"Imminent Domain" and the Rat King

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Nicky Demitry '26 
Production Editor 

In a stunning turn of events, local developer Wyatt Güy (it’s German) has declared his intention to exercise a lesser-known legal maneuver known as “imminent domain” in order to seize control of the long-abandoned Dewberry building in downtown C’ville.

While most citizens are familiar with the concept of eminent domain, where the government can acquire private property for public use, imminent domain flips this attribute of political sovereignty on its head. In this case, it is the citizen(s) who are eager to acquire the government's property, or at least hold it hostage until something is done about it.[1]

Pictured: Rat King asserts adverse possession of Dewberry Building 
Photo Credit: Nicky Demitry 

Güy, known for his bold real estate ventures and penchant for controversy, has vowed to "rescue" the Dewberry building from its roughly 15-year slumber. However, his plan involves a hefty price tag for the city – a sum that many speculate could rival the GDP of a small country.

"It's simple economics," Güy explained with a smirk. “The City has neglected this prime real estate for far too long. Now, they'll have to pay the price – quite literally.”

The Dewberry building, also called the “rotting heart of Charlottesville,”[2]  “the Parthenon of C’ville,” and “the lair of Ushegrim the Plaguebringer and His Rat Horde,” has become a notorious eyesore for over a decade. Its hulking metal frame serves as a grim reminder of bureaucratic inertia, also sometimes called “70k a year in property taxes to the city.”[3]

"It's about time someone took matters into their own hands," remarked local resident Sheila Thompson. "If the city won't do anything about it, why not let someone else have a go? Like the rats? They need a place to live too. When does adverse possession kick in?”

But not everyone is amused by Güy’s audacious scheme. City officials have called his bluff, insisting that they have no intention of relinquishing control of the Dewberry building – at least not without a fight.

Pictured: Victims of Rat King 
Photo Credit: Nicky Demitry 

"The Doctrine of Imminent Domain does not apply when we refuse to acknowledge or take actual possession of the property,” argued Vice Mayor Prian Binkston. “The Dewberry still technically belongs to John Dewberry, who pays us to keep this rat party going. And more importantly, do you wish to anger the rǎtş? Have you looked upon the face of the Rat-King? Have you ever felt real fear?”

Meanwhile, Güy remains undeterred, confident that he holds all the cards in this high-stakes game of rat real estate roulette. “Imminent domain, eminent domain – call it what you will,” Güy quipped. "But at the end of the day, it's all about who's got the deepest pockets—NOT the biggest or most mutant rats, trust me on that.”

As the battle for control of the Hellsmouth Dewberry building heats up, one thing is certain: we cannot—cannot—anger the rǎtş.[4]

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ncd8kt@virginia.edu 

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[1] This doctrine has most notably been used in recent times in defense of the “insurrectionists” that “stormed the Capitol Building.” Their counsel, an “attorney” who has “not yet passed the bar,” and goes only by her initials (NCD) went on record wearing a balaclava to say, “This bold new legal strategy asserts that these Patriots were merely exercising their right to ‘imminent domain.’ We all know that eminent—I mean, imminent domain is an inherent attribute of political sovereignty. My clients are aware that imminent domain mandates that the property seized be utilized for “public good,” and maintain their seizure of a table from the Lower West Terrace of the Capitol Building was indeed for public good. As in, members of the ‘public’ put it to ‘good’ use by reimagining it as a battering ram against the police.” See CBS News, Conservative social media influencer charged for her role in Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

[2] “They who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night…Have we not a perpetual inclination, in the teeth of our best judgment, to violate that which is Law, merely because we understand it to be such?...it is the beating of his hideous heart!” -MontrealBagelFan on Reddit, obviously referencing Poe.

[3] The city says the developer paid $71,902.08 in 2022, and $70,693.26 in 2021. See 29 News, The Dewberry stands empty, and it’s silence from the developers.

[4] I’d like to go on record stating that I legit love rats, but I do divide them into Day Rats and Night Rats, and the Night Rats once stole a scallop from me. Also, how funny is it that the city tried to file a blight suit in 2013 and Dewberry was literally just like “nah.” Bro this isn’t even your building anymore, it belongs to the rats.

Write Now, or Forever Hold Your Peace

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Monica Sandu '24 
Production Editor Emerita 

Two weeks ago, I invoked 3L privilege to avoid being assigned an article by Editor-in-Chief Andrew Allard ’25, in what can only be described as a Law Weekly cold call. However, rather than feeling relieved to avoid an additional responsibility for the week, I was struck by a profound sense of bittersweet melancholy, an almost nostalgic yearning for a time not yet gone. “I’m a 3L,” I realized. “I’m graduating in May. This is my last chance to write for the Law Weekly.” But what was I to write about?

My first thought was something to do with graduation regalia, why we wear it in the first place, what its colors mean, and so on. In fact, I had even come up with a glorious title: “Pomp and Circumstance: A History of Law School Regalia.”  But did I really want my last hurrah to be a well-cited summary of Wikipedia?[1] “No,” I thought, “I want to make something special.” So, I thought I’d share with you all my Law Weekly journey and explain just how much this paper has come to mean to me.

Perhaps the most striking thing to me about my time on the Law Weekly is how close it came to never happening at all. I was but a wide-eyed 1L wandering the wilds of Spies Garden[2] during the Fall Activity Fair. It was there that I naïvely signed up for as many mailing lists as I thought sounded interesting.[3] But one table in particular drew me in. A table surrounded by surprisingly athletic and energetic students in too-short gym shorts who were extremely eager to talk to me as soon as I glanced their way. The first person I spoke with from the Law Weekly was then-Editor-in-Chief Phil Tonseth ’22, whose promises of pizza and light copy-editing had me intrigued. More than anything, however, I was eager to meet new people and to join a social group on Grounds. Even though I was only two and a half hours away from my hometown, it may as well have been on the other side of the world for how out of my depth I felt those first few weeks—and I was grateful for any sort of guidance my 2L and 3L elders could give me. And so, although I’d never worked on a newspaper before, I attended that Monday’s Law Weekly meeting. Although I still felt like some stranger who had barged in on a group of friends, my worries were eased by the presence of other Section A 1Ls, including future Editor-in-Chief Nikolai Morse ’24. Using gel pens, we got to work manually checking printed out articles for spelling errors, bolstered by fresh Dominos. The meeting ended around 6:00 pm that evening, and I walked away from it a mixture of disappointed and anxious. “It’s such a huge time commitment,” I thought. “If I join, I’m scared I’ll fail 1L.” At that moment, I decided that the Law Weekly wasn’t for me.

But something got me to come back the next week. At some point in my discussion with other editors, I learned that the Law Weekly no longer had a cartoonist. I’d always loved to draw, and I figured that drawing something every week wouldn’t take nearly as much time as writing a full article. I came up with a cartoon entitled “Spies Garden,” featuring spy figures in trench coats and dark sunglasses popping out of flowers. I attended the meeting that week to submit my cartoon. And then I attended the next week. And the next week. And the week after that. The first event I ever wrote about was a panel of lawyers who spoke to 1Ls about what a career in government would look like. I had brought my laptop and was taking copious notes, making sure not to miss a thing. There was a sense of pride in being there as a journalist, in getting the scoop on events at the Law School. All I was missing was my press badge.

Come spring elections, I knew that I wanted to get more involved in the paper, and so I, as a rising 2L, became a co-executive editor of the Law Weekly, shifting my role from a more writing (and cartooning) intensive one to a more editorial role. Nevertheless, during 2L, I would use my platform at the Law Weekly to write different articles I was passionate about, from how to start a student organization to a history of Romanian folk dancing and an in-depth review of Eurovision every year. I took pride every week when I saw my name printed in the colophon. Whenever I had an article published, I would take pictures of it and send it to my family group chat.[4] And I never had to worry about cooking Monday night dinner.

By the time I was a rising 3L, I was full of ambition. Although I initially planned to run for Editor-in-Chief, it came up in my discussion with then-Editor-in-Chief Dana Lake ’23 that I had taken a graphic design class in high school where I had actually learned InDesign. Because of this experience, Dana suggested instead that I run for Production Editor. The rest is history.[5] The new Law Weekly executive board, headed by Nikolai Morse ’24 with current Editor-in-Chief Andrew Allard ’25 (then Executive Editor) and me as Production Editor, got off to an (understandably) slow start as we tried to get our bearings. If I thought hanging around until 6:00pm was late, imagine my worries when, on that first evening, we didn’t finish putting together the paper until nearly 10:00 pm. The old anxiety returned; what had I gotten myself into?  But with every week, we became an increasingly better-oiled machine. At first we were done at 9:30 pm, then 9:00 pm, then 8:00 pm, and so on. Sometimes, we’d even finish before sunset if we were extra efficient (and when the time change was in our favor). I got to know InDesign’s quirks, learned to laugh when it inevitably crashed (which it does at least once a meeting), and memorized all the tools and shortcuts I needed. And I got to do it all while surrounded by my wonderful friends.[6]

Reflecting now on my legacy at the Law Weekly, it doesn’t feel real that this is the last time I’ll be writing an article as a student. Even after the elections and the installation of the new executive board, I’ve hung around to train our new Production Editor Nicky Demitry ’26 and help out where I can. To think that in a few weeks I’ll be leaving this all behind, I can’t help but feel emotional. In the Law Weekly, I found an opportunity to explore events I never would have attended otherwise, an outlet for my creativity, and a family that is unparalleled here at UVA Law. Thank you, Law Weekly, for being one of the best things in law school. It’s been an honor and a privilege to be here all three years. I’ll always cherish my time with you.

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ms7mn@virginia.edu

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[1] In case you are curious, here you go: Academic dress in the United States, Wikipedia (last accessed Apr. 2, 2024). See also https://www.academicapparel.com/caps/Academic-Hood-Development.html.

[2] Back when I was still pronouncing it to rhyme with “eyes.”

[3] Some of these lists still send me emails to this day.

[4] I always grab multiple copies of the paper to give my family whenever I can.

