United States Supreme Court Justice David Souter’s decision to retire is not a great shock, but it is a big moment in the new administration.
It is a fairly recent notion that justices are selected from among sitting judges. Justices Harlan, White, Warren, Black and Douglas are among the many justices who were not from judicial ranks.
If a judge is selected, Sonia Sotomayor adds a second woman and a first Hispanic to the Court. She also has the odd honor of having been appointed to one court by George H.W. Bush and to another by Bill Clinton (though there is more to that story).
If any academic, then Elena Kagan or Cass Sunstein would seem logical choices. They both have distinguished records and close relations to President Obama.
But what if it were a politician or practicing lawyer as the president once suggested?
Any ideas?
Denis Hauptly
Vice President, Technology Strategy
Thomson Reuters Global Resources
The Helping Families Save Their Homes Act (H.R. 1106) has been passed by the U.S. House of Representatives and is now under consideration in the U.S. Senate. It is aimed at preventing mortgage foreclosures and enhancing mortgage credit availability.
The bill, and the concept of servicer safe harbor, also is now the subject of a free audio webcast and white paper from securitization litigation expert Talcott J. Franklin, co-author of two noted legal treatises on securitization from West.
In addition to Franklin, the webcast features:
Aline van Duyn, U.S. Markets Editor, Financial Times
Eric J. Brenner, partner, Boies, Schiller & Flexner LLP
Micah S. Green, partner, Patton Boggs LLP, and former President and CEO of The Bond Market Association
Hamish P. M. Hume, partner, Boies, Schiller & Flexner LLP
Katherine M. Porter, associate professor, The University of Iowa College of Law
The free webcast, titled The Next Scandal in the Credit Crisis, is available here.
The free white paper from Franklin, titled Mortgage Servicer Safe Harbor: A Legal and Policy Analysis, is here.
Playwright Tony Kushner will take part in the next event in the Guthrie Theater’s continuing legal education series with West LegalEdcenter.
Kushner will be a panelist at the CLE titled Love, Law and Litigation: A Dialog of Bias in American Sexual and Gender Identity on June 9 at the Guthrie in Minneapolis. He is best-known for his two-part epic Angels in America, and has won the Pulitzer Prize, an Emmy Award and two Tony Awards.
The event aims to explore polarized social attitudes related to sexual orientation and gender identity and their effect on law throughout the United States, and will feature live stage performances by Guthrie actors, along with discussions of excerpts from Kushner’s plays by a panel of legal professionals.
Attorneys around the world also can access the event online at West LegalEdcenter as a live webcast from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. Central on June 9, and later as an on-demand video.
To enroll in either the live event at the Guthrie or the live webcast on June 9, visit West LegalEdcenter.com, search by program name and continue through the checkout process.
The course, which costs $200, provides 2.0 credits toward the Elimination of Bias requirements in Minnesota, California and Oregon. It provides 2.0 or greater CLE credits toward the Ethics requirements of most other jurisdictions. CPD credit has also been applied for in the United Kingdom.
Posted by Kevin Hunt, senior communications specialist, Thomson Reuters
An article in City Pages traces the history of West and the value and expertise that West and Thomson Reuters provide through their professional legal research and reference products.
Erin Carlyle conducted interviews with several leaders within the legal businesses of Thomson Reuters, including President & CEO Peter Warwick.
City Pages is a weekly newspaper in Minneapolis/St. Paul, covering news and entertainment in the Twin Cities and Minnesota.
Posted by Kevin Hunt, senior communications specialist, Thomson Reuters
While winding down at the end of a day of recruiting new talent for West at Michigan State University last October, Dan Bennett and Jay Peyer started talking about the kinds of iPhone and iPod touch applications they could create.
Little did they know that conversation would put them on a path to develop the first Thomson Reuters app for the popular Apple mobile devices.
Today their creation, a Black’s Law Dictionary app, is officially for sale on iTunes.
The app features the 8th edition of the relied-upon and respected dictionary, edited by Bryan A. Garner. Black’s is considered by many attorneys, legal professionals and law students to be the most citable and credible legal dictionary. And a mobile version just made sense, to provide easy access to its legal terms and phrases and embedded audio of that information which does not require an Internet connection.
The process to create the Black’s Law Dictionary app allowed Bennett, a senior director in New Product Technology at West, and Peyer, a senior software engineer in Application Technology, to break new ground.
The Black’s Law Dictionary app from Thomson Reuters is available for purchase on the App Store in Apple’s iTunes for $49.99.
Even Garner, himself very much a fan of books, is excited to see Black’s Law on the iPhone.
“The idea that you can have a very full, elaborate, complex and richly textured book like Black’s available at your fingertips is fantastic,” Garner says. “I myself am stubbornly in favor of print sources, but I like to watch my daughters use their iPhones. And I know that there’s another generation of people who really prefer the electronic medium at their fingertips.”
While Black’s Law Dictionary is the first iPhone application from Thomson Reuters, there’s more in the queue. We’ll keep you posted as more apps are launched.
The practice of law in the People’s Republic of China can be a challenge for any attorney working on behalf of companies doing business with the Chinese.
China, now the world’s third-largest economy and the recipient of more foreign investment each year than any other country, can be a bit intimidating. Its business laws and the practice of deal-making have long been a source of confusion or mystery.
But it doesn’t have to be that way.
I recently talked with Owen D. Nee Jr., of counsel with Jones Day, for a Westcast podcast (Listen to the audio).
Nee told me the failure of many joint ventures is linked to basic misunderstandings of the deal-making process, which too often occur because the investor or its counsel fail to study the applicable legal ground rules.
Today we’re marking the anniversary of Thomson’s acquisition of Reuters, and the launch of the Thomson Reuters brand across the company.
In this video, Peter Warwick, president and CEO, Thomson Reuters, Legal and members of his executive team talk about what we’ve achieved in the business in the last year, and what opportunities lie ahead:
Posted by John Shaughnessy, senior director, Corporate Communications, Thomson Reuters
This blog, discontinued and moved to LegalCurrent.com in May 2009, presented commentary and information about the practice and business of law, and the products and services of the legal businesses of Thomson Reuters.
