Speaking of Tortfeasors

...there's one in the Gulf of Mexico called Gustav. And he's at fault. But he's not paying any monetary damages. He might cause some, though.

Amanda and I are bugging out Sunday morning and heading for the hills. Literally. And figuratively.

Psalm 121:1 I lift up mine eyes unto the hills. From whence cometh my help? My help cometh from the LORD, the maker of heaven and earth.

Stay safe, Baton Rouge.

Prof. Crimlaw vs. Prof. Torts: A Hypothetical

Don't Beg For My Question. You Can't Have It.

I, too, have been guilty!

Of what?

Of misunderstanding the phrase "beg the question." I would always hear the media and layperson on the street make such statements as, "It begs the question, 'Why do the Japanese disguise themselves as vending machines to escape would-be assailants?' " I wondered if that was correct, but accepted it as face value.

After hearing Professor Torts use the phrase in a negative light more than once (i.e., "Don't tell me that Mr. X, that's not a logical answer, it only begs the question!"), I decided to dig deeper.

Begging the question is a logical fallacy that asserts something is true just because it is. For example, "You can't deny that Yoplait Original Red Raspberry 99% Fat Free Yogurt is the tastiest yogurt because it's the best."

In other words, please don't beg for questions. Beg for answers. If you are hereafter told that someone or something begs the question, don't give in and agree that questions are pursued by beggardly entities.

I beg of you, if you have any questions about this post, please see the related links below.


Japanese Dress as Vending Machines to Ward Off Criminals

Begging for Actual Questions?

Rule #3

Rule #3 (of law school)

Do not fear the Librarygeist.

Such a ghost does not exist.

I've been at my desk for 4 hours (with breaks here and there) and a girl from one of my classes nearly made me jump out of my skin when she suddenly appeared behind me to ask about the Contracts assignment.

I think I started not liking libraries when I saw the opening scene of Ghostbusters as a kid. But I must remember: the library is my friend. Although at this hour of night...

Rule #2

Rule #2 of law school

Let there be moderatione in thy excitemente over knowledge apprehended in private studye.

In other words, in the midst of your monastic seclusion studying cases for the next day, you may be susceptible to great moments of self-fulfillment and joy, thinking to yourself, "Ha ha! I get it!" Beware because when you gleefully engage in discussion or listen to lecture on your supposed knowledge the next day, you may find the professor's understanding is vastly different, nay, exactly opposite to the profound revelation you experienced while studying in seclusion the day before.

Rejoice and be encouraged by thy intellectual zeniths, but be thou humble.

Consideration

Generally speaking, if I gave you a gift, you would call me a nice guy. You might even say I am a considerate person. Likewise, you might say I was kind enough to show you consideration. In the law of contracts, giving a gift means that there is no consideration present.

What does showing consideration mean in a legal context? Well, first of all, consideration is not shown to someone; it's given. The word is used in the context of "in consideration of your promise to do x, I will do y." Y may be an act, a forbearance from doing some act, a change in a legal relation, or a promise to do one of the three forementioned things in this sentence.

The idea is that courts will not just enforce just any old promise. If that were the case, my wife could sue me for not being home in time for dinner. (Although, in my case, she is much too kind to initiate such litigation.)

For the court to enforce a promise, there must be adequate consideration. In other words, the contract is seen as a "bargained-for" exchange. The promisor (guy making the promise) wants something the promisee (guy receiving the promise) has, and the promisee wants something the promisor has. Thus, the parties will create a contract to get what they want. Win-win scenario. ...Maybe.

Further, the making of the promise by the promisor must induce the furnishing of consideration, and the furnishing of the consideration by the promisee must induce the making of the promise.

This is more all-inclusive than one would think. For example, a century and a half ago, an old man promised his nephew to pay him a large sum of money if he abstained from drinking, cursing, gambling and other vices until age 21. The lad performed said abstinence and recovered the money from his uncle. The court enforced this as a contract. The uncle made a promise to pay to induce certain consideration, namely the good moral behavior of the nephew. Likewise, the vice-free behavior of the nephew induced the uncle's promise.

There are situations where only one half of the equation is met. A grandfather once promised his granddaughter to pay her a regular income annually. His hope was that the money would allow her to not have to work. Not surprisingly, the girl quit her job and began living off the grandpappy's income, until grandpappy passed away and the executor of his will refused to keep paying the baby girl her free money. The court refused to enforce this as a contract. The promise made by the grandpappy induced the consideration, namely, the girl quitting her job. But her quitting the job did not induce the grandpappy's promise. The promise had already been made, regardless of whether she would then choose to quit her job, or not.

The flipside is also true: the courts will not enforce a contract in which the promise does not induce the consideration, even when the consideration induces the promise. For example, a rich papa once helped arrange financing for a son's start-up business. The son then promised to pay the father as a board member but later refused to pay his father and changed his own salary. When jaded, angry, and wrathful papa sued for breach of contract, the court held for the son. The papa's financing was consideration that induced the son's promise to pay him monetary dividends. But the son's promise did not induce the consideration; the papa's gratutitous gift pre-existed the son's promise.