[5] You’d be surprised how effective “graphic design is my passion” can be as a campaign slogan!

[6] And the occasional enemy ☺

Which Law School Class Are You, Based on your Zodiac Sign?

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Julia D'Rozario '24 
New Media Editor 

Welcome back to the Law School Astrology series. This week’s Law Weekly will be the last edition of my 3L year, making this the third, and final, installment of the series.  It’s bittersweet—bitter, because I love writing these, and sweet, because I’ll finally be able to stop looking over my shoulder for enraged, pitchfork-wielding Sagittarians.[1] With that said, keep reading for one last poorly researched, deeply biased take: Which Law School class are you, based on your zodiac sign?

Capricorn (December 22 – January 19)

Patent Law

Capricorns have an unfortunate reputation for being snobby and unapproachable. But the truth is, you’re really not! People are intimidated by your intellect and don’t take the time to get to know you and realize that you can actually be incredibly fun. For this reason, you are Patent Law. I’m in the class now, and the number of people who have told me that they “could never” is absurd. If you’re reading this and have an interest in intellectual property, just go for it. I swear you don’t need a tech background. Capricorn, you may feel like people just don’t “get” you… and you’d be right. But I really like you anyway.

Aquarius (January 20 – February 18)

Torts

Aquarians are the human equivalent to those Torts fact-patterns they teach to 1Ls. Every once in a while, you’ll encounter one that’s borderline normal. But the other 99% of the time your immediate thought is just, “how in the ever-loving f*** did this happen?” How does a snail get into a ginger beer? Who takes a bunch of sheep on a boat and just lets them roam loose on board? Why would you ever get on The Flopper if you didn’t want to fracture your knees?

Pisces (February 19 – March 20)

Legal Aid Justice Center Clinics

Pisceans are widely considered to be the “empaths” of the zodiac. You are known for being tender-hearted and emotional; this, in turn, makes you sympathetic to the needs of the people around you. Like the various Legal Aid clinics, you are driven by your desire to help others.

Aries (March 21 – April 19)

Negotiation

You are fun, I’ll give you that. But you’re also entirely unhinged. You’re essentially a permanent manifestation of the unscrupulous, shenanigan-prone negotiation goblin that emerges from the depths of the human psyche during an in-class Negotiation simulation exercise. And, like those Negotiation simulations, my memories of you trigger my fight-or-flight response.

Taurus (April 20 – May 20)

Seminar in Ethical Values

If you’ve ever taken a Seminar in Ethical Values, and if you’ve ever met a Taurus, you know this comparison is a no-brainer. I’ve previously compared Tauruses to a fuzzy blanket or a sunny Spring afternoon—which is to say, laid-back, wholesome, peaceful. Seminars in Ethical Values have that exact same vibe. I like.

Gemini (May 21 – June 21)

Constitutional Law

Gemini, as a constellation, is known as “the Twins”, and Geminis are recognized for their inherent duality. At your best, you are flexible, easy-going, and curious about the world around you. At your worst, however, you can be non-committal, inconsistent, and flaky. Like Constitutional Law.[2]

Cancer (June 22 – July 22)

Law and Literature

I quite literally recommend this class to everyone. It’s fun, unique, and has made an immensely positive impact on my time in law school. There is also no other class in the law school where you will read something and then get asked, “how did that make you feel?” Like Law and Literature, I believe everyone needs an emotional-support Cancer to improve their law school experience and talk about their feelings with.

Leo (July 23 – August 22)

Advanced Verbal Persuasion

Leos are known for being charismatic, warm-hearted, and extremely confident—you’re never afraid to take center stage. For this reason, you are Persuasion. I’m in the class now, and I love it. I can be very quiet,[3] and I get nervous before giving a speech, but the class is so welcoming and gentle in nature that it’s slowly pulling me out of my shell. Leo, like Persuasion, your confidence and welcoming nature inspire those around you–even if your extroversion makes us want to hide from you at first.

Virgo (August 23 – September 22)

Evidence

Firstly, I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that both Virgos and Evidence are excessively fixated on rules and order… to the point that no one is having fun anymore. But also, If you’ve read the other installments of this series, you know that I have a long and troubled history of Virgo-related emotional anguish. Therefore, despite recognizing your many good qualities, I choose to actively avoid you. Just as I have avoided taking Evidence, despite being informed like twice a day that I’ll need it for the Bar . . .[4] Vir-Go away.

Libra (September 23 – October 22)

Fed Courts

I’ve written in the past about how Libras are the aesthetes of the zodiac—you are known for being a lover of art, philosophy and intellectualism. While this can manifest as external appreciation, it can also manifest as internal hyper-awareness… you’re extremely concerned with how others perceive you and often find yourself doing things not because you want to, but because you think it will impress others. Like taking Fed Courts. I promise, you don’t have to do this to yourself. No one else cares.

Scorpio (October 23 – November 21)

Repugnant Transactions

Scorpios are often known for their fascination with the weirder, more taboo sides of humanity. Your friend who watches Vice Informer videos in his free time? A Scorpio. Your friend with a My Strange Addiction addiction? Also a Scorpio. Your friend who took Repugnant Transactions, and now won’t stop talking to you about blood and plasma sales, illicit organ markets, sex work, and drug legalization? You guessed it—a Scorpio.

Sagittarius (November 22 – December 21)

Civil Procedure

Why are you the way that you are?

In all seriousness, having been subject to my anti-Sagittarius bias in the last two articles, you may be here searching for answers. Like Civil Procedure, you find yourself thinking, “am I really that bad? Or am I just complicated?” The truth is that you are both complicated and that bad.[5]

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jkd2dd@virginia.edu

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[1] See Julia D’Rozario, Which Niche Area of the Law School Are You, Based on Your Zodiac Sign, Law Weekly, Sep. 21, 2022; Julia D’Rozario, Which Law School Event Are You, Based on your Zodiac Sign, Law Weekly, Sep. 20, 2023. (in which I was extremely mean to Sagittarians, because it’s my article and I can do what I want).

[2] To quote Nikolai Morse ’24, the Chief Justice Emeritus of this fine paper, “Con law is Gemini. Two-sided, always changing, and contradictory. And also moody."

[3] Yes, when I’m not running my mouth about astrology, I’m fairly quiet.

[4] People keep telling me this. I would have had to learn it for the Bar even if I took the class. Rules have a way of flying out of my brain 0.2 seconds after the final.

[5] Last ever Sagittarius disclaimer: as I mentioned in parts one and two, I actually like you. Truth be told, several of my closest friends are Sagittarians. But I do also have exactly one mortal enemy, who is also a Sagittarius. And hell hath no fury like an astrology girl with a keyboard.

Destination Truth: Charlottesville

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Nicky Demitry '26 
Production Editor 

We’ve reached the part of the semester where nothing feels real, so what better time than now to embark on a journey detailing my top cryptids and liminal spaces of Charlottesville, Virginia. Without further introduction:

Top C’ville Cryptids 

1) Professor Paul Freedman at the C’Ville downtown city market, at like 4am. 

Politics professor Paul Freedman teaches (among other things) the politics of food at the College, and enjoys lurking around the farmer’s market, hissing at people and correcting Karens about city ordinances.

2) The White Deer™

It’s a deer. It’s white. I saw it once while rowing on the Rivanna Reservoir. I took a grainy photo. I had good luck until the next time I saw a normal deer.

Pictured: The White Deer 
Photo Credit: Virginia Rieley, CVille Today 

3) Ranger

I’m avoiding naming actual humans in this list for various reasons, but Ranger is an exception because a) I asked and obtained permission, and b) if you go out to bars on the Downtown Mall, you will eventually run across him. My hint for you is sunglasses.

4) Those two lifted dumbass cars that drive laps around the Downtown Mall with loud music, bopping up and down and complete with flashing lights

Love, and also hate. But mostly love. I feel like the cars are friends IRL, outside of the drivers.

5) ZXCV cat

He’s fading a bit now because the artist moved away from Charlottesville. No one really knows what the deal is with this cursed kitty, but I love him, and ZXCV are the four bottom leftmost keys on the keyboard. So there’s that. My favorite thing is the unhinged theories people have posited about ZXCV over the years. See if you can find the remaining ZXCV cats out and about C’Ville.

Pictured: ZXCV Cat 
Photo Credit: r/Charlottesville 

On to Liminal Spaces[1]

1) York Place

On the Downtown Mall, this weird combo mini-mall/apartment building houses Grit Coffee, Marco & Luca Dumplings, a tailor, a nail salon, some other places… honestly, I don’t know. You can walk through it and emerge on the outside of the mall, pointed at South Street Brewery. Does this sound impressive or liminal? No, not really. You gotta experience it for yourself.

2) Dewberry Building when you can hear the rats

C’Ville’s great shame and curse. So much I could write on this saga and on my not-so-secret passion for zoning meetings. But this isn’t about ME, it’s about that weird, uncertain liminality that haunts the towering expanse of Dewberry. Stay tuned for my next piece on eminent domain reform. And stay tuned for the sound of the rats skittering and chittering in the nights, and picture the roiling horde of bodies—remembering of course that we have uncommonly large rats here—coalescing into a rat king. Cute!

3) Miller’s Third

What else can I say? My favorite place to go after working a bar shift, or if I just really want my hair to smell disgustingly of smoke whilst I watch drunk people do increasingly sexual maneuvers at the pool table while they make heavy eye contact with some unlucky soul. Nothing says 1:30 a.m. drinking culture in C’Ville’s tallest bar like bright lights shining mercilessly upon vacant eyes, reddened by cigar/cigarette smoke. Bonus points if you order pretzel bites, a crispy Coors Light, and gaze upon this renaissance in wonder.

4) The old UVA hospital (West Complex)

Really makes you understand why Charlottesville was the Ground Zero for Buck v. Bell (read the fun sign by Region Ten on Preston if you haven’t come across this delightful story in class). Anyway. Shit’s haunted. Went to free therapy there once in grad school and decided I’d be better off just keeping the depression and recurring nightmares of the weird lil dude from Twin Peaks. And in conclusion, here we are.

