| |
| META TOPICPARENT | name="FirstEssay" |
|---|
| | | Second, the law student, for a class called “ConLaw,” reads a case about abortion. In a dissent, the law student reads: | |
<
< | | >
> | | | | | |
<
< | The dissenter connects a decision about abortion to a decision about the citizenship of “the unhappy black race.” Since he was a slave, Mr. Dred Scott was not a citizen, and therefore he did not have “the privilege of suing in a court of the United States in the cases specified in the Constitution.” Dred Scott v. Sandford. Inspired by the austere logic, the law student re-imagines Casey: | >
> | The dissenter connects a decision about abortion to a decision about the citizenship of “the unhappy black race.” Since he was a slave, Mr. Dred Scott was not a citizen, and therefore he did not have “the privilege of suing in a court of the United States.” Dred Scott v. Sandford. Inspired by the austere logic, the law student re-imagines Casey: | | |
Conceive, from “com-,” intensive prefix, and “capere,” "to take.” The mother who conceives is taken with child. The fetal child is the actor that takes. We rule that the ability to take, that is, to have a discernible effect in the world impossible but-for the presence of the actor, constitutes life.
| | | 2. In which the role of the law and law studentry in the law student's past is unearthed | |
<
< | First, old memories visit the law student. With his mother at her office, he’s bored. A man offers to shake his hand. They shake. After, the man gives the law student a piece of candy. The law student’s mother explains: “He’s a partner.” This is the law student’s earliest memory of that word. When the law student hears the word again—this time in its general usage—he experiences the disorientation common to learning children: “Partner” means “man with authority and a distant affect.” How can it also mean “companion”? | >
> | First, old memories visit the law student. With his mother at her office, he’s bored. A man offers to shake his hand. They shake. After, the man gives the future law student a piece of candy. The student’s mother explains: “He’s a partner.” This is the law student’s earliest memory of that word. When the future law student hears the word again—this time in its general usage—he experiences the dissonance common to learning children: “Partner” means “man with authority and a distant affect.” How can it also mean “companion” and “friend”? | | | Second, before the law student began practicing law studentry, he was a teacher. He taught high school history. His curriculum contained a lesson about a case, Brown v. Board, which he later read for “ConLaw.” After explaining to his students things they already knew, he would ask them a question whose answer was already known. He would ask: “Why, at this school, are the only white people teachers?” | | | 3. In which the path of the law is found to lead past law studentry | |
<
< | First, just after Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address, dedicating a cemetery for some who died in Dread Scott’s “consequences for the Nation,” he remarked to a friend: “That speech won’t scour,” as a plow baked in Illinois mud won’t scour. | >
> | First, just after Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address, dedicating a cemetery for some who died in _Dread Scott_’s “consequences for the Nation,” he remarked to a friend: “That speech won’t scour,” as a plow baked in Illinois mud won’t scour. | | | | |
<
< | Today, Lincoln is in a vault buried 10 feet into the Illinois mud, but I memorized his words when I was in fourth grade, as, I think, do many fourth graders. | >
> | Today, Lincoln is in a vault buried 10 feet into the Illinois mud. But his words aren't buried. I know—I had to memorize them when I was in fourth grade, as, I think, do many fourth graders. | | | | |
<
< | Second, when I visited my old friend, after his joke about justice, he confessed to a legal problem—one he'd lived with for some time. I thought to my casebooks, trying to recall a similar problem and its solution, intuiting a solution, recalling evidence of it, but the solution itself evaded me. I told him: "I'd like to help make it go away." And he replied: "Thanks." | >
> | Second, when I visited my old friend, he confessed to me, after his joke about justice, a legal problem—one he'd lived with for some time. I thought to my casebooks, trying to recall a similar problem and its solution, intuiting a solution, recalling evidence of it, but the solution itself evaded me. I told him: "I'd like to help make it go away." And he replied: "Thanks." | | | Third, I imagine the pile of words, words about the law and words not, words that help, words that harm, words that scour and those that don't—words I'll write before I meet my mud. I hope some of them are worthwhile. |
|
