Legacies of Lincoln

legacies-of-lincolnThis year marks both the bicentennial of Abraham Lincoln’s birth and the sesquicentennial of his visit to Milwaukee to speak at the Wisconsin State Fair. (Lincoln’s Milwaukee speech, delivered September 30, 1859, is available here.) To commemorate these events, Marquette University Law School, together with the Department of History, will host a conference entitled “Legacies of Lincoln.” This conference, occurring on October 1 & 2, promises to be a very fine event.

First, on Thursday, October 1, at the Alumni Memorial Union, the History Department’s annual Klement Lecture will be delivered by Allen C. Guelzo, Professor of Civil War Era Studies and Professor of History at Gettysburg College. Professor Guelzo’s Klement Lecture will address “Colonel Utley’s Emancipation: The Strange Case of President Lincoln and His Bid to Become a Slaveowner.” The lecture will start at 7 p.m., preceded by a reception beginning at 6 p.m.

Second, on Friday, October 2, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Law School, the conference will feature three panels variously addressing aspects of Lincoln’s career and legacy:

  • “Lincoln and Politics”: Heather Cox Richardson, University of Massachusetts–Amherst, will be joined on the panel by Alison Clark Efford and James Marten, both of Marquette University.
  • “Lincoln and the Constitution”: Michael Les Benedict, The Ohio State University, will participate in a panel that will include Stephen Kantrowitz, University of Wisconsin–Madison, and Kate Masur, Northwestern University.
  • “Lincoln as Lawyer”: Mark E. Steiner, South Texas College of Law and author of An Honest Calling: Lincoln’s Law Practice, will speak, along with Joseph A. Ranney, DeWitt Ross & Stevens, and Thomas L. Shriner, Jr., Foley & Lardner, both of whom are adjunct faculty at the Law School.

Advance registration is required for the conference, which is free except for lawyers seeking 4.5 hours of CLE credit ($40). Conference information and a link to the registration page are available here. Particular thanks to Professor Dan Blinka for his work in helping to organize this conference and to Professor Jim Marten, chair of the History Department, for making common cause with the Law School in leading the conference. I hope that many of you will register and join us.

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Judge Cannon and the Continuity of the Profession

old-courthouseEach May the Milwaukee Bar Association holds an annual Memorial Service to remember lawyers in this region who have passed away within the previous year. It occurs in the Ceremonial Courtroom of the Milwaukee County Courthouse and is attended by a variety of judges, lawyers, family of deceased lawyers, and others. When I was appointed dean in 2003, my friend, Tom Shriner, invited me to give the annual Memorial Address, in light of my association with the late Dean Howard B. Eisenberg, and I have tried to attend the event each subsequent year as well. This year, one of the “responses” to the Memorial Address (or remembrances) was delivered by Tom Cannon, director of the Legal Aid Society of Milwaukee and former faculty member of the Law School (see this previous blog post by Professor Blinka). Tom remembered his father, the late Judge Robert C. Cannon, L’41.

Here is a bit of the beginning of Tom Cannon’s remembrance:

Dad was probably destined to become a lawyer. By the time he was born in 1917, his father was already emerging as an iconic figure in the legal profession. Dad’s uncle, Ed Carey, was also a lawyer. And many of Dad’s numerous cousins became practicing attorneys as well. These included the Jenningses, Foleys, Tierneys, Gillicks, and Flemings — all well-known, multi-generational legal families in Milwaukee.

One of Dad’s earliest memories was sitting in a high-ceilinged courtroom in the ornate old Milwaukee County Courthouse on what is now Cathedral Square. His father was trying a case there against a cousin, Joe Tierney, Sr. As the sun streamed in through a bank of tall, stately windows, and crept toward the jurors’ faces, Dad watched his father walk over and slowly draw the shades. Perhaps it was that early moment that influenced him to become a lawyer.

Tom’s remarks are well worth the few minutes that it will take to read them — and to remember both Judge Cannon and others of our forbears who contributed much to society through the legal profession. You can find a link to them here.

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Diploma-Privilege Case Continues

The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit has handed down an opinion in Wiesmueller v. Kosobucki, No. 08-2527, a class action challenging—under the federal Constitution’s “dormant commerce clause”—the diploma privilege.  The diploma privilege, of course, is the Wisconsin Supreme Court rule that permits law graduates of Marquette University and the University of Wisconsin to be admitted to the practice of law in Wisconsin (without, for example, having to take a bar exam).  The Seventh Circuit reversed the district court’s dismissal of the case, not because it concluded that the diploma privilege is unconstitutional but because the plaintiffs should have an opportunity to submit evidence on the matter.  The court stated that “Marquette and Madison are law schools of national stature, and we can hardly infer without any evidence that they concentrate on educating their students in the law of the state that these law schools happen to be located in . . . .”  Slip op. at 11.  So it remanded (stressing that “[w]e intimate no view on the ultimate outcome”).  Id. at 15.

The court said much else of note.  This includes that the diploma privilege “has only indirect effects on interstate commerce and regulates evenhandedly” and that “the regulation must be at least minimally reasonable.”  Id. at 8 (internal quotation marks omitted).  On the latter point, the court noted as follows: “We emphasize ‘minimally.’  The judiciary lacks the time and the knowledge to be able to strike a fine balance between the burden that a particular state regulation lays on interstate commerce and the benefit of that regulation to the state’s legitimate interests.”  Id.  (I cannot resist adding that the court allowed that “[t]he two law schools in Wisconsin are very fine law schools, doubtless among the nation’s best . . . .“  Id. at 13-14.)  The problem, according to the court, is that “we find ourselves in an evidentiary vacuum created by the early termination of the case by the grant of a motion to dismiss.”  Id. at 8-9.

While Marquette is not a party to this case (the defendants are the members of the Wisconsin Supreme Court and its Board of Bar Examiners), I expect that on remand (and any subsequent appeal) the diploma privilege will pass constitutional muster.  This is the beginning of my seventh year as dean and thirteenth as a member of the faculty at Marquette; throughout this time Marquette Law School has sought to ensure—because of the diploma privilege—that our students are especially introduced to the law and legal profession of Wisconsin.  Certainly I expect that it is not the case (to quote a “supposition” posed by the Seventh Circuit) “that Wisconsin law is no greater part of the curriculum of the Marquette and Madison law schools than it is of the law schools of Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Virginia, the University of Texas, Notre Dame, the University of Chicago, the University of Oklahoma, and the University of Northern Illinois.”  Id. at 9.  Indeed, I know it not to be the case at Marquette, and I expect that a similar thing is true at the University of Wisconsin.  To be sure, it will take a while to demonstrate all this through the litigation system, but Marquette will provide the Attorney General’s office any support that it requires in marshaling evidence.

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