5) Gilmer Hall basement (scary!)

Stranger Things, IRL. Conspiracies abound. I participated in experiments there as an undergrad for $20 per appointment, and something definitely went wrong with me. I’ve said too much.

6) Zen Gardens at Morven

I’m running out of space, so Google Morven, UVA past lives, UVA Contemplative Sciences, and John Cleese. TL;DR: They’re trying to figure out if kids are actually describing past lives when they’re being all freaky when you’re watching Frozen, pointing at Anna being frozen solid and saying, “That’s how I died before you were my babysitter.” Lmao, ok. Babysit yourself.

7) Where I Got My First Covid Vaccine During Pandemic

A circus tent, paid for by Dave Matthews, in the parking lot of the desiccated husk of a Kmart and an abandoned Gold’s Gym. Across from Whole Foods. Truly dystopian surrealism.

8) Basement of the Law Library, Maritime Section

9) The Texas Roadhouse

I can’t fully endorse, because I am technically banned.[2] But yeah makes you question reality. Red Lobster was worse, and I’m devastated it closed.

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ncd8kt@virginia.edu

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[1] Disclaimer. I have had genuine fights with friends over the definition of a liminal space. At one point I planned to pre-defend my categorizations of liminal spaces listed below, but now I just don’t care. I welcome your letters. I WELCOME THEM.

[2] This is real, and not for the bit.

FedSoc Presents: Text, History, and Tradition

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Ryan Moore '25 
Law Weekly Historian 

When I first came to law school, I did not truly understand what judges did.[1]  Sure, judges settle disputes, but how exactly does a judge decide what is right and who should lose? Magic?[2] Reading pig entrails?[3] Their own personal views?[4] All were equally plausible to a 29-year-old me listening to Dean Dugas’s orientation PSA about the Bar Exam’s Character and Fitness requirements.

During law school, my professors focused extensively on discussing “why” a case came out the way it did. We spent hours each week going through a court’s “output”: what was the black letter law from the case, and how did the court justify its reasoning. But comparatively less time was spent discussing the court’s “input”: what arguments the advocates made to shape the court’s thinking on the matter, and what arguments the judge(s) found most persuasive. When I began my 1L summer job, I was surprised to learn how much time the Fairfax County Public Defender’s Office spent researching the ins and outs of each judge their clients appeared before. “What arguments will this judge buy?” “What aspects of my client’s history should I emphasize?” “Is it smart to seek bond on Thursday if [judge redacted] is the one considering my motion, and they tend to deny bond for drug crimes?” By knowing the judge, the lawyer knew which arguments to present.

This is an extremely long-winded (and word-padding) lead-in to my coverage of the Federalist Society’s 5th annual symposium, History At Work: Text, History, and Tradition Applied, held on April 5. The event began at 8:00 a.m. on a Friday. You read that right: 8:00 a.m. on a Friday. Can you believe I got up that early just to cover an event for Law Weekly? Because I did not; I blew through all four of my alarms. I missed the free coffee and pastries from 8:00-8:30 a.m. I missed the first panel discussion on Text, History, and Tradition on Bruen’s Second Birthday, featuring my free food table buddy,[5] Professor Frederick Schauer. I missed Post-Ratification History and Liquidation. I missed the free lunch catered from Mezeh, although I did eventually collect some scraps.[6]

I even missed the event I was most excited for: Judging History: A Look into Chambers, with Professor Rachel Bayefsky and Judge Joan L. Larsen of the Sixth Circuit. I had so many questions. What does text, history, and tradition mean in practice? How do judges most effectively use history? What do judges do when history is unclear, or contradictory? Whose history counts? Also, “text” and “history” both make sense, but what does “tradition” cover separate from “history”? These are all really great questions, and extremely relevant given the current makeup of the Court and its love affair with private jets text, history, and tradition. And I would have known the answer to them if I had made it on time.

By the time I slinked into Caplin Auditorium at 1:10 p.m. for the 1:00 p.m. Which History: Originalist Debates in Incorporation panel, I was kicking myself for missing the good stuff. After all, everything but two parts of the Bill of Rights have already been incorporated against the states, what else was there to discuss?

I shortly realized how wrong I was, as the talk lead by Professor Julia Mahoney[7] and Professor Kurt Lash of the University of Richmond School of Law, expanded from a discussion of incorporation into a wide-ranging summary of the day’s events that addressed a number of my earlier questions. The panelists began their remarks by noting that while history is enlightening, it can easily be misused. So-called “law office history” is open to abuse, as advocates selectively parse the historical record only for facts supportive of their side. Professor Mahoney cited the Court’s reasoning in Dred Scott[8] as a good example of this misuse of history.

Professor Mahoney then laid out her argument for a three-part approach to applying history to legal analysis. First, history can act as legal authority. The idea is that through a careful examination of the historical record and reasoning by analogy, judges can arrive at “right” or “wrong” answers, and “better” or “worse” outcomes. This is, in Mahoney’s words, currently “where the action is.” Second, history can serve as guidance to judges. Third, history is inspiration.

Mahoney cites Tyler v. Hennepin County[9] as highlighting this three-part approach. Applying history as authority, the Court arguably could have found for Minnesota. Statutes authorizing the state to sell a home subject to a tax-lien and keep the post-lien equity (“home equity theft” as its detractors refer to it) are well-rooted in history. While certainly a minority rule applicable in just about eight states, the statutes date back to the New Deal era, if not before. If home equity theft was a longstanding, legitimate practice, how could the practice become illegitimate and unconstitutional over time absent a constitutional amendment?

In response, Mahoney argues that the Court then applied history as guidance, and to some extent, as inspiration. The Court looked back to the Magna Carta and its notions of the protection of private property. After establishing these principles, guided and inspired from this country’s English legal tradition, the Court ruled unanimously for the homeowner. But Professors Mahoney and Lash ended their talk by warning that the use of history as authority is often wrongly defended as a constraint on judges. For example, American history has tolerated significant restrictions on the freedom of speech that are draconian to our modern conception of the First Amendment. The Founding generation, with its lofty rhetoric about freedom of speech and the press, also brought us the Alien and Sedition Acts, after all.

tq77zz@virginia.edu 

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[1] Honestly, I probably still don’t.

[2] Cold.

[3] Warmer.

[4] Hot! See Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, 597 U.S. ___, (2022).

[5] First, can I call a law professor “buddy,” or should I wait until after graduation? Second, do you think he remembers the three times we have randomly met at the free food table?

[6] No Professor Schauer in sight.

[7] Who I swear I am still doing RA work for. I’ll have a draft to send you soon!

[8] Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 393 (1857).

[9] Tyler v. Hennepin Cnty., 598 U.S. 631 (2023).

Off the Beaten Path: North Grounds' Alternative Study Spots

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Ashanti Jones '26 
Features Editor 

As of this week, there are only three weeks left until the start of final exam season at the Law School (the final countdown if you will), which also means we are on the eve of the undergraduate invasion.™ As a 1L, the undergraduate invasion™—the seasonal flocking of undergraduates from main grounds to the Law Library to talk at ungodly volumes and watch TikTok videos at the monitors study—was by far in the top ten of the most infuriating events of the fall semester. This semester, I have decided to take matters into my own hands and bravely venture outside of the Law Library to study for the sake of my sanity and my Con Law grade. In case anyone else was a dedicated Law Library study-er last semester and wants to reclaim their study time this time around, I present a list of other study spots on North Grounds to utilize this semester.

Slaughter Hall Rooms 290 and 292 – Moot Courtrooms
The moot courtrooms are a personal favorite. Nine times out of ten, they are completely empty except for the rare class or mock trial practice, making them pretty reliable makeshift private study rooms for those in a pinch.

Purcell Garden
Purcell Garden, the little outside area right across from the Admissions Office, makes for a great study spot because it’s relatively quiet since it’s rarely utilized by students and provides a steady supply of snacks to refuel since it’s a short distance away from the Student Affairs office.

Pictured: Purcell Garden 
Photo Credit: UVA Law 

Darden Library
Similar to the moot courtrooms at the Law School, the Darden’s library is completely empty probably 90% of the time[1] and has a lot of monitors – don’t think I have to say much more to sell this one.

Pictured: Darden Library 
Photo Credit: UVA Darden School 

Holcombe Green Lawn
For the more outdoorsy study-er who wants to avoid the foot traffic of Spies Garden but doesn’t want to sacrifice the greenery of Spies for the quietness of Purcell Garden, I present Holcombe Green Lawn, a.k.a the big yard in front of the law school. Holcombe is not the most “ready to study” space, in that you have to put in a little effort to make it work by bringing a picnic blanket or something to sit on if you don’t want to be on the bare grass, but it’s still a pretty decent option. The biggest problem with studying on Holcombe would be the noise from the traffic on Massie Road, but this can also be solved by popping in some earbuds.

Pictured: Holcombe Green Lawn 
Photo Credit: UVA Law 

alj3emz@virginia.edu 

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[1] No shade, just facts.

Section C Birthday Celebrations

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Mark Graff '26 
Online Editor 

I’ve always been a birthday person. As a kid, going to school on my birthday meant the excitement of entering the classroom to birthday wishes and extra attention. As I’ve gotten older, this desire has remained, yet its social acceptability has seemingly dwindled. Luckily, as a 1L at UVA Law, fellow birthday lovers once again receive that special designation from their section reps, typically in the form of store-bought treats prior to a doctrinal. As a section rep myself, I enjoy making the trips to Harris Teeter to pick out the best-looking cupcakes for my classmates. However, after receiving homemade cookies on my birthday from my longtime friend Will Chambers ’26, I learned that his section honors birthdays with a more personal touch than the rest.

In Section C, all birthdays are celebrated with homemade desserts and flowers courtesy of their section reps. The idea seems to echo the same youthful desire that I (and I suspect many others) have missed as I’ve gotten older. “I don’t remember exactly how we settled on it, but Steve Kim [’26] and I just wanted to do stuff a little out of the ordinary for the birthdays in our section, get flowers and have like a handmade treat for folks. It’s a little rough as you get older and you’re not getting necessarily the birthday attention and wishes you might’ve had before law school, so we figured why not do something to make sure everyone’s special day still feels special,” said Will.

