before played the game, was a member of the Amherst football team for three years.  He not only starred...

Read More »

The Chinese Diaspora. Graphically.

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: China Law Blog

The Wall Street Journal has up a fascinating and illuminating graphic on the Chinese diaspora. This graphic depicts where Chinese have settled around the world. I knew Peru had a lot of Chinese, but would never have guessed 1.3 million. I also knew Thailand and Indonesia had a ton of Chinese, but surprised they each have more than 7 million.

Check it out. 

Read the rest of the...

Read More »

Rodney C. Haron – Fresno Personal Injury & Trucking Accident Lawyer

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: Profiles In Law Rodney C. Haron has over 35 years of legal experience and currently focuses his practice on representing personal injury, auto accident and truck accident victims in Fresno and in San Joaquin Valley.  Although Mr. Haron started his practice dealing with a wide variety of criminal and civil cases, he immediately found that he had an [...] Read the rest of the...

Read More »

Boston Auto Accidents Lawyer – David R. Lucas

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: Profiles In Law David Lucas is an attorney at the Massachusetts law firm Nigro, Pettepit & Lucas, where he specializes in litigation for probate, real estate and civil matters.  David also has experience in litigation as a Boston auto accidents lawyer and election and campaign finance law. Mr. Lucas obtained his J.D. from Suffolk University Law School after [...] Read the rest of the...

Read More »

G. Blake Thompson

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: Profiles In Law Texas trucking accident attorney Blake Thompson is a member of The Mann Firm.  He is admitted to practice in Texas, the U.S. Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit, and the U.S. district courts for the Eastern, Western, Northern, and Southern districts of Texas.  In 2003, he received a J.D. from Baylor University, where he was a [...] Read the rest of the...

Read More »

High Hopes for Pot Trademark Protection Dashed

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: WSJ.com: Law Blog - WSJ.com A few months ago, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office created a new trademark category dedicated to medical marijuana, spurring a frenzy of applications from pot dealers in the 14 states where the drug is legal for medicinal purposes. But the category was nixed last week.

Read the rest of the...

Read More »

Ex-Microsoft GC Said to Be Ready for Another Legal Fight, This One Involving MLB

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: ABA Journal Top Stories Former Microsoft general counsel Bill Neukom spent 15 years in an antitrust battle with the federal government, fending off an effort to break up the company. Now Neukom, 68, has a new career as managing general partner of the San Francisco Giants, but that doesn’t mean he’s finished with legal fights. He is said to be prepared to take legal action to prevent the Oakland Athletics from moving to San Jose, the New York Times reports. “Neukom is happy to talk about how he sneaks away from work when the Giants are at home to watch batting practice and how… Read the rest of the...

Read More »

Why ‘Associate’ Doesn’t Just Mean One Thing Anymore

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: WSJ.com: Law Blog - WSJ.com Once upon a time at law firms, like 20 years ago, partners were partners and associates were associates. But these days, the categories are much fuzzier. For instance, for some time, you've had partners with financial stakes in their firms (equity partners), and partners without equity stakes in their firms (non-equity partners).

Read the rest of the...

Read More »

Is There Acapulco Gold in Pot Trademarks? Applications Are High

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: ABA Journal Top Stories A decision by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to create a category for medical marijuana has fired up companies seeking protection for their product and business names. Soft drink makers want to trademark Canna Cola and Keef Cola, the Wall Street Journal reports. Companies seek to protect the names Budtrader and Pot-N. A candy maker hopes to trademark “Bhang, the original cannabis chocolate.” The category, established in April, was short-lived, however. After a Wall Street Journal reporter called, a spokesman said the pot classification would be removed, or “nipped in the bud,” in the words of the headline writer.… Read the rest of the...

Read More »

Law Student Ditches Class for Poker Tournament, Wins $24K

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: ABA Journal Top Stories University of San Diego law student Andrew Jeter had to make a tough decision. Should he go to his tax class, where attendance counts toward the grade, or should he compete in the 2010 World Series of Poker? Jeter made the right choice, at least from a financial standpoint, TaxProf Blog reports. He won a little more than $24,000 and finished 568th. Jeter missed three classes in all, amounting to about $8,000 per missed session, the blog says. Jeter was a student in a class taught by blogger and law professor Paul Caron, whose students are equipped with clickers to… Read the rest of the...

Read More »

Judging the Justices: Some Statistics From 2009-10 Oral Arguments

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: WSJ.com: Law Blog - WSJ.com It’s well known that several Supreme Court justices are baseball fanatics; in the event that baseball players are equally fascinated by Supreme Court statistics, Sri Srinivasan has some new data to plug into their fantasy bench.

Read the rest of the...

Read More »

On The State Of China State Secrets.

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: China Law Blog

China Economic Review just published an article by CLB co-blogger, Steve Dickinson, entitled, "Chinese Walls."

Steve starts out his article by discussing the inherent tension between China's desire to manage "economic information" while at the same time wanting to move to becoming a "modern market economy." China has responded to this tension by overhauling its state secrecy system:

In recent months the State Council has promulgated an amended State Secrets Law and the state assets regulator has put forward new rules regarding commercial secrets held by state-owned enterprises (SOEs).

The idea is to limit the scope and amount of information classified as secret and improve the systems for preventing disclosure of classified information.

China's new approach to state secrecy focuses on the following three themes: 

Restricting the scope and quantity of state secrets. Only information classified in advance as secret by an authorized government agency qualifies as a state secret. And, under the Secrets Law, the number of agencies able to make classification decisions is strictly limited. The old system where virtually any government agency or SOE was authorized to arbitrarily designate information as a state secret has been eliminated.

Both Chinese and foreign observers have criticized the PRC state secrets...

Read More »

Common Divorce Mediation Myths

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: SettlementBoard.com Divorce Law in Minneapolis can be complex and litigating a divorce can be difficult. An experienced divorce attorney who is trained in mediation can help you create an agreement that is in the best interests of everyone concerned. Ask your lawyer about your divorce mediation options. Read the rest of the...

Read More »

Threatening language may support claim of hostile environment, even without sexual references.

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: Federal Employment Law Articles For the second time in as many weeks, a federal appeals court decision rests on the determination that an alleged harasser who makes gender-specific slurs and comments can create a hostile work environment for a female employee, even though the harasser is an “Equal Opportunity Harasser” who makes crass and offensive remarks to “everyone, regardless of gender.”

Read the rest of the...

Read More »

Notice to Job Applicants of Intent to Search Social Networks.

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: Federal Employment Law Articles Employers who want to use include social-networking sites into their background-check process when considering potential job candidates often ask whether they have to notify the applicant in advance that his or her Facebook page may be viewed during the hiring process. Unless you have a third party perform the Facebook search, the answer is “no.” Employers do not legally need the consent of a potential employee to conduct an Internet search and to view what is otherwise publicly available. But the mere fact that something is not legally required does not necessarily mean that it’s not a good idea. In fact, I’m an advocate of notifying applicants not only that you intend to review the individual’s online presence, including his or her presence on social networks, but also the specific items that you’ll be looking for when you do conduct the search.

Read the rest of the...

Read More »

Labor and Employment Insights (July 2010) (pdf).

Monday, July 19th, 2010
Source: Federal Employment Law Articles Skimp Now, Pay Later; Religious Discrimination, Harassment and Accommodation; Eight Ways to Avoid Age Discrimination Liability.

Read the rest of the...

Read More »