Due process or not due process? That is the question.

In the Tsarnaev aftermath, a lot of fervor has arisen over Miranda rights, due process, and "enemy combatant" status.  There are terms, historical notes, backbends, and loopholes that keep coming up.  We, as US Citizens, are subject to them, whether or not we agree.  But to move forward, most just choose to agree.  This means one thing: the Constitution has become like Apple's Terms and Conditions.  

Here are some known facts:
The Constitution applies to US Citizens.  
The Constitution includes the Bill of Rights.
The Bill of Rights are the first 10 Amendments.
One of those Amendments is the 5th Amendment. 
The 5th Amendment provides for Due Process.
Due Process applies to US Citizens.

Now let's define due process.  In a nutshell, due process is presenting your case in court fairly.

Brace yourself:

There are two types of due process: substantive and procedural.
Substantive due process: whether the government has an adequate reason for taking away a person’s life, liberty, or property.
Procedural due process: the procedures a government must follow to take away someone’s life, liberty or property. 


Yes, we just defined due process but now it gets a teensy bit tricky.  

When police take a person into custody and interrogate him (custodial interrogation), that person must be given Miranda warnings regardless of the severity of the crime.  

This is where people start citing the "Public Safety Exception".  This exception allows police to question a suspect in custody without Miranda warnings about the location of a missing gun or the location of a missing kidnapped victim for the protection of the police or the public.  These are immediate questions for a perceived immediate threat.  

      Does the public safety exception apply here?  

      There's new evidence emerging that Tsarnaev may have been part of a ring. However, this evidence is emerging over a period of days...days after he was caught.  Ideally, the public safety exception should last a short amount of time so that Miranda can swoop in and allow for the person to have due process.  But, on the other hand, Tsarnaev is not conscious.  So any questions asked cannot be answered.  The risks are now all perceived risks that start with "Maybes".  Maybe there are more bombs out there.  Maybe the one phone call he gets will result in him remotely setting off a bomb.  Maybe there is a terrorist ring he is a part of that is ready to strike.  All these maybes are just that: maybes.  They're not fact, but they are based on fact.  A fact that is quickly becoming a historical fact without immediate future danger.  I say that the public safety exception does not apply here. 

      So is he an enemy combatant?

      You might think that United States citizens captured in America cannot be designated as enemy combatants.  False.

      Precedent looks at two cases: Ex parte Quirin and Rumsfeld v Padilla. Quirin involved a bunch of German-Americans (one was a US citizen) landing on Long Island during WWII.  They were captured and tried as enemy combatants.   José Padilla was a US Citizen captured in Chicago for terrorism related conspiracies back in 2002, but he was not charged at the time.  He was designated an enemy combatant. He was subjected to enhanced interrogation tactics (also known as torture) while waiting to be charged.  The Padilla case history is not a pleasant read.  It is like reading about a roller coaster that goes forward for the first half of the ride, and then goes backwards for the second half of the ride.  

      Ultimately, Padilla was charged just before his case reached the Supreme Court (over three years after being arrested).  So yes, there were cases upon cases just to decide whether or not he would be charged.  

      Will Tsarnaev be held as an enemy combatant?  Will he face the daunting paperwork mountain ahead of him? The paperwork alone could be deemed cruel and unusual. Whatever the outcome, this will create important precedent.  If Tsarnaev was involved with a terrorist ring and he had terrorist objectives, then the War On Terror's battlefield has expanded and, well *spoiler alert* nobody is safe.  There are more home grown terrorists out there.  When they are caught, whatever happens with Tsarnaev will apply to them. 

      Politicians and talking heads across the country emotionally rant that Tsarnaev should not receive his Miranda rights and should be held as an enemy combatant.  Generally, these politicians and talking heads are not lawyers.  So let's leave the lawyering to the lawyers.  After all, it is lawyers who made Apple's Terms and Conditions.  The rest just have to click "Agree".  