Each time there’s a Section C birthday, the process of baking treats involves an hour or two of labor, all intended to make their section mates feel special on their big day. For Will, the time investment is a source of personal satisfaction and a way to unwind, as he turns off his phone and gets lost in the process of making delicious birthday gifts. “I’d say most are less than two hours of total work time, and it’s really just a favorite activity of mine for decompression—turn off my phone, listen to some music, and make something tasty,” said Will. Though 1Ls have little time to spare, Will makes sure each treat is prepared with care, no matter the extra time commitment. “It could go faster if I used a stand or hand mixer, but most of the time, baking is about just getting ingredients together in the right proportions and adding your own spin on flavors and forms of the final product,” said Will.

Though Section C may now be used to the standard their reps have set, people seem to enjoy the fruits of their labor each time, “It’s less of a surprise for folks now than it was the first dozen or so times but because we try to switch it up for each person specifically it’s still fun to see people react to a treat they maybe haven’t had in a while.” Will and Steve’s aim embodies UVA Law collegiality™, with the goal of making someone’s day one birthday at a time. “Ultimately, it’s a small gesture that helps brighten folks’ time together in this stressful place. We won’t be in our sections beyond this year so it’s nice to do something for the folks you see day in and day out during 1L.”

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mg2dja@virginia.edu

Eurovision 2024 (An Extremely Detailed Explanation)

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Monica Sandu '24 
Production Editor Emerita 

It has become tradition at this point for me to write an article every spring giving my thoughts on the upcoming edition of the Eurovision Song Contest. As this is my last year writing such a review for the Law Weekly, I would like to take you all on a deep dive into that colorful, wonderful, and often absurd world that is Eurovision: a Europe-wide battle of the bands where culture and creativity come together on a global stage.

Overview

The Eurovision Song Contest began in 1956 as a “technical experiment in television broadcasting,” i.e., a live music competition.[1] Only seven countries—the Netherlands, Switzerland, Belgium, Germany, France, Luxembourg, and Italy—participated that first year. Since then, Eurovision has been broadcast every year except for 2020, with fifty-two countries having participated at least once.[2]

Eurovision is the origin of many iconic acts throughout the years, including Domenico Modugno with “Nel Blu Dipinto Di Blu,” better known as “Volare,” in 1958; ABBA, who won in 1974 with “Waterloo”; Riverdance, the interval act for Eurovision 1994 hosted in Dublin; and Epic Sax Guy, part of the band Sunstroke Project, whose song “Run Away” represented Moldova in 2010.

How Eurovision Works

Every year, countries whose national broadcasters are members of the European Broadcast Union (EBU)[3] choose a song and artist to represent them, either internally selected by the broadcaster itself or through a national song competition. The chosen act, which must be no longer than three minutes, will go on to represent their country in a three-day music festival composed of two semi-finals and the Grand Final. Participating countries, with the exception of six automatic qualifiers (the “Big Five”[4] of the UK, Spain, Germany, Italy, and France, along with the previous year’s winner), are divided by random draw into one of the two semi-finals.

 Each semi-final is a massive concert, broadcast to millions of viewers, where each act performs their song live on stage, one after another. Viewers in the participating countries vote for their favorite songs by text or online. You can only vote in the semi-final in which your country competes, and you cannot vote for your own country. Each country gives out twelve points to the song that got the most votes from viewers in that country, ten points to second place, eight points to third place, and seven to one points for the fourth through tenth place. The top ten countries within each semi-final advance to the Grand Final, though qualifiers are announced in random order to avoid bias.

The Grand Final follows a similar format. Following a random draw placing them in either the first or second half of the show, each of the twenty-six finalists will be assigned a running order number and will perform in that order. Viewers from all participating countries, both finalists and non-finalists, may vote in the final. Additionally, each country also has a five-member professional jury who rank the songs from one to twenty-five (excluding their own country.) Each jury’s set of twelve to one points is allocated based on the aggregate ranking of the jurors. Jury points count for half of a song’s total score and are announced by a representative of each country’s jury, one country at a time. Once all the national juries deliver their votes, the hosts will announce how many public points each country got from all of the other countries’ televotes combined, in order of lowest to highest jury score. The winner of the jury vote is the last person to receive their public vote, resulting in a tense split-screen between them and the current front-runner.  The country with the most points wins!

Eurovision 2024

Although Eurovision is typically hosted by the country that won the previous year, 2023 was particularly unique following Ukraine’s record-breaking victory in 2022. As the contest could not be safely held in Ukraine, the United Kingdom, who placed second, hosted the show in Liverpool, in a collaboration between the BBC and Suspilne, Ukraine’s national broadcaster. At the end of the night, Sweden took home the Eurovision trophy for a historic seventh time, becoming only the second country in the Contest’s history to do so, tying with Ireland for the greatest number of wins overall (though Ireland remains the only country so far to have won three times in a row.) Singer-songwriter Loreen won with her song, “Tattoo,” becoming the second person (after Ireland’s Johnny Logan) and first woman to win the contest twice, having also won for Sweden in 2012 with her song, “Euphoria.”

Eurovision 2024 will be hosted in Malmö, Sweden! 2024 will see thirty-seven countries competing, with Romania’s withdrawal due to financial difficulties and five-time winner Luxembourg making a long-awaited return after last participating in 1993.

My Ranking

1 point to France! I always love a good French ballad, and this year is no exception. Slimane steals the show in “Mon Amour” with his incredibly powerful voice, filled with longing, vulnerability, anger, and even self-deprecation as he begs his love to return to him and to remember what they shared together.

2 points to Serbia! Serbia’s Teya Dora brings us “Ramonda,” a beautiful, heart wrenching ode to finding hope even in one’s darkest hour. The Ramonda is a small purple flower that grows in mountainous areas with rocky soil and is often very difficult to find.[5] Strikingly, the Ramonda is able to revive itself with just a small amount of water even after being completely dried out. Because of this ability, it became the symbol of the Serbian people’s suffering and endurance during World War I, in which Serbia lost 28 percent of its population.[6] Calling out for her lilac Ramonda, Teya Dora’s struggle throughout the song ends with a glimmer of hope as a single flower blooms like a phoenix from the ashes.

3 points to Austria! As the name would suggest, “We Will Rave” is a pure Eurodance party where Austria’s Kaleen sings about curing a broken heart through raving. It’s just an overall excellent EDM dance bop that I can’t help but listen to on repeat!

4 points to Italy! “La Noia” juxtaposes an energetic, Latin American-inspired dance beat with lyrics about the monotony of life and the stiflingly restrictive nature of gender norms. Comparing her life to a cumbia—a style of Colombian folk music characterized by a strong, repetitive rhythm–singer Angelina Mango nevertheless dances her “cumbia of boredom” to find reprieve, as she would rather try to escape and fail than never try at all.[7]

5 points to Belgium! Something about this song and its composition totally captivates me. Mustii’s “Before the Party’s Over” is a rich, brooding piece of music that reflects on the brevity of life and the importance of living authentically while you are still able to do so. It’s intensely atmospheric, nearly abstract, and has one of the most unique song structures of the year. Instead of the typical verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-chorus form, the song continually builds until it reaches its musical zenith in a final explosion of desperation and determination.

6 points to Spain! Spain’s Nebulossa sings “Zorra,” playing with the double meaning of the word “zorra” (either a female fox or a vulgar term for a promiscuous woman) and aims to reclaim the word as one of female empowerment. With instrumentation and vocals that call back to the Spanish pop scene of the 1980s, it’s a great time all around!

7 points to the Netherlands! Wonderfully upbeat and surprisingly heartfelt, “Europapa” is a love letter to Europe and to finding one’s own identity. “Europapa is about an orphan who travels throughout Europe (and beyond) to find himself and tell his story,” artist Joost Klein explains. “At first, people don’t recognize him, but he goes on seizing any opportunity he gets to let himself be seen. Europapa is a tribute to my father. When bringing me up, he passed to me an expansive view of the world.”[8] Behind its quirky façade and earworm refrain lies an emotional mixture of nostalgia, wanderlust, and the bittersweet feeling of accomplishing your dreams in honor of loved ones who have passed.

8 points to Norway! “Ulveham” (meaning “wolfskin) by Gåte is a folk rock-metal combo song featuring a traditional herding call with lyrics based on a thousand-year-old Scandinavian ballad about a young maiden who is transformed into a wolf by her evil stepmother and must break the curse. Combined with the return of the Norwegian language to the contest for the first time since 2006, what’s not to like? 

10 points to Armenia! Armenia’s song “Jako,” by French-Armenian duo Ladanvia, is everything I love and exactly what I want to hear in Eurovision: a supremely fun folk fusion that’s an explosion of pure color and joy, bringing modern flair to a blend of traditional sounds. Singer Jaklin Baghdasaryan and multi-instrumentalist Louis Thomas make up the duo whose musical style is inspired by Armenian folklore, traditional Balkan music, and maloya from Réunion, to name a few.[9] “Jako” is Jaklin’s childhood nickname, and the lyrics are a call to all young girls in the world to be their “real, wild, unapologetic selves.” [10] Overall, Jako is a beautiful showcase of Armenian language and culture that makes you feel like getting up and dancing!

12 points to Croatia! This song has perhaps the greatest backstory of the year. Marko Purišić (aka “Baby Lasagna’) initially intended for his song “Rim Tim Tagi Dim” to be a filler track on his debut album until a friend suggested he submit it to Dora 2024, Croatia’s national selection. It failed to make the initial cut but was kept as one of four backup songs. When one of the artists withdrew the next day, Baby Lasagna was chosen to replace her. He then went on to win Dora with 247 public points, ten times more than second place and more than all of the other twenty-three acts combined.[11] Croatia skyrocketed in the betting odds, reaching first place as the most likely song to win the contest, surpassing even longtime leaderboard dominator Ukraine.[12]        

         Rim Tim Tagi Dim combines techno, heavy metal, and rock to tell the story of a young man from the Croatian countryside who is leaving his village to pursue better opportunities abroad and faces extreme anxiety about leaving everything–and everyone–behind. With iconic lyrics like “Meow, cat, please, meow back” and costumes based on traditional Istrian dress, Rim Tim Tagi Dim manages to entertain while also addressing serious topics in contemporary Croatian culture–the “brain drain” of the countryside, the uncertainty of immigrants integrating into new lands and wanting to bring at least some traditions with them, and fears of young people who must choose between their home and their future.

