Friends in higher ed: As legal (and allegedly legal) pressures increase, you might want to pay close attention to who at your institution is telling you what "the law" is. In particular: Are they an attorney? - ThreadSky

design-law.bsky.social • 16 days ago

Friends in higher ed: As legal (and allegedly legal) pressures increase, you might want to pay close attention to who at your institution is telling you what "the law" is.

In particular: Are they an attorney?

Comments

stcohen.bsky.social•16 days ago

My experience of this was in the UK not the US but the advice from university lawyers was to comply with extra-legal governmental threats in advance, so I wouldn’t actually rely on them.

design-law.bsky.social•16 days ago

Oh, we've got plenty of those types here, too. My point was that you should pay attention when even *they* won't publicly back a certain position (other than endorsing it by silence)

stcohen.bsky.social•16 days ago

I guess I don’t understand you, then. In my experience it isn’t about “types”. The job of the legal office is to protect the institution; universities are highly vulnerable to govt pressures; the office will always advise over-compliance unless some equal threat emerges.

dizave.bsky.social•16 days ago

The NACUA mailing list has got to be interesting right now

docshrew.bsky.social•15 days ago

If you're in Texas, assume everything is being collected and monitored, including your historical research, email signatures, campus, and group involvements. Be sure you carry professional liability insurance if you're able to.

msmaye.bsky.social•15 days ago

This is true

design-law.bsky.social•16 days ago

Attorneys can get into trouble (and even lose their law license) for "engag[ing] in conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation."

9114scentralave.bsky.social•15 days ago

So if you are in a case and your lawyer displays signs of working with the prosecutors this is cause to contact the ABA, correct?

design-law.bsky.social•16 days ago

So, just hypothetically, let's say that a public university administration found it politically (or otherwise) expedient to misrepresent the clear content of a state statute.

They might publicly communicate their "interpretation" of that statute only through non-attorneys.

design-law.bsky.social•16 days ago

If the general counsel (or the law dean, or the most senior administrator who is an attorney) isn't publicly stating the interpretation, but only ratifying it through silence, that might tell you something.

rednecklefty.bsky.social•16 days ago

What if you ask the general counsel at the school if they affirm the opinion of the administrator? And frame it so that they have to respond, or confirm the opinion by not responding?

design-law.bsky.social•16 days ago

Note that this hypothetical assumes that it is a clearly-written statute. Some statutes (and cases) might be ambiguous and open to different reasonable interpretations.

paladin4justmercy.bsky.social•16 days ago

So look at that op-ed through this lense?... makes sense.

design-law.bsky.social•16 days ago

I wasn't talking about any op-ed.

ebs.bsky.social•16 days ago

Second: are they a *good* attorney?

irinamanta.bsky.social•16 days ago

And even if it is a lawyer, ask yourself what their incentives are.

robertgibson.bsky.social•16 days ago

The "General Counsel and Vice President of Risk Management" at my former institution worked with a right wing legislator to introduce a Bill that rids all state institutions of tenure. Supposedly as a "private citizen".
It so happens he is the defendant in a tenure dispute.
Coincidence, I'm sure.

design-law.bsky.social•16 days ago

Yes, definitely. Especially when an issue is *not* clear-cut (as in my hypothetical).

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