Job Market Haiku

Admitted lawyer

In terrible job market;
Enjoying the ride

Keeping Up With the Dow Joneses

May the day of my birth perish, and the night that said, ‘A boy is conceived!’ That day—may it turn to darkness; may God above not care about it; may no light shine on it.  (Job 3:3-4)

There's something about the story of Job which draws everybody in, religious or not.  The story of his struggle is legendary, and rightfully so.  It has the drama of legends like the Ramayan and the reality of relatability.

Today, a down legal market has many struggling.  There are scores of underemployed and unemployed lawyers out there. These jobless are unfortunately not Jobless, which makes the whole scenario very unfortunate.

When the legal market sank, many lawyers who worked for big corporations and big law firms were let go from their "top tier" jobs.  That is because firms and companies wanted to cut costs.  The best way to do that was to get rid of pricey lawyers.  These "top" lawyers then sought jobs on the next tier below.  Employers rushed at the chance to hire these legal brains.  This resulted in the standard crop of applicants to this level looking elsewhere for jobs. The steps downward continued all the way.

Trickle down economics, if you will.

One of the drawbacks of the legal industry is that lawyers can practice law until the day they die.  A working body is not needed.  So long as your brain works, you can practice law.  As a result, lawyers can and do practice into their 80s and 90s and don't retire or die soon enough.  Longevity, as great as it may be in many other cases, is a real problem for the legal industry.  The new breed is effectively stumped from gaining critical legal experience in their young age.  The top guns in their old age, for some reason, are not taking advantage of the situation and training these young, moldable minds.

How does this prevent jobs from opening up?  If old lawyers (most who are partners in law firms) are not retiring/dying, then those jobs do not become available.  As a result, the lawyers below their status do not have an opportunity to move up to that position.  And if those lawyers cannot move up, then the lawyers below the other lawyers cannot move up.  And if those lawyers cannot move up, then their jobs cannot become available to other lawyers available for hire.

Again, trickle down economics.  

[Digression: Lawyers, for the most part, love to talk, and if they love to talk, then they love to talk about themselves. That's what we in the industry call "networking".  If you are a new lawyer or a law student, you attend networking functions and ask the lawyers about themselves and keep making them talk about themselves.  Then the lawyer finds that he had a very interesting conversation with the young lawyer or law student, perhaps not realizing that the entire conversation was about the lawyer, which is why the lawyer finds the young lawyer or law student interesting.]

Back to the old lawyers.  They have a desire to do as much as they can as their minutes tick away.  However, if they have a desire to make an impression in the legal world, then the greatest way to leave an impression is to train the new breed of lawyers.  By training the new breed, one is guaranteed to live forever.  Thus, the wealth of knowledge the senior attorneys have does not go to waste when they retire or pass away.  The knowledge becomes an inheritable treasure which can benefit others long after the lawyer has passed on.  

Those who evolve, externally or internally,
are the ones that get to keep on keeping on.

Otherwise, we continue in our current stage where lawyers apply for jobs at all levels.  And lawyers with little to no experience apply for whatever they can get.  This leads to employers clearly stating in their job postings for paralegals "JDs need not apply" or "paralegal certificate required".  A law school grad not getting a job as a paralegal is like a chef from Umberto's not getting a job at Domino's.

********
It is all a cyclical struggle.  And why wouldn't it be?  If we didn't struggle, then what's the point?  Why lounge around in total comfort?  That's not what the grand thing called "LIFE" was ever meant to be.  Complacency is never an option. This cycle is crucial to who we are as humans and a testament to what we can become.

In the period when we're "between jobs", we feel like Job.  We cry out Job's sorrowful soliloquy (part of which begins this article)  and we send our complaints to the heavens, only to know that the answer from God has been the same since time immemorial:

Brace yourself like a man.  (Job 40:7)

At the worst, and best, of it all, that is all that we can do. And, hopefully, that is what we will do.