         In 1989, Yugoslavia won Eurovision for the first—and only—time, with the song “Rock Me” by the Croatian band Riva.[13] Because the entry was from Croatia, which was at the time one of eight Yugoslav federal units, the 1990 contest was held in Zagreb.[14] Were Croatia to win Eurovision this year, it would be their first victory as an independent country.

         Eurovision 2024 will take place on Tuesday, May 7 (Semi Final 1); Thursday, May 9 (Semi Final 2); and Saturday, May 11 (Grand Final) in Malmö Arena and will be broadcast in the United States on Peacock. Let the Eurovision Song Contest

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ms7mn@virginia.edu

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[1] Origins of Eurovision, Eurovision.tv (last accessed March 11, 2024).

[2] Eurovision Song Contest, Wikipedia (last accessed March 11, 2024).

[3] Plus Australia, which has participated since 2015 as special guests of the EBU. While they have yet to win, they placed second in 2016 with Dami Im’s “Sound of Silence.”

[4] The “Big Five” are the EBU’s five largest financial contributors and help make the contest possible.

[5] Ruxandra Tudor, “The world is on fire, every flower too”: Teya Dora seeks hope amid struggle in the “Ramonda” lyrics, Wiwibloggs, Mar. 22, 2024.

[6] Ramonda (song), Wikipedia (last accessed Mar. 11, 2024).

[7] Ruxandra Tudor, “I die without dying” — Angelina Mango dances cumbia to slay boredom and gender expectations in the “La Noia” lyrics, Wiwibloggs, Mar. 16, 2024.

[8] Ruxanra Tudor, “Europapa”: Joost Klein releases his Eurovision 2024 song for the Netherlands, Wiwibloggs, Feb. 29, 2024.

[9] Ladaniva, Wikipedia (last accessed Mar. 24, 2024).

[10] Antranig Shokayan, “I will dance and you will watch”: Armenia’s Ladaniva sings about embracing who you are in “Jako” lyrics, Wiwibloggs, Mar. 20, 2024.

[11] Rim Tim Tagi Dim, Wikipedia (last accessed Mar. 13, 2024).

[12] Odds Eurovision Song Contest 2024 – Who will win the Eurovision Song Contest 2024?, EurovisionWorld.com (last accessed Mar. 13, 2024). Odds change regularly, so it’s possible Croatia will fall out of first place by May.

[13] Riva (band), Wikipedia (last accessed Mar. 13, 2024).

[14] Yugoslavia participated in Eurovision for last time on May 9, 1992, in Malmö. That same month, on May 30, 1992, the United Nations Security Council Resolution 757 imposed sanctions against Yugoslavia barring, among other things, their participation in “scientific, technical and cultural exchanges and visits.” United Nations Security Council resolution 757, Wikipedia (last accessed Mar. 19, 2024). After declaring independence from Yugoslavia in 1991, Croatia’s former sub-national broadcaster became its national broadcaster HRT. HRT sought to participate in Eurovision in 1992 but was denied for lack of EBU membership. However, with HRT’s acceptance to the EBU on January 1, 1993, Croatia participated in Eurovision as an independent country for the first time in 1993. Croatia in the Eurovision Song Contest 1993, Wikipedia (last accessed Mar. 19, 2024).

Ramping Up to a Tasty Spring

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Noah Coco '26 
Managing Editor 

As the warmer temperatures and vexatious allergies herald another spring season, nature’s early bloomers have begun gracing us with tantalizing visual spectacles, tempting us to ditch the books for a walk in the park. Look no further, for example, than the beautiful yellow and white daffodils adorning the hills along Arlington Boulevard in front of the Law School. Journey deeper into the forest, though, and you may find a curious yet aesthetically unremarkable plant amidst your feet. What this plant lacks in ostentation, however, it more than compensates for with delicious flavor. Indeed, it is that time of year when the seasonal ramp plant makes its noble appearance.

         Ramps are an edible wild onion plant with a garlicky odor and fresh spring onion flavor. They have a very brief harvesting season—before the edible leaves yield to an unappetizing flower stalk—that typically begins in mid-March in Virginia and lasts only a few weeks. Ramps grow in clusters of bulbs that typically produce two or three flat, smooth, light green, roughly lance-shaped leaves. They grow in forested areas with rich and moist soil, often near rivers or streams. Difficult to cultivate, ramps can instead be found punctuating the wild woodlands throughout much of the Appalachian and Great Lakes regions.

Pictured: Foraged Ramps being pickled 
Photo Credit: Micah LeMon, The Alley Light

         Ramps are a delicious spring treat for those privileged enough to have procured some. Although they predominantly grow in the wild, you will likely still find them at farmers markets during their harvesting season. But because this window is so brief, it is easy to miss out on them altogether. Enthusiasts may prefer to obtain ramps straight from their source, opting to forage for them in the forest. Unless you are aware of a known patch of wild ramps, finding these spring delicacies is no guarantee. The reward to those who do manage to find a verdant patch of ramps carpeting the forest floor, however, is appropriately satisfying.

         With their garlic and onion flavor profiles, ramps can be substituted into most dishes that require either of these grocery store staples, or any of their close relatives. Every part of the plant from leaves, to stalk, to bulb are edible, although it may be the case—especially if you forage your own ramps—that you will only have the leaves to work with.[1] But no matter! The leaves still impart the same fresh flavor, though perhaps less pungent than the bulb.

Among the many uses of ramps, they are often added to pasta sauces or soups, sautéed with eggs or in stir fries, or preserved in pickling jars or ramp butter. One of the most common uses for fresh ramps—and one that I fully endorse—is to make ramp pesto. To date, one of the greatest dishes I ever created was a ramp chimichurri over a strip steak. Nearly unlimited permutations of recipes can incorporate ramps, and I am sure they will all be delicious.

The tragic irony of this versatile and delectable plant, however, is its ruthlessly brief growing season. As quickly as the leaves sprout from their bulbs in the early spring ground, so too will they recede, leaving behind an elegant, leafless flower stalk supporting a flower crucial for next year’s production. There is still time to get ramps for this season, but do not expect them to be around much longer.

         For anyone inspired to venture out and forage their own ramps, a few disclaimers are in order. First, as a law student I feel obligated to warn against trespassing on private or otherwise restricted property. This is a hopefully obvious risk that is common to all foraging. Make sure you know where you are foraging and check that you are authorized to be present on that property.

         Second, be cautious of ramp look-alikes, many of which are toxic to consume. This, too, is a risk common to all foraging, but thankfully it is relatively easy to mitigate when foraging for ramps. Two look-alikes that are particularly toxic to humans—False Hellebore and Lily of the Valley—grow in similar-looking clusters and sport similarly shaped leaves as ramps. You can distinguish these leaves from ramp plants, though, because they have a distinct pleated pattern, compared with the flat leaf of the ramp plant. If you fail to rule out these other species by this first test, you still have a second chance: simply sniff a cut leaf. A ramp plant will have a pungent onion or garlic smell, whereas these two look-alikes—or any others, for that matter—will not. If you fail both of these sensory tests, maybe consider a different hobby that gets you out into nature—learning bird calls, perhaps.

         Finally, and perhaps most importantly as far as my own interests are concerned, don’t ruin ramps for the rest of us. Ramp plants are at risk of overharvesting because of their high demand, short season, and the natural fragility of the plant. Ramp seeds have a ninety-five percent mortality rate and can take seven to ten years to fully mature. Best practice for harvesting is to cut only one of the leaves from the stalk – or two if the plant has three leaves – leaving the remaining leaf and bulb in place to reproduce year-after-year.

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cmz4bx@virginia.edu 

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[1] More on that below.

Tales of a Legal Subreddit

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Ashanti Jones '26 
Features Editor 

While sitting in the audience watching the 116th rendition of the Libel Show, I noticed the toxic questionable atmosphere of the UVA Law subreddit was a recurring topic of discussion. The most striking mention of the subreddit occurred during a skit depicting confessionals of UVA Law students where the scene culminates in the priest damning the audience to hell for our contributions on the platform. As I reckoned with my newfound place in the afterlife, I wondered if the subreddit was really that bad? Sure, there has been the occasional outlandish post about SBA, the administration, or Bar Review location of the week, but the subreddit still provides a much needed resource to our community—the infamous shitposts. The constantly overlooked and underappreciated shitposts do more than just provide some much needed sarcastic humor, they provide on-the-ground updates on the current drama happenings at school. Walking out of the auditorium,[1] I decided to celebrate one of the more “positive” aspects of our subreddit by ranking this school year’s best shitposts based solely on my subjective opinion with no objective, quantitative method at all.

1. “Order of the Queef: timing and cutoff?”

The title alone places this one pretty high on my list because of the obvious reason and the potential strategy involved. This post was sandwiched in between other genuine posts about the Order of the Coif, so at first glance I didn’t even notice this one was not quite like the others and the idea of someone trying some sort of comedic timing on the subreddit is both stupid and admirable. 

2. “Lack of Goth Girls”

This one is only funny to me because it implies that the lack of goth girls on Grounds is a systemic, institutional issue that needs programmatic intervention, and I like the idea of affirmative action for goth girls.

3. “Is it still possible to grade onto Libel after tryouts?”

I liked this one because we love a good play on current events and the implication that Libel has high standards.

4. “Anyone know how to permanently delete Venmo history?”

While there is a high chance this post was not meant to be a shitpost at all, I’d like to believe it is for my own personal enjoyment. The post provides zero context to the title, with only a simple “Thanks in advance.” There is no actual joke, but the inference was enough.