What does the doctrine of consideration have to say about the our society's legal view of promises?

Promises are weighty, yes, and there is a moral duty to keep them. But we refuse to enforce promises that were made without each party really having an awareness of the bargain.

Of course, that doesn't take detrimental reliance and a host of other more modern contract theories that still might allow Baby Girl to recover money from Granddaddy. But that's what the rest of the semester is all about.

____

All that to say, Rule #1: In law school, you learn the rule. And that's it.
And then there's the exception to the rule. And that's it.
And then there's the exception to the exception. And that's it.
And then theres...

____

Tune in next time for "Rule #2"...

My, What a Large Pyramid!

Getting to school at 8 am and leaving at 8 pm for several days in a row can have several effects.

For one, it tends to make me feel like a nocturnal creature. I get to the Paul M. Hebert LSU Law Center shortly after the sun has begun basking the world in its glow and finally leave the law library at day's end to find the sun has gone to bed. Does that make me Dracula, the Dark Knight, or just a raccoon? More than likely, I'll go with the raccoon option. I'm so hungry by that time of night, I'd dig through a trash can to find food.

Getting to the library an hour before class gives me a good opportunity to warm my legal brain up. Finish a little Roman history, perhaps...perform a few mental calisthenics - hypotheticals they're called...finish some case reading I didn't finish the night before. Whatever the case, there's a mass exodus from the library at 9 a.m. for class. And here we go again with Professor Criminal-law, C.L., for short. With esoteric questions of moral condemnability being hurled in our general direction with the rapidity of a fully-automatic firing weapon, we gaze forward in shock and awe at this academic performance. And we are engaged in it.

Perhaps, I just wanted to prove to myself and the class that Yes! my brain is grappling with legal issues as everyone else is. Or perhaps, I could not take the built-up pressure of having not been called on in any class yet - much like the pressure that a movie character feels to yell when hiding from a villain for a long period of time. Or perhaps, my breakfast just turned over a complete revolution in my stomach. Or perhaps, I really was offended by the notion that beyond a reasonable doubt would consist of not even having the thought for one second that the defendant is guilty.

Whatever the cause, I felt my hand yanked to the ceiling by some force within my body to argue and of course the Prof. C.L. pleasantly gestured toward me to speak. 60 seconds later, the Prof. and I had apparently had some sort of - intelligible? - exchange of ideas in which he claimed I had used the words "prolonged" and "abiding", which appeared written in green marker on the white board. All I could think to myself was, "Did I actually say that?" And to tell you the truth, I very wel may have. I just don't remember anything excep: (1) Right as 70 eyes turned to me - rather, 70 pairs of eyes = 140 eyes - I felt my throat invaded by the Sahara Desert and all of its aridity and (2) Realizing I was rambling, I suddenly stated "I feel as though I am rambling at this point and digging a hole from which there is no recovery" to everyone's nervous laughter.

And so goes the mystery of law school. Of being a "1L." I mean, "1L"? I know laywers are intellectual geeks, not creativity artists, but, "1L"? I feel like not only are we inmates, but inmates who don't even have differing identification numbers. We're all just "1L."

But the truth is, it's all very enjoyable. After several others classes in a day - including Prof. Torts tossing out hypotheticals involving smiling and benign people tossing buckets of acid on supposed friends - we come to the "end" of our day.

And then it begins. The hermitage begins. At least for me it does.

I find my cubby on the library 3rd floor and "dig in" like a soldier in the trenches. Or to use a different analogy, I enter the warm womb of intellectual thought and spend hours pouring over cases and theory and statutes to synthesizse something that I hope will actually be talked about in class the next day.

I know that one day I will begin blogging my thoughts on legal theory and such, but for now, Iam a foreigner in the land of Legal Thought, wandering with amazement, excitement, terror, and bewilderment among the pyramids, Great Sphinxes, psychedelic port-a-potties, and other ancient monuments.

"Let Us Suppose": Welcome to Law School

I've been putting off my first 1L post with the pretense of "I'm too busy for that!" But as I sit here freezing on the desolate third floor of the library reading criminal law, I figure I'm due a short break. And a C.S. Lewis quote in a criminal law textbook? Let's say law school is not what one might expect.

But that's not totally true. As I did expect, the days are long, the reading material is dense as Cajun gumbo, and the professors are self-admitted masters of oratory. None of which I will refer to by name, nor any fellow students, for the sake of respecting their identities. For example, I would only refer to a consitutional law professor as "Professor Constitution."

Before my readership makes a mass exodus from this weblog, let me confirm that this is not going to strictly become a law school blog. It will simply become a mostly law school blog.

HA!

A friend advised me not to be "That Guy" in my classes. The student raving on about his knowledge of the homework or asking tangential questions that show his or her better-than-the-professor-knows-it knowledge of the material. I have certainly avoided that. I've actually only spoken up in one class a couple times, ever-so-briefly. Actually I wonder if the promised and unnerving Socratic Method is some sleeping giant that will suddenly be released from the dens of academia as of yet, for only a couple classes have employed the infamous law school calling-on of students.