A Tale of Two Tiers

Yesterday, I had two separate meetings with Ian and Tommy, two people with legal backgrounds.  Ian is a lawyer. Tommy has moved on from law and is in the improv world.  Both are from opposite ends of the law school tier system.  Ian attended a top law school, Tommy attended a lower ranked law school.  I don't know why, but I expected very different conversations with both people.  Not that one conversation would be dumb and the other intelligent, but that each conversation would have different outlooks on life, different strategies, etc.  Yet, in both conversations, the same word popped up.


Hustle.


Tommy hustled upon graduation.  He rented an office, took the per diem route, and, within a matter of months, gained many clients for his solo firm.  Ian had a highly sought-after job at a top law firm.  Ian did not have Tommy's hustle yet, but *spoiler alert* it's about to happen.  Both were, undoubtedly, making a lot of money.


But, like most people with great plans rattling in their brains, they were restless.  They wanted more. They wanted something else.  


For Tommy, a lifelong performer, it was a life that involved a stage and comedy.


For Ian, a CPA with a background in banking and business, it was a life of running his own law firm.


So the two left their jobs to pursue other things, essentially, to pursue themselves.  


Enter the hustle.


Tommy offered to mop floors at comedy clubs just to get his foot in the door.  Now that his foot is in, he continually reaches out to firms, corporations, and people in many different ways to offer his services. Ian is in contact with law schools, law students, and law organizations to get his name out and let his message be heard.  


Tommy is now doing a lot of work to bring laughter to people, but he has not completely left the legal world.  He has an accredited CLE, which he has taught in places all over North America, called "Improv(ed) Legal Skills".  This is not about bringing humor to the courtroom, rather, it is about thinking on your feet, developing a better relationship with a team, listening effectively, and conquering fears.  The class has been so successful that there is a waitlist to take it.  However, appointments can be made so that he brings the class to your corporation or law firm.  


Tommy does all this while being the Director of Corporate Programming at one of the great improv theaters/schools in New York City: The People's Improv Theater (The PIT).  Although he took an economic hit when he transitioned from law to improv, he told me that he is much happier now eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with his young son than he was eating steak dinners in Bermuda.      


Ian has his feet firmly rooted in the legal world, but his feet are not exactly rooted in a typical office.  Ian embraced technology and opened a virtual law office just a month ago after leaving his job at the law firm.  He specializes in immigration, bankruptcy, surrogacy/adoption, wills, and contracts.  


Ian also runs a blog about being successful in law school and beyond.  This blog is in anticipation of his upcoming book, The Law School Lowdown, which details everything from getting into law school to getting a job.  More info on this at a future date (hopefully a book review as well).  Ian is hustling his way to new areas, which is inspiring to see.


Ian and Tommy have excellent backgrounds and attitudes to ensure that their hustle helps their craft come to light.  Both have gone the route of believing 

There will be plenty of time to think inside the box when I'm dead.  

What did I learn?  Tiers matter when one wants a job in a multi-billion dollar industry making a name for the company and making a couple bucks for yourself.  But, when it comes to making a name for yourself, tiers don't matter.  It's the tears you put into your work that will undoubtedly take you to where you need to be.  

The Flaws of Claus

In the legal world, professional integrity is important.  This integrity is shaped by how a lawyer presents him/herself, interacts with fellow colleagues, and many other things.  According to the American Bar Association's code of professional responsibility, lawyers are not allowed to knowingly lie.  Many different types of people live a life of not lying, lawyers included.  After all, the words we utter are a deciding factor in whether somebody will trust us.  This all leads to the issue at hand "Whether a lawyer loses any integrity when s/he tells a child that Santa Claus exists?"  


Although a simple sounding question, it is actually very complex.  The question would read better if phrased as such, "What happens when an adult person tells a child that an obese man can travel hundreds of thousands of miles an hour with flying four-legged animals (that do not have wings), has an itinerary of every single child (the likes of which Dateline should investigate), lives in arctic temperatures with his wife and small workers (who have not unionized) and are likely subjected to more human rights violations than grammar rules violated by this sentence?"  