5. “Are we gonna be allowed to eat hot dogs during class on Monday since it’s Labor Day?”

This could potentially also be a genuine post, which is probably the main reason I find this one funny. In the process of making this list, I have realized 1) my bar for funny is quite low, and 2) the comedians of UVA Law must be in hiding because they are not very present on the subreddit. 

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alj3emz@virginia.edu 

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[1] Totally not a last minute article idea because of brief™ week.

Law Weekly Runs the D.C. Rock 'n' Roll Half-Marathon

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Ethan Brown '25 
Satire Editor 

To all my esteemed regular readers in the Law Weekly: I’m back, baby, and I’ve reached my final form—Satire Editor. Thanks to everyone who has supported me in my long-storied journey to this lofty position atop the bottom of the paper’s colophon. Sadly, my article this week marks a return to one of the rare things I am willing to be sincere about: long-distance running. After reviewing last spring’s Charlottesville Ten-Miler and November’s Philadelphia Marathon, I now felt compelled[1] to summarize my latest race: The Washington, D.C. Rock ‘n Roll Half-Marathon, held Saturday, March 16.

I ran this race two years ago in March 2022. I liked it then just fine, setting aside a terrible hill up to Woodley Park from Rock Creek Parkway at mile five that absolutely decimated my chances at PR-ing. But my boyfriend lives a crisp mile and a half from the starting line, so I figured this was a convenient way to get in a spring race, my prior unpleasant experiences with the hill notwithstanding.

The course is a fun one, especially because I’ve spent a lot of time in D.C. and know some of the neighborhoods we traversed very well. Starting out on the Mall, we made what is basically an almost complete circle around some of the most densely-populated portions of Northeast and Northwest D.C. First, we trudged through Foggy Bottom before making a quick out-and-back jaunt across Memorial Bridge. (While I normally am not one to say anything positive about Arlington, Virginia, I will make an exception here and say that this was probably the first out-and-back I’ve done in a race that I didn’t hate.)

Leaving Arlington behind, we then snaked up Rock Creek Parkway past the far reaches of Georgetown, passing underneath Massachusetts Avenue towards Woodley Park, where sadly, I got to relive my memories of the hill. Then, heading east, we went through Adams Morgan and Columbia Heights before making a straight shot down around Howard University. Heading south, we meandered through Judiciary Square until ending up at the environs around the Capitol Building.

I was a big fan of the course map. Since I’ll be living in Adams Morgan this summer, it was a cute teaser of what’s to come just a few blocks away from my upcoming apartment. I also loved the different finish line; in 2022, we finished much farther away from the Mall, by RFK Stadium. This was both unattractive and inconvenient, especially for the poor saps who lived in Arlington and had to sit on the Orange Line for forty minutes to get home.[2] This time, my commute back to my boyfriend’s place in Woodley Park was comparatively a breeze. Granted, this is in no small part because I no longer live in the godforsaken wasteland that is Arlington, Virginia.[3]

Pictured: Jared Tay '25, Ethan Brown '25, Colby Woodis '25, Nicholas Sheets '25, and Jon Griffith '25 after finishing the race. 

Logistics and route aside, the race itself was a blast. We couldn’t have asked for better weather, with it being a crisp fifty degrees under partly cloudy skies. It was also delightful to get to Metro down within a few blocks of the start line because I’ve had a close shave before with last-minute parking snafus that almost made me miss a race. In addition to the great weather and convenient access, I also think that the Rock ‘n’ Roll has upped their course support game from two years ago. There were several water and Gatorade stops, and even a few opportunities to grab energy chews, which felt a little unexpected for a half marathon. I didn’t partake in any of the energy chew stops because I brought my own,[4] but I obviously appreciated the water breaks.

The combo of excellent racing weather and my general love of all things D.C. running made this my fastest half-marathon yet. I wasn’t expecting to PR, but I suspect training for the Philadelphia Marathon last semester did a lot to elevate my baseline running fitness. Granted, by the end, I still simply wanted to perish, as I have at the end of every race I’ve ever run.

I fully expect that my next race review will be of the Marine Corps Marathon this October, which, hilariously, is in Arlington despite my inexplicable criticism of the city in this article. But as I reflect on this race, I forgot how much fun it is to race in your hometown.[5] As someone who is counting down the days until I get to move to D.C. next spring, this was a great reminder of what is hopefully waiting for me after law school.

As a closing note, everyone should totally follow me on Strava because I am very consistent with providing kudos and love that app more than life itself. xoxo.

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cpg9jy@virginia.edu 

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[1] And when I say I “felt” compelled, I mean that I “was” compelled by new Editor-in-Chief Andrew Allard ’25.

[2] At the time, I was one of said saps.

[3] I joke! I love Ballston just as much as the next Deloitte consultant who loves vests, fishing with his boys, and uploading pictures of said fishing with boys to his Hinge.

[4] Sponsor me, Gu.

[5] Blah, blah, yes. I grew up in Manassas thirty miles away. I’m that annoying person.

UVA Law on the Supreme Court: Stanley Forman Reed

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Ryan Moore ‘25
Historian

When I nominated myself as the Law Weekly Historian 1L year, I thought it would be a fun, low-commitment opportunity to write about the history of the Law School. I could show up to our weekly meetings, eat some free pizza, rant about the toxic UVA Law subreddit,[1] and hash out some articles. What I did not foresee is that I would actually have to do research. Unlike covering an event at the Law School, UVA history articles require hours of research and refining a topic into an interesting story.

This week I do not have “hours” to research my article, because it is currently Sunday morning and I am sitting in Caplin Auditorium between rehearsals of the Libel Show. But just like BuzzFeed, I am not above phoning in an article by using and abusing the listicle format. Without further ado, here are the top 5 things you need to know about one of the two alums UVA Law sent to the Supreme Court: Stanley Forman Reed.

1. Stanley Forman Reed had a long career.

Reed was born on December 31, 1884, in Minerva, Kentucky. He began practicing law in Kentucky in 1910 and was elected to the Kentucky General Assembly two years later. After the outbreak of war in April 1917, Reed joined the U.S. Army and received his commission as a first lieutenant in the Army Intelligence Division.[2] He left the Army in 1918 and returned to practice law. Prior to his time on the bench, he served as U.S. Solicitor General from 1935 to 1938.

2. President Roosevelt appointed Reed to the Court.

Reed was nominated to the Supreme Court on January 15, 1938, by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to succeed Justice George Sutherland. His confirmation process was swift, and he was unanimously confirmed by the Senate ten days later.[3] He spent the next nineteen years on the Supreme Court as something akin to the Justice Anthony Kennedy of his day, providing the key fifth vote in racial desegregation, civil rights, and economic regulation cases. He served on the Supreme Court from 1938 until his retirement in 1957.

3. Reed is the last Supreme Court justice not to graduate from law school.

Reed attended, but did not graduate from, both UVA Law and Columbia Law. He practiced law at a time when you did not need a law degree. Instead, lawyers of his time could “read the law.” Reading the law allowed a prospective lawyer to apprentice with a more-experienced lawyer or judge. In many instances a prospective lawyer need not apprentice with anyone at all—President Abraham Lincoln closely studied the leading legal treaties of his day before setting out his own shingle.[4]

Honestly, I am glad the American Bar Association has largely gotten rid of the practice of reading the law. After all, who would want to miss out on the joys of law school?[5]

4. Reed’s Supreme Court replacement was a disaster.

This entry is off-topic, but I got sucked into a Wikipedia rabbit hole, and I refuse to let this research go to waste. In 1957, Reed retired from the Supreme Court, and President Dwight D. Eisenhower nominated Charles Evans Whittaker of the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals as his replacement. Whittaker’s time on the Court was an unmitigated disaster. He reportedly was an “extremely weak, vacillating justice" and often sided with whoever “made the last, but not necessarily the best, argument."[6] He seemed to have an inferiority complex, despite being one of the nine most powerful lawyers in the country. He lasted five years on the court before suffering a nervous breakdown during Baker v. Carr and resigning.[7]

5. Reed was the final holdout in Brown v. Board of Education.

As our 1L ConLaw professors were sure to mention, the decision in Brown v. Board of Education was unanimous.[8] This was by design, as Chief Justice Earl Warren knew overturning segregation would be extremely controversial. The only person standing between Chief Justice Warren and a unanimous opinion was Justice Reed. Reed lacked personal commitment to civil rights: he was a member of a whites-only social club, and his home had an all-white racial covenant. He also hailed from the border state of Kentucky. Reed had previously recused himself from the prominent civil rights case Shelley v. Kraemer in 1948.[9]

On May 17, 1954, the Supreme Court announced its decision in Brown. In attendance was future Supreme Court justice Thurgood Marshall, who had argued Brown before the Court. Chief Justice Warren read the Court’s opinion, ending with the phrase “so say we all,” indicating the unanimity of the Court’s opinion. Reed and Marshall locked eyes, “because [Reed] wanted to see my reaction when I realized he hadn’t dissented,” Marshall would later say. Both men exchanged nods, and then Reed began to cry.

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tqy7zz@virginia.edu

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[1] Y’all need some milk.

[2] http://www.fjc.gov/servlet/tGetInfo?jid=1984.

[3] https://www.senate.gov/legislative/nominations/SupremeCourtNominations

1789present.htm.

[4] Frederick James Allen, The Law as a Vocation, Harvard University (1919).

[5] Me.

[6] Howard Ball. Hugo L. Black: Cold Steel Warrior (2006).

[7] 369 U.S. 186 (1962).

[8] 347 U.S. 483 (1954).

[9] 334 U.S. 1 (1948) (holding that racially restrictive housing covenants are legally unenforceable).

Savings and Investing Strategies

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Brent Rice '25 
Staff Editor 

Continuing our series offering readers financial advice from the Law Weekly writer with crippling credit card debt (and who may or may not have finished 1L several thousand dollars in the hole), I decided to head over to the Financial Aid Office’s “Real World Finances” series for the “Saving and Investing Strategies” workshop on February 27. While the series is targeted towards graduating 3Ls who will soon have an income with which to employ these strategies, there was a healthy amount of 2L students presumably hoping to learn some quick strategies to amplify their summer incomes in order to increase their 3LOL bar spending money.

