(via
YouTube)
Yesterday,
13
Trump-appointed
federal
judges
took
a
break
from
their
busy
schedule
of
adjudicating
cases
and
controversies
on
the
taxpayer’s
dime
to
write
a
snarling
letter
to
Columbia
University
declaring
that
they
would
no
longer
hire
any
graduate
of
either
the
law
school
or
the
undergraduate
institution
until
the
judges’
demands
are
met.
Social
media
critics
are
roasting
the
logic
of
punishing
Columbia
FedSoc
members
to
own
the
libs.
We
had
a
similar
reaction
when
Judge
Ho
first
pulled
this
stunt
almost
a
year
and
a
half
ago.
But
what
we’ve
learned
since
then
is
that
this
is
mostly
a
ruse
designed
to
boost
publicity
for
thirsty
culture
warrior
judges
with
the
welcome
side
effect
of
convincing
spineless
administrators
to
freak
out
and
bow
to
the
judges’
requests:
harsher
rules
to
chill
protest
speech
and
affirmative
action
for
otherwise
unqualified
conservative
professors.
In
an
effort
to
justify
this
inappropriate
abuse
of
federal
office,
the
judges
included
a
bizarre
throwaway
line
at
the
end
of
their
letter:
Justice
William
Brennan
refused
to
hire
law
clerks
from
Harvard
Law
School
because
he
disliked
criticisms
of
the
Supreme
Court
by
some
of
its
faculty.
The
objective
of
our
boycott
is
different—it
is
not
to
hamper
academic
freedom,
but
to
restore
it
at
Columbia
University.
See,
even
the
left-leaning
Justice
Brennan
used
his
office
to
boycott
clerks
from
schools
he
didn’t
like,
so
SUCK
IT,
LIBS!
There’s
a
whole
scholarly
article
to
be
written
about
the
weird
conservative
article
of
faith
that
“well,
you
kinda
sorta
did
it
too!”
amounts
to
not
only
a
good
argument
but
a
foundational
requirement
of
any
debate.
But
for
today’s
purposes
we
need
only
evaluate
the
Brennan
claim
on
its
own
merits
and,
um…
IT’S
ENTIRELY
UNTRUE!!!
As
it
happens,
Professor
Stephen
Wermiel
wrote
the
definitive
history
on
the
subject
in
Justice
Brennan
and
His
Law
Clerks.
Had
the
judges
intended
to
act
in
good
faith
or
even
understand
how
basic
research
works
(and
might
not
actually
understand
that
task),
it
wouldn’t
be
hard
to
discover
that
Justice
Brennan
did
not
engage
in
a
boycott
of
any
kind.
For
years,
Justice
Brennan
farmed
out
his
clerkship
hiring
to
Harvard
Law’s
Paul
Freund.
Professor
Freund
would
select
clerks
for
Brennan,
and
the
justice
would
hire
them
mostly
sight
unseen
straight
out
of
law
school.
Unsurprisingly,
this
practice
irked
rival
law
school
deans:
It
was
not
long
before
Justice
Brennan
began
getting
pressure
from
the
deans
of
other
law
schools
to
consider
their
students.
Eugene
Rostow,
the
dean
of
Yale
Law
School,
wrote
Justice
Brennan
in
June
1957
asking
when
Justice
Brennan
would
like
law
clerk
suggestions
from
Yale
and
what
criteria
should
be
considered.
A
few
months
later,
Rostow
wrote
again,
asking
whether
the
“men”
he
proposed
to
recommend
should
have
a
circuit
court
clerkship
first.
Freund
was
in
England
for
the
academic
year,
and
Justice
Brennan
wrote
to
complain
that
he
was
“being
bombarded
with
letters
from
many
schools
suggesting
interviews
with
nominees
for
clerkships
next
year.”
Justice
Brennan
then
wrote
back
to
Rostow,
“You
are
not
going
to
like
me
for
this,
but
I
have
decided
that
I
will
continue
to
take
advantage
of
Paul
Freund’s
generosity
in
assisting
me
in
the
selection
of
law
clerks.”