Thomas Nast created the modern
plump Santa that many try to look like
in their everyday life.

This question displays multiple mistakes about our society.  Here are a few (feel free to highlight some more in the comments section):


1.  We teach our children a false science.
This impossible idea shows that a person can defy the laws of physics and survive multiple G-forces with no protective encasement around him in a non-aerodynamic mode of transport.  It is also important to mention that Santa Claus is not a relative of Icarus.  That is to say, the higher Santa flies above the Earth and thus closer to the sun does not mean he is feeling warmer.  To the contrary, it is freezing cold where he flies.  Is it any wonder why American students are losing the global competition in math and science?


2.  Privacy is not important. 
A man has a network that allows him to spy on every child.  Now, a child must reason at a rudimentary level, "If Santa can see me while I'm sleeping or awake, then he can see me clothed and undressed." Which must be disconcerting because the child's parents told him that strangers aren't allowed to see him naked.  And this same stranger seems to be following him everywhere he goes because whatever store he goes into, this man is making him sit on his lap and tell him what he wants for Christmas.  Can we say stalker?  


3.  This teaches a child poor reasoning skills.  
This man is overly jolly, can drink millions of glasses of milk without vomiting (everybody in college knew somebody who tried drinking a gallon of milk in under an hour, never turned out well did it?), can eat hundreds of millions of cookies without getting a stomachache, handle his morbidly obese weight so well that he can squeeze down a chimney (in America, at least, and conform to other cultures as he must when he crosses borders), and has a toy for every Christian person in the world in a toy sack that is roughly about twice his size.  As a further point, if this man knows when I have been bad or good and "sees you when you're sleeping and knows when you're awake", then why write him a list of what you want?  By right, he should be all-aware and well-aware of what you want!  


4.  Faith is dispensable.  
As the child ages, he'll stop believing in God.  Why not?  Parents, the harbingers of truth, told the kid that an all-seeing, all-aware being existed.  And then, like pulling a rug from underneath a dozing koala bear, that person suddenly doesn't exist and is ripped from the fabric of that child's life.  


BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE!  A man named Jesus was born on this day.


BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE!  His mother was still a virgin after his conception and he came to die for every Christian's sins.


BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE!  He wasn't born on this day, he was born in the springtime.  Because duh, baby animals are not galloping around in the winter.  


BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE!  December 25th was chosen because a boat load of pagans had their pagan holiday on this day and the Christians wanted to appeal to them so they switched up Jesus's birth day (no offense, Jesus!).  


And, as we know, this was not the only time Jesus was hoodwinked with a quick exchange.  He was also partially merged into Santa Claus (along with St. Nicholas, Father Christmas, and Sinterklass.).  A child my wife tutors said it best, "I asked my friend what would happen if Santa died.  He replied, 'God would make him come back to life and he would live forever.'"


*     *     *     *


I was asked why I don't celebrate Christmas.  I replied that I actually do celebrate Christmas, except that I celebrate it as Christmas' namesake would have celebrated it, which means I celebrate it in the spring/summer.  Which also means I do not celebrate it because the namesake never celebrated it, rather he simply engaged himself in acts of prayer and self-betterment everyday.  


Sometimes, following precedent is not so bad. 

Tweet to @salawm

An Undue Process: A Tale of Troy Davis and Anwer Al AwSnap

It was the best of times.  

A convicted murderer of a police officer received his lethal injection after decades on death row.  Troy Davis had also shot somebody else and pistol-whipped a homeless person.  The police officer was coming to the aid of the homeless person.  During his trial, numerous witnesses testified that they had seen him either shoot one guy or kill the other.  Pretty solid case.  So solid that the jury found him guilty within two hours of deliberations.  

Al Qaeda and the Taliban seemed to be on the run, scattering elsewhere and repositioning themselves in Pakistan.  The founder of Al Qaeda, Osama bin Laden, was reportedly killed.  A leading recruiter of Al Qaeda, Anwar Al-Awlaki, was killed a few months later.  The war on terror was seeing major progress.  