The session was led by UVA Law Professor Paul Mahoney, who previously served as Dean of the Law School and is credited with skillfully leading the School through the 2008 financial crisis, ensuring both its students and finances did not collapse in despair. Professor Mahoney seems to have been the right man at the right time and once again rose to the occasion to assist us helpless law students in escaping the financial crises of our own making.

If you are reading this article in lieu of reading for class (looking at you 3Ls) and only have a few short minutes to spare, one of the most important takeaways of Professor Mahoney’s session was to remember, and leverage in your favor, the power of compounding. At its core, compounding is the idea that interest can build on top of interest, which can work either for or against you.

For example, most of the end value of a person’s retirement accounts is attributable to money invested in the account between the ages of 25-34. For this reason, you can make compounding work for you by saving for retirement early and often. Another way to make compounding work for you is to only borrow assets that will appreciate (i.e., go up) in value, for example a house or your law school education.

Compounding works against you when you borrow money to buy assets that depreciate in value quickly—such as a new car. Or, even more so, when you do not pay your credit card bill in full each month, as interest accumulates on top of interest, which can exponentially increase the amount you owe.

The session next turned to a discussion of the relationship between risk and return, where risk can be estimated by the extent to which the return on an asset varies from one period to the next. Financial professionals know that bonds are less risky than stocks. In addition, the longer your investment time horizon, the more risk you can take in pursuit of higher long-term returns. Finally, it is important to know that diversification within an asset class, if done well, can reduce risk without reducing return.

All of the above sounds great but if you are looking for more ways to put this practical knowledge to use, Professor Mahoney next covered different types of financial professionals we can turn to for help, as well as their fee structures and pros and cons of each.

“Full-Service” Brokers:

These investment professionals are paid on a commission basis and often sell “proprietary” products on which the broker earns additional fees. Because they are not fiduciaries, they are not required to avoid all conflicts of interest when helping you invest. Hence, the broker’s incentive is to sell you investments on which they earn the highest compensation, which can eat substantially into your own returns. That said, if you don’t trade often, a broker can be an inexpensive source of advice.

Registered Investment Advisors:

This type of financial professional usually charges a fee based on the amount of assets under management (e.g. 1.25% per year). Because they are a fiduciary, they are required by law to serve your interests and either avoid or disclose all conflicting interests. In this structure, the incentives and legal duty are well-aligned with your own financial interests. That said, you can pay a lot for this advice if you have a lot of assets under management, and this payment has a compound effect, which works against you in the long run.

Do It Yourself:

While recognizing that many of us came to law school to avoid math and complicated numbers, Professor Mahoney finally shared an investment strategy where you become the financial professional. In this system you decide which mix of asset classes best suits your needs and risk tolerance and you make those investments using a discount broker, mutual fund, or exchange traded fund (ETF). The advantage of this strategy is that it is the lowest cost to you and you are in control of your investments. The disadvantage to this strategy is also that you are in control of your investments, and you may act irrationally or emotionally in a way that reduces your long-term return.

For those interested in a little bit of DIY, the session concluded with a short discussion of the differences between mutual funds and ETFs.

A mutual fund is an investment vehicle that sells shares to investors and uses those proceeds to buy portfolios of securities. They offer daily liquidity as mutual funds will buy back those shares from the investor at the end of any trading day. When evaluating mutual funds, it is important to look at the “Expense Ratio” as many similar funds charge very different expense ratios and, in addition, competition has led some companies to offer a small number of index funds with an expense ratio of zero. One advantage of mutual funds is you can buy it and forget it, but there are some negative tax consequences to mutual fund ownership as they are pass-through entities for tax purposes.

ETFs are a more recent product offering than mutual funds. These investment vehicles hold a portfolio like a mutual fund, but trade on a stock exchange as if they are an individual stock. For this reason, they offer instant liquidity but must be bought/sold through a broker, rather than through the fund itself. Expense ratios for ETFs may be lower than for mutual funds because there are less administrative costs and ETFs may be slightly more tax efficient than mutual funds, since you only pay taxes when you sell. That said, like other products traded on a market, you need to carefully evaluate the bid-ask spread and choose ETFs with lower spreads among similar funds. In addition, most ETFs don’t offer automatic reinvestment of your earnings so it takes more effort in order to get a compounding effect that works in your favor.

All in all, the session was very informative and I, for one, look forward to putting this newfound knowledge to use. That is, if and when I have any money to invest.

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wrf4bh@virginia.edu

Public Interest Students' Funding Concerns

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Ryan Moore '25 
Historian 

The University of Virginia School of Law is a prolific fundraiser. Our endowment sits at $831.4 million as of June 30, 2023.[1] On February 27, the Law School announced that it had reached its $400 million funding goal fifteen months ahead of schedule.[2] This represents “the third-largest total in the history of any law school.”[3] Because this fundraising ultimately returns to benefit the student body, every law student is thankful to the 16,000 donors and alumni who made this possible.

But it sometimes seems that not all students are benefited equally. Throughout the last year, public interest students have expressed frustration and disappointment with a perceived lack of support by the Law School and administration. This lack of financial support is acutely felt by public interest students during their summers, where positions are often unpaid or paid significantly less than private firm summer associate positions. To learn more, I talked with several public interest students, including LPS co-president Delaney Tubbs ’25, about public interest summer funding, communication with school administration, and what all of us can do to help.

On February 23, public interest students (and private firm students in solidarity) sent a letter about recent changes made to the structure of summer funding at the Law School to Dean Risa Goluboff, incoming Dean Leslie Kendrick, and the Law School Foundation.[4] Public interest students laid out a timeline that underscores a lack of communication and support from school administration.

On November 28, 2023, the school announced that they were increasing the Public Service Summer Grant (PSSG) funding for public interest students from $4,000 to $5,000 for 1Ls and $7,000 to $8,000 for 2Ls. While still significantly less than the tens of thousands of dollars students can make in summer associate positions, any increase in public interest funding is appreciated.

However, by early 2024, word spread that the School planned to remove alumni summer fellowship opportunities, which provided an additional source of funding for public interest students. The fellowship previously supported a significant number of public interest 2Ls, nearly 25% of whom received supplemental funding in amounts up to $10,000. Instead, public interest students can still apply for alumni fellowships and grants but will no longer receive additional funding beyond the base PSSG amounts.

The official change to alumni summer funding was not announced until February 5, 2024, after many students had already made summer plans and committed to work in high cost of living cities where vulnerable populations are in need of support. While alumni fellowships are not guaranteed, public interest students have a higher chance of receiving additional school funding than funding from large, national public interest support organizations. To me and many public interest students, the changes to alumni funding feel like a loss of resources for public interest students.

Much like Justice Stephen Breyer, when I am forced to make a hard decision, I often resort to a balancing test.[5] On the one hand, we have the costs to the University of additional funding. On the other, the quality of life of public interest students. Inadequate summer funding affects public interest students during the school year as they must make their budgets stretch to cover their summer jobs. The cost to the university for increasing summer grants is essentially negligible. Only thirty-one out of 315 students in the Class of 2025 did not partake in OGI last summer. For the Class of 2024, only thirty out of 300 received a PSSG. There may very well be financial constraints that make additional levels of support unfeasible, but given the imbalance between the needs of public interest students and the costs to the University, we are all owed an explanation.

What we can do to help

One of the many features I like about UVA Law is that private firm students step up to support our public interest colleagues. Whether it is the annual PILA auction, which raises thousands of dollars in supplemental summer funding, or just buying your public interest friends a drink at Bar Review, everyone recognizes the necessary work public interest students do. I am heartened that many students going to private firms this summer signed the open letter in support of our public interest colleagues.

I also believe that SBA has a responsibility to explicitly platform the needs and concerns of public interest students. SBA has the ear of school administration in a way that other student organizations do not, including weekly meetings with school officials. I was surprised that after the letter issued by public interest students, SBA had not reached out to offer support. Shortly after this article goes to press, public interest student representatives plan to meet with school administration to discuss their concerns. It would be great if SBA leadership could throw their weight behind this effort.

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mgt6bs@virginia.edu 

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[1] https://news.virginia.edu/content/uva-law-reaches-400m-campaign-goal-early.

[2] Id.

[3] Id.

[4] All numbers in this article regarding public interest student funding are sourced from this letter.

[5] This is about the only thing we have in common.

Can AI Improve My Brief?

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Noah Coco '26 
Managing Editor 

In the previous edition of the paper, I authored an article covering an event hosted at the Law School highlighting the impending impact of artificial intelligence (AI) technology on legal practice. In short, AI technologies are expected to increasingly perform legal tasks and displace the legal workforce. Attorneys who can most effectively deploy AI technologies will be best positioned to succeed in the transforming legal industry.

With that portent looming large, I wanted to experiment with some of the legal AI tools currently available. As a new entrant into the space, I was unfamiliar with the current landscape of legal AI tools, so I began with one that recently showed up in my email inbox: Westlaw’s Quick Check.

Westlaw pitches Quick Check as “[c]utting-edge AI combined with Westlaw's editorial excellence [delivering] relevant authority traditional research might miss.” As the description suggests, Quick Check is a document analysis tool powered by an AI model that, among other useful features, purports to analyze uploaded documents and suggest authorities that may be relevant to the legal issues identified in the document but that were not cited in it. The tool generates a report that lists relevant authorities organized by the headings from the original document, and it displays the outcome of the recommended cases along with excerpts of case text relevant to the legal issue analyzed.