Prof. Criminal Law, however, ironically was the one who told us he didn't use the Socratic Method (the Greeks eventually put Socrates to death, he reminded us, to nervous chuckles throughout the student stadium seating) - and then went on to question us more than any other professor. Actually I reviewed my notes, and I have only 2 typed pages of nothing but questions asked by the professor.

By the way, the other main characters in my evolving story will be Prof. Contracts, Prof. Torts, Prof. Civil-procedure, Prof. Legal-Traditions-and-Systems, and Prof. Legal-Research-and-Writing.

I could tell you more, but the truth is I'm still trying to figure out what's going on. I can tell you the reading is interesting. Very fulfilling.....and the hardest I've ever done. Well this end's my break.

Does anyone have a heating blanket? (I heard some chair-scooting. There must be other life forms up here on the 3rd floor.) "Utilitarianism and punishment of the innocent..."

Flight of the Tanooki

One new t-shirt, one week, 3 hairstyles.

Clarification, hair growth shown in reverse order for exaggerational purposes. (Folks always said my hair grew fast...)

A Better Class of Criminal

As far as my fairly comic-hero ignorant mind can tell, this is Batman's third major film outing. There was the laughable and cheesy 1960s television show, followed a couple decades later by a round of movies that were slightly more serious but still highly cheesy. With Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins (2005), Bruce Wayne's batsuit character took on a much darker and mature tone. With Nolan's latest, The Dark Knight, things don't lighten up; they just get heavier.

The question is not if, but when you should see this one in theaters. Have I ever actually coughed up the money to see a film in theaters not once, but twice? If so, I can't remember.

What's most impressive about The Dark Knight is the menacing and sickly fascinating Joker. Informing fellow mob bosses that he is the "chaos factor" and that Gotham deserves a "better class of criminal," the late Heath Ledger's character proves such a scary villain not merely because of spooky face paint, but more that he enjoys death and destruction for its inherent entertaining value. Perhaps this is most clear in such moments as the purple-robed clown torching millions of dollars of mob money to prove that accumulating filthy lucre is a sissy criminal's motivator.

In fact, the Joker is such an impressive and terrifying villain that the "light" emanating from the good guys in this film seems to be very dim indeed. If one were to confront moviegoers exiting the theater after watching this violent and hopeless flick, one could effortlessly convice them the film could have been just as easily been named "The Joker."

And the thing is, he always seems to win. Forget your good-will-triumph-over-evil-every-time superhero movie. The fact is, many people die and many criminals bask in impunity time and again, with relieving moments of Good trumping Evil interspersed through the 2 and a 1/2 hours of silver screen mayhem. But that's what makes a moralist rejoice. Despite evil on every side, the good guys are relentless in their stand, incorruptible...for the most part.

Aside from the Joker and his facial scars of dubious origin, other stand-outs include Lieutenant Gordon, the fancy-moustached man who is a pillar of integrity, quite possibly the strongest character in the film. Harvey Dent is the city attorney who awakens a sleeping giant through pursuing prosecution of dozens of wormy Gothamites involved in a money-laundering scheme of global proportions. Michael Caine's growing-ancient character gives plenty of thick-British-accented keen advice to Mr. Wayne at the moments it is needed most. And Morgan Freeman's character once again delivers as the man of mystery who is the firm and unyielding underbelly for all of the crazy Batmaniac inventions needed to fight back the mob demons loosed from the gaping mouth of comicbook antagonist hell.

And there's the main man. The man who can become the outcast, who can do the job that no one else wants to do because he can take it, as old man Alfred says. The hero Gotham deserves, but not the hero Gotham needs. The most glorious moment of the film, for me, comes when Bruce Wayne decides that Gotham does not need another hero, but rather someone to bear the brunt of the blame, so that the city's people will not lose hope in righteousness. As a Christian, this moment could not but remind me of a greater story in which an infinitely more worthy individual takes the blame for the entire world's sin, because that is what is needed for salvation, rather than a superhero tooting his own horn.

So what does this movie have? Appeal. Appeal that extends beyond geeky comic book infatuation. Intellect? Check. If you can decipher the money laundering scheme, you're one up on this accounting major. Action? Check. Nonstop, and well thought-out. Wait till you see the air rescue with the forked-nose aircraft, which actually was used by the American military in the Vietnam War. Character? Check. It's easy to see past the bullets, knives, and clown costumes to see raw humanity.

The one thing the movie may lack is a change of scenery. A location movie, this one's all about Gotham. You're looking at concrete and skyscrapers nonstop. The film was shot in Chicago, which seems fitting when one thinks of the prohibition-era mob wars circa 1930.

I think that The Dark Knight is about understanding. Learning to understand what truly motivates one's enemy. Learning one's own limitations. Understanding human fallibility. Understanding that though Evil may have a number of mini-triumphs, Good will ultimately triumph just because it's Good.

"Why so serious?" Jokerman asks? Because the film will leave you with a lot to ponder. And, perhaps, because a clown holding a knife to one's throat instantly slays any remaining shreds of belief in a happy and soaring comic book story.