It was the worst of times. 

During the time after Troy Davis's first trial, key witnesses recanted their testimony.  One alleged eyewitness, Dorothy Ferrell, was a recanter.  You might scoff, "Ah, her testimony could not have been that important if it is easily recanted." Well, I hope you want some sugar in your scoffee because Dorothy testified that she had seen Davis slay a person from her room across the street.

Is that bitter?

Might need more sugar. 

Dorothy also said that she felt forced to testify the way she did because she was on parole for a shoplifting conviction and the DA's office had agreed to a plea deal in exchange for her testimony. 

She pointed the finger at somebody for murder in exchange for help for a shoplifting conviction? (you can push play now)  

(Definitely need more sugar.)

This is the part where a lawyer's/law student's mouth drops.  

Truly, it may have been a blunder on the attorneys to not properly look into each witness. These days, finding out that a witness for the prosecution is currently in plea negotiations is something to always look for in order to discredit witness testimony. All the defense attorney has to say is "Oh, hey, jury, check this out: She's only saying this stuff because if she does, SHE will get less time for a crime she committed." Then again, there were 34 witnesses for the prosecution. To look into the background of each one would take an enormous amount of time. 

Dorothy was not the only recanter. Three other key witnesses stated they felt pressured to say what they did. Another was threatened to be charged as an accomplice if he did not testify against Troy Davis. Jurors later said if they had known then what they knew now, they would have tried harder in school.  They would have also not convicted Troy Davis. Ever. 

Everevereverevereverevereverever.

"I'm not actually Atticus Finch, 

but I do play him in a movie. 

And darnit, PETA, stop thinking 

that birds were killed in that movie!  

Nothing was killed in the movie.  

Well, actually, crap, that's incorrect."  

(During some points of that last clause, if you are a true American patriot, you could only see "revere". If, at any point, you saw "evergreen", you are illiterate.)

It seems that a black man was tied to a crime in the South even though the evidence was doubtful. 

Boy oh boy, where is Atticus Finch when you need him? 

Meanwhile, Osama bin Laden was shot, killed, and thrown overboard into a sea all before President Barack Obama strutted away from the podium announcing that bin Laden was dead. (If you want to read more on OBL, read this entry.) Al-Awlaki had something coming his way. He had just started riding shotgun in a pickup truck and had probably just turned on his favorite Jock Jams volume (to remind him of his good ol days as an American youth) before a missile came out of nowhere and jammed his jock.

Went from listening to "boom boom boom"
to going boom, boom, boom.
What?  Too soon, soon soon?

Yes, he was an American. He was born in New Mexico. No matter how vile his actions, no matter how morally reprehensible, he still was entitled to his day in court. The United States had a law in place for acts involving terrorism. 

Yes, there was a law in place for exactly what Al-Awlaki did. 

It is part of a relatively unknown act called the US PATRIOT Act. Under sections 18 USC 2339A and 2339B (the material support to terrorists and material support to terrorist organizations laws, respectively), these statutes state that if somebody knowingly provides support to a known terrorist or terrorist organization, then he will be imprisoned for, at most, 15 years. If their actions result in the loss of life, then they may receive life imprisonment. The death penalty applies for those guilty of treason, of gathering or delivering defense information to aid a foreign government, or a list of other reasons under section 3591(a)(2). 

However, the death penalty can only be given after a trial.

So the case against al-Awlaki was pretty much air-tight.  All America had to do was find him, arrest him, and bring him to trial.  Yet, a memo within the walls of the White House skipped the steps of due process and stated that he was killable.

Killable, not kill a bill.

The US Government alleges that he could not be captured.  One of the reasons he could not be captured was because the US did not want to get stuck in a quagmire of diplomatic relations if US troops touched down on Yemeni soi...sand. (Which the Obama administration may or may not have considered when touching down in Pakistan to take out OBL.) This further makes no sense because Yemen had granted the US permission to fire missiles in Yemen, all the US had to do was ask Yemen if they could pretty please land in Yemen really quick. We are Americans, we are great at going into places really quick.