Justice
Brennan
added
that
he
knew
there
were
other
qualified
applicants
from
other
law
schools
but
that
“it
is
a
great
comfort
to
have
the
help
of
someone
like
Paul
whose
judgment
for
this
purpose
necessarily
commands
[his]
full
respect.
Eventually,
Brennan
would
open
up
his
hiring
process
to
include
applicants
from
other
schools.
The
judges
authoring
this
letter
seem
to
have
seized
upon
one
line
in
Professor
Wermiel’s
article,
“But
in
1963,
Justice
Brennan
became
somewhat
disillusioned
with
his
alma
mater,
where
his
Court
decisions
were
sometimes
not
well-received….”
What
they
MISS
because
they
appear
pathologically
incapable
of
anything
but
bad
faith
cherry-picking
is
what
comes
next:
By
October
1965,
he
had
made
commitments
to
fill
the
next
three
years
with
clerks
from
schools
that
included
the
University
of
Pennsylvania,
Notre
Dame,
Stanford,
Michigan,
and
Yale.
During
the
ten
Terms
from
1965
through
1974,
Justice
Brennan
took
five
clerks
from
Yale;
four
from
Harvard;
two
from
each
of
Pennsylvania,
New
York
University,
and
Berkeley;
and
one
from
each
of
Stanford,
Virginia,
Michigan,
Chicago,
Boston
College,
Notre
Dame,
and
the
University
of
Detroit
Law
School.
There
was
no
boycott!
Justice
Brennan
stopped
exclusively
hiring
from
Harvard,
but
not
only
continued
taking
Harvard
clerks,
the
school
still
produced
the
second-most
clerks
for
the
justice.
The
example
that
Judge
Ho
and
his
merry
band
chose
as
the
historical
precedent
and
ethical
justification
for
their
boycott
is
an
out-and-out
falsehood.
It’s
a
lie,
but
are
the
judges
putting
their
names
on
this
letter
actually
liars?
It’s
a
subtle
distinction
but
an
important
one
as
crossing
that
threshold
would
require
some
degree
of
intentionality
on
the
part
of
the
judges.
And
which
judges
would
deserve
that
branding
even
if
there
was
genuine
ill-intent?
Even
if
some
of
the
judges
were
aware
that
the
letter
grossly
misstated
the
record,
should
this
be
imputed
to
the
other
signatories,
or
should
they
be
excused
for
attaching
the
weight
of
their
office
to
a
letter
based
on
their
own
bottomless
laziness
in
checking
its
citations?
One
of
the
judges
signing
the
letter
is
Brantley
Starr,
who
tried
to
gin
up
some
free
publicity
by
raging
against
ChatGPT
for
hallucinating
cases
—
should
he
be
held
accountable
for
his
letter
hallucinating
facts?
Should
we
assume
malice
where
incompetence
is
an
option?
A
burning
question!
Either
way,
the
Columbia
students
seem
to
be
better
off
missing
out
on
tying
their
careers
to
these
judges.
Earlier:
Federal
Judges
Say
They
Won’t
Hire
From
Columbia,
Leveraging
Their
Public
Offices
To
Bully
An
Institution
They
Don’t
Like
James
Ho
Cancel
Cultures
Yale
Law
FedSoc
Because
Other
Students
Are
Mean
To
Yale
Law
FedSoc
Students
Federal
Judges
All
But
Admit
Yale
Law
School
Boycott
Was
A
Ruse
And
The
School
Fell
For
It
Hard
Free
Speech
Is
The
Freedom
To
Shut
Up
And
Listen
To
Your
Betters,
Trump
Judge
Explains
Columbia
Law
Review
Asks
To
Cancel
Exams
Amid
Administrative
Grading
Confusion,
General
Absolute
Chaos
Joe
Patrice is
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Lawyer.
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