This week, I’ve been filling out my “Application to Register as a Candidate for Admission to the Practice of Law” in the State of Key Midwestern Swing State. That is, an appli­cation that I have to fill out before I can be permitted to fill out an appli­cation to be allowed to take an exam­i­nation to see if I’m allowed to be a lawyer. Yes, it is an appli­cation to be allowed to file another appli­cation at some time in the future. Isn’t bureau­cracy a glorious beast? Part of this appli­cation is a “character ques­tion­naire.” See, you cannot be a lawyer in Key Midwestern Swing State [ . . . ]

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All helpful urges should be circum­vented. Apparently I did so well on my citation check for the Key Midwestern Swing State University Law Review (that’s Key M.W. Swing St. U. L. Rev. for you Bluebook fans) that the editors sought fit to offer me a research check that had been abruptly abandoned by another assistant editor. Always pleased to be recog­nized, I of course accepted. Now the planets have aligned and the Great Confluence of Deadlines arises from the mist. The Day of Reckoning is upon us and I find myself screaming in my sleep: What have I done? What have I done?!

A play of which I am not terribly fond. The real subject of this post is bar require­ments. For those unfa­miliar with our American system of regu­lating the legal profession, all persons purporting to offer legal advice, or purporting to represent clients in court, must be licensed by the Supreme Court of the state wherein they are prac­ticing. Like doctors, masother­a­pists, fortune-​​​​tellers, and taxi­der­mists, state govern­ments license lawyers, and no one without a license may practice law. In order to gain a license, or in lawyer esoterica, “be admitted to the bar,” a prospective attorney must meet some require­ments. These require­ments vary from state [ . . . ]

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Since the beginning of the semester, the University has received a fairly consistent (and consis­tently bogus, but nonetheless consis­tently disruptive) stream of bomb threats.  One day, one building.   The next, another.  It was almost like some lazy and mischievous under­graduate, displeased with the crepus­cular hour of his first class of the day, decided to send a little email.  A new one for each building for each day of the week.  They were always resolved without incident, and an arrest was made after the second one.  But alack, alas!  The perpe­trators are multi­farious and inde­pendent, engaging in wicked, wicked copycat mischief!  They have continued, [ . . . ]

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