"Yo, wait up, I just gotta run in and use the bathroom real quick."

It was the age of wisdom.

Judges have an enormous weight on their shoulders.  (Some even have an enormous weight on their bellies.)  You may remember the following from your elementary school U.S. government course.  The judicial branch interprets the laws.  Under the judiciary, we have attorneys who are to use the law to represent others.  District Attorney Spencer Lawton, the lead prosecutor for the Troy Davis case, adamantly states that there were ample opportunities for the court to overturn the conviction, if it needed to be overturned.  In fact, Mr. Lawton informs the public that there were 14 appearances before six courts.  The US Supreme Court even ordered an evidentiary hearing in 2009.  This meant that defense counsel could present any and all evidence for review by the court.  At the end of that hearing, the judge was not convinced. The conviction was still upheld.  The judge did his job.  He interpreted the law as he saw fit.  

Walker, Taliban Ranger

The lawyers who work in the executive branch are some of the brightest legal minds in the nation. They spent a countless amount of hours in researching caselaw to see how to play this out.  (Actually, they are lawyers, so those hours are not countless and the appropriate billing amount for the hours worked has been charged.)  Plenty of American terrorists had been captured and tried.  But no American terrorist ever had a hit on his head.  John Walker Lindh was an American citizen and member of Al-Qaeda, but he did not have a hit on his head, he was just captured during a battle.  These great brains put their minds together to put together a terrific strategy.  

They must have been confident in their findings, because the Department of Defense tracked al-Awlaki for some time and then killed him.    

It was the age of foolishness.

Sometimes, upholding the law is blurred with upholding one's self-interests. With Troy Davis, the DA had slam dunked a case; but with witnesses allegedly recanting, things could have ruined this DA's career. Especially once everybody found out about the bits and pieces of evidence the DA may not have disclosed.  Or, perhaps the whole Doubt Movement that was to help Troy Davis was all a bunch of foolishness.  Davis had multiple tries before multiple courts to have his conviction overturned.  If all those courts did not see anything to bring about doubt, then how could the people continue to declare there was doubt?  Whereas, on the other hand, if all those people did see everything to bring about doubt, then how could those courts continue to declare that there was no doubt?   

The only way a judge can interpret the law is if he has parties before him, which are usually brought by the executive branch. This is because the executive branch enforces the law. Police officers, for example, are under the executive branch. The military also falls under the executive branch (Department of Defense). So, for a court to hear out both sides to al-Awlaki's issues, the military would need to bring him in. 

Except that the executive branch decided he did not need to be brought in.

He just needed to be taken out.

And this is where the checks and balances system failed.

The three branches of government are a system of checks and balances on each other, to ensure that one branch does not become too powerful. For the executive branch to bypass the rule of law and order the killing of an American citizen simply bypasses the judicial branch. The proper thing to do would be to capture al-Alwaki, bring him before a court, and let the court takes its course.  It seems that the Obama administration went through such a trial in figuring out how they could kill al-Awlaki that it made it okay for that trial to take the place of an actual trial. 

It was the epoch of belief.

"Hey, I also sound like I'm from
Baltimore."

Anwar Al-Awlaki was a man with influence. Why? All one has to do is watch his videos. He is not a guy who yells in a loud voice. His beard is not scraggly, but quite thick and full. His voice makes you do a double take. You see a man who looks like he is straight from Arabia, but he sounds like a guy from Baltimore. His speeches talk much about stories that happened in early Islamic history and are even pleasant to hear. Also, he wears glasses that look like John Lennon's glasses. Surely, this guy must be a good guy!

With Troy Davis, nobody knew what to believe. In his court case, the jury believed one thing. In his media case, everybody believed something else. One jury of his peers found him guilty within two hours, whereas the national jury of his peers continued to find him not guilty for two decades.

Maybe if he looked more like her...?

