Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Is the hunger there?

Every year over on my personal blog I solicit suggestions on how we can make Baylor Law a better place. This year, the post yielded up 82 comments from students and former students.

One intriguing part of the process this year was that not one of those comments related to the religious mission of the school.

I don't think the issue is that the students don't care about that part of our mission, which I think is very important. Rather, I suspect that they simply don't see that as an area which urgently needs change one way or the other... or so I hope.

Monday, October 8, 2007

When Justices Go To Church

I was in Washington for the start of the Supreme Court's term this year, having written one of the briefs in the Kimbrough case. One item on the news the Sunday before the start of arguments was that six of the Justices attended the annual "Red Mass" at the Cathedral of St. Matthew, which is held every year to commemorate the opening of the court. With five Catholic Justices (who were joined at the service by Justice Breyer, who is Jewish), the service seems fitting.

Not all agree, though. In this article, Marci Hamilton at Findlaw argues that "there is good reason to question the judgment of the Justices who attended." In the article, Hamilton seems to link attendance at the service to the outcome in Gonzalez v. Carhart.