Posted by Jonathan Adler:
Kmiec on Chemerinsky:
http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2007_09_09-2007_09_15.shtml#1189694973
Pepperdine law professor [1]Douglas Kmiec comments on UC Irvine's
disgraceful treatment of Erwin Chemerinsky in the LA Times. Here's a
taste:
Erwin Chemerinsky is one of the finest constitutional scholars in
the country. He is a gentleman and a friend. He is a gifted
teacher. As someone who participates regularly in legal conferences
and symposiums, I have never seen him be anything other than
completely civil to those who disagree with him.
So the news that UC Irvine had selected him to be the first dean of
its new law school was welcome indeed. And the subsequent news --
that it withdrew the offer Tuesday, apparently because of Erwin's
political beliefs and work -- is a betrayal of everything a great
institution like the University of California represents. It is a
forfeiture of academic freedom. . . .
Ironically, Erwin and I have often disputed the extent to which law
is only politics. It has been my view that law must be understood
as its own discipline and that the Constitution must be interpreted
in a manner that respects its text and its history rather than any
desired outcome. If federalism is a principle to be honored in the
Constitution, for example, deference must be given to state
choices, whether they are liberal or conservative. Erwin was less
confident that law and politics could be so neatly divided.
I will continue to believe that the law has its own place above
politics, but Erwin's dismissal surely makes that belief harder to
sustain. UC Irvine's inability to keep politics out of its
decision-making will make things difficult for the new law school.
It will become more difficult to recruit new faculty and to attract
the respect that the school would have so easily acquired by giving
the deanship to Erwin -- and which it so tragically forfeited by
its casual, and all too last-minute, withdrawal of the offer.
References
1.
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-kmiec13sep13,0,6182233.story?coll=la-opinion-rightrail
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