It was the epoch of incredulity.

Anwar al-Awlaki spoke on how much he loved peace and how he wanted all to know that Islam is a religion of peace. That is, until the wars on Iraq and Afghanistan happened. He believed that this was a war on Islam and so, in return, there must be a war on America. It is scary that he could pinpoint the moment when he went from your average peace-loving Muslim to your Osama-bin-HatinAmerica types. More incredulous, still, is that he kind of looks like Bob Saget. 

"Good night, Michelle" vs. "Good night, from Hell."

Ok, not really.

He was connected to other domestic terrorists through internet forums. He was connected to terrorism through his subsequent videos denouncing America and calling for jihad. The evidence was clear. But the evidence never had a chance to be seen in court.

For Troy Davis, the evidence was not so clear.

The one thing that continues to be clear is that there was a perversion of justice. A famous quote says

Justice delayed is justice denied.

And what is justice denied? Well, that's something we'd have to ask Troy Davis and Anwer al-Awlaki.

The Summer I Learned to Spit Sunflower Seeds

It was a dark and stormy night. 

Somewhere in the world.

Watch this video

But not where I was.  I was in a room stuffed with tables, books, and overworked people.  The people were my fellow students.  The books were bar review books.  The tables, well, you know what tables are for. 

Resting your head for a nice nap.

It was 8 weeks into an intensive review of everything law school had taught me (and then some). The final hour was drawing nigh:  the Bar Exam.  This meant that at least once an hour, somebody would throw a pen at a book because they disagreed with the book’s answer.  They could articulate exactly why they disagreed and provide the law for why they disagreed with the book’s answer.  They could discuss little legal nuances for an hour with other people in the library, who were also looking for a release.  They could do so much but they could not calm down. 

I say “they” when I should really be saying “we”. 

It was a tough two months to prepare for a “mere” two days.  Friends and family members were letting loose with the F word. Not THE F word, rather, the other F word.  “You’re going to do fine.”  “You’re a smart kid, you’ll be fine.”  “When have you not done fine?”  “You parked here too long, now you have to pay a fine.”  But, we as law students had done our research.  We knew that lions before us had fallen victim to the Bar Exam.  Lions who did amazing things in the real world, that shaped our country to be what it is today, fell prey to the Bar Exam.  Nobody wanted to go through the rigors of retaking the Bar Exam; the physical and emotional stress would be much too much. 

So we did what we could.  We took the exam.  8,000 people in the Javits Center in New York City.  And now we wait until November when the results come.  I could not help but think that just outside the building, there were people who were on vacation, visiting NYC for the first time.  There were people rushing to work.  There were people who just broke up with their boyfriends or girlfriends. People who just experienced death.  The world kept on going.  No matter how I did on this exam, no matter how I would do later, the world would keep on moving.  And that was something that did not make me bitter (because nobody else knew the pain of this struggle), it just eased me through the process.   A couple nights before the bar exam, a good friend of mine said, “No matter what happens, we’re all coming out of this alive.” These few words were a powerful sentiment as he said this a few days after the shootings in Norway ended so many lives. 

Rock stacks are much better than book stacks 

The exam came and went, just as any other 24 hour cycle goes.  People even gave birth right after the exam.  My wife was waiting after the exam ended.  We packed up the car and went to the Adirondacks for a few days.   Just a few days prior, I had been surrounded by gadgets and technology.  My laptop, iPod, smartphone.  All these things I traded in to simply go camping in the woods.  Instead of gadgets in both hands, I had my wife’s hand in one, and sunflower seeds in the other.

Both were my wife’s doing. 

I agree, too many Disney pics.
But, even Mulan learned to spit.

I had no idea how to spit sunflower seeds.  My brain had been crammed with tons of information over a two-month period and I thought I could not put anything else in there.  But then I put the seeds in my mouth and all the tensions and stress went away.  When camping, chewing on sunflower seeds are an essential, you could say it is a law of the land. 

And I had a new law to learn.