I approached Quick Check with a simple challenge: can it improve my LRW brief? Or, can it improve a hypothetically bad version of my brief emblematic of disregarding two semesters’ worth of LRW class sessions? Although I presume that at least one-third of the Law School has by now analyzed this same legal issue, I will give a brief crash course on the legal question analyzed. The case concerns whether digital sampling of sound recordings constitutes per se copyright infringement or whether a de minimis exception applies. The first main argument presented in the brief supports the rule that digital sampling constitutes per se copyright infringement. Assuming the court does not adopt this rule, however, the second main argument maintains that the particular instance of digital sampling in the case is not de minimis as a matter of law, first under a test called the fragmented literal similarity test, and second under a test called the observability test.

I first uploaded a moderately complete draft of my own LRW brief. Due to the gracious beneficence and tutelage of the Law School’s own Professor Ruth Buck ’85, I was very confident that nearly every authority relevant to my analysis was already accounted for. The results of the Quick Check report confirmed my suspicions.

As a preliminary matter, Quick Check correctly identified the headings labeling the two main arguments, as well as the three sub-arguments contained under both. However, as expected, the suggestions bore meager relevance to the precise legal issues analyzed in the brief. For example, although the recommended cases for the first sub-argument of the first main argument did all pertain to music and copyright infringement, they all dealt with different forms of infringement, none of which concerned digital sampling. I was nonetheless impressed that the top-recommended cases were all within the jurisdiction of the Second Circuit—four of the cases were tried in the Southern District of New York, and the fifth was argued at the Second Circuit itself. If not a coincidence,[1] then the AI model’s ability to recognize the relevant jurisdiction from the brief is admittedly impressive.

Although the failure to identify additional relevant cases is excusable since it is likely that nearly all relevant cases have already been included in the brief, less excusable was the failure of Quick Check to recommend any relevant or useful secondary sources. Of the scant twelve recommendations across all the headings, two authorities—one, an alphabetically-listed table of case names from a treatise on copyright, the other, the digital sampling portion of American Jurisprudence Proof of Facts—comprised seven of the total, and they were not particularly helpful. This is a striking result since a basic targeted search in Westlaw’s generic search bar yields hundreds of relevant law review articles and other authorities. It is surprising that not even the most cited law review articles on the topic were recommended.

Although the initial test of the “control” brief produced unsurprisingly mediocre results, I next challenged the Quick Check tool with an “experimental” brief where I removed key text and citations from the arguments. First, I completely removed the discussion of the statute from the Copyright Act of 1976 that is most relevant to the discussion of sound recording copyright infringement.[2] Second, I removed the discussion of one of the few cases in the Southern District of New York (and the Second Circuit broadly) where the de minimis exception had been applied to a case of digital sampling of s sound recording copyright.[3] Third, I omitted one of two Second Circuit cases applying the fragmented literal similarity test.[4] Finally, I omitted three cases where the fragmented literal similarity test had been applied to digital samples of sound recordings.[5] Maybe I was a little heavy-handed on the omissions, but I wanted to see how much Quick Check could help me if I had been completely unconscious in every LRW class of the year.

After uploading the lackluster brief, I first observed that recommendations of relevant statutory provisions were not actually a feature offered by Quick Check. Pity. Quick Check did, however, provide a backdoor of sorts, since the recommendations for the first sub-argument of the first main argument recommended the same relevant case twice, each time highlighting text that cited the missing statutory provisions. Perhaps if I had not read the cases carefully enough the first time, these results could have provided a second chance. The results did actually impress me for another reason. Again assuming no coincidence, Quick Check properly recommended the case that was most beneficial to my side of the argument, rather than the competing case for the opposing side that unflinchingly eviscerated the statutory argument put forward in the first.

The recommendations fared marginally better in identifying the omitted cases. Only one of the omitted cases was identified among any of the top five recommended cases displayed on the main page of the report.[6] However, three more of the omitted cases were recommended when I clicked on the links to “See additional cases” appended to the main report.[7] Although the cases were not recommended under the same headings as those from which they were originally included, it is difficult to find fault in that lack of precision in what is otherwise a nuanced legal issue. More upsetting were the recommendation of dozens of irrelevant cases and the failure of Quick Check to recommend the final omitted case, which actually applied the fragmented literal similarity test to six different digital samples.[8] Moreover, it should be unsurprising that Quick Check again failed to recommend any appreciably beneficial secondary sources.

In conclusion, Quick Check will likely not meaningfully improve either a relatively good or relatively bad LRW brief (yet). The main problem I had is that the top recommendations were generally not relevant and missed the main legal issue. When Quick Check did identify relevant cases missing from the brief, they were not matched to the appropriate argument headings. Also, by the time I found the cases, it felt no more efficient than working through search results rendered from a targeted search in the generic search bar. Nonetheless, some of the characteristics of the results did impress me, and the tool should not be entirely discounted. The results of this dubiously rigorous study should also be taken with a grain of salt because they seem incongruous with the general narrative surrounding generative AI, particularly models used for legal research.[9] I would highly recommend testing the tool out for yourself. Perhaps you will have more success than I had, but at the very least you will be preparing yourself to adopt the technologies that will likely shape your legal career.

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cmz4bx@virginia.edu 

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[1] I find it improbable that this was purely a coincidence since many music copyright cases naturally arise out of California in the Ninth Circuit.

[2] For those of you in the know, 17 U.S.C. § 114.

[3] Again, for those that care, TufAmerica, Inc. v. WB Music Corp., 67 F.Supp.3d 590, 591-98 (S.D.N.Y. 2014).

[4] Same disclaimer, Ringgold v. Black Ent. Television, Inc., 126 F.3d 70, 75 (2d Cir. 1997).

[5] For the last time, TufAmerica, Inc. v. Diamond, 968 F. Supp. 2d 588, 603 (S.D.N.Y. 2013); New Old Music Group, Inc. v. Gottwald, 122 F.Supp.3d 78, 97 (S.D.N.Y. 2015); Williams v. Broadus, No. 99 CIV. 10957 MBM, 2001 WL 984714, at *4 (S.D.N.Y. Aug. 27, 2001).

[6] TufAmerica, Inc. v. WB Music Corp.

[7] Ringgold v. Black Ent. Television, Inc.; New Old Music Group, Inc. v. Gottwald; Williams v. Broadus.

[8] TufAmerica, Inc. v. Diamond.

[9] For a more redeeming experience with legal AI tools, check out Westlaw’s other AI model, Ask Practical Law AI. In hindsight that may have been a more successful article.

Sir, This is a Courtroom

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Andrew Allard '25 
Editor-in-Chief 

On the Monday before spring break, the Supreme Court (known to some as the “nine greatest experts on the Internet”) held oral arguments in the NetChoice Cases.[1] The cases involve two laws passed by Florida and Texas that aim to restrict social media platforms’ content moderation practices.

While some observers have speculated that the cases could generate a watershed moment in First Amendment law and internet freedom, the oral arguments held in late February seem to have abated those concerns for now. It appeared likely that the Justices would take a narrower path and avoid defining the precise contours of social media platforms’ editorial rights at this stage.

But for what the arguments lacked in legal drama, they made up for in silliness and ineptitudes resulting from the Justices’ and the advocates’ … less-than-complete understanding of internet culture. So, in celebration of our (hopefully) retained internet freedom, without further ado: the top moments from the NetChoice Cases.

Pictured: Ancient artifacts from the Tide Pod contest 
Photo Credit: Harvard Health 

1. “They [social media platforms] can discriminate against particular groups that they don't like, whether it's a group that encourages kids to take the Tide Pod contest or something else.”

This first banger comes from none other than the Chief Justice himself, John Roberts. During the first argument, Justice Barrett and counsel for NetChoice, Paul Clement, both mentioned the Tide Pod challenge. So naturally, Justice Roberts, mustering as much “how do you do, fellow kids?” energy as his sixty-nine-year-old[2] self could, decided to join the fun. I’m not sure what the Tide Pod “contest” is, but I know that Justice Roberts is winning it.

2. “You know, the expression like, you know, sir, this is a Wendy's.”

Aaron Nielson’s awkward use of this phrase revealed a slightly better command of Internet culture than that of the Chief Justice, but that’s not saying much. Nielson, counsel for Texas in Paxton, said this seemingly in an effort to rebut the argument that social media platforms have editorial rights and assert that they are instead more like telephone companies. Yeah, I don’t get it either. But then, hey, does anyone think the Justices even know what this phrase means when used correctly? Well, maybe Justice Kagan does.

3. “I’ve been fortunate or unfortunate to have been here for most of the development of the Internet.”

In fairness, Justice Thomas didn’t really get anything wrong here. Thomas took his seat on the Court in 1991, and Section 230—which to some extent “created” the modern Internet—was passed five years later. Despite this experience, Thomas seems to be the least online member of the Supreme Court. My guess is he feels more unfortunate than fortunate to have been along for this ride.

4. “Twitter users one day woke up and found themselves to be X users and the content rules had changed and their feeds changed, and all of a sudden they were getting a different online newspaper, so to speak, in a metaphorical sense every morning, and a lot of Twitter users thought that was great, and a lot of Twitter users thought that was horrible . . . .”

Do I even have to tell you that this was Justice Kagan? Legend. If this example seems awfully specific, that might be because of Kagan’s (in)famous anonymous Twitter account.[3] One can only guess if Justice Kagan is in the camp of users who thought the Elon Musk/X makeover was “great” or “horrible.” Hm…

5. Honorable mention: “I want to have a Catholic website. I can keep off somebody who’s a notorious Protestant.”

Honestly, this one from Paul Clement has nothing to do with Internet cultural knowledge or a lack thereof. But the phrase “notorious Protestant” made me laugh, so I felt the need to include it.

Someday, we, too, will awkwardly try to talk about new things we don’t fully understand. And the very successful among us will perhaps even get to do so in the esteemed halls of the Supreme Court. But for now, I’ll continue to point and laugh at those who are older and no longer in the loop.

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tya2us@virginia.edu

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[1] NetChoice v. Paxton and Moody v. NetChoice.

[2] Nice.

[3] Debra C. Weiss, Kagan acknowledges incognito Twitter use; Ginsburg sees obstacles for women, ABA Journal (Feb. 3, 2020).

Law Weekly's Suggestions for This Year's Club Leadership Transitions

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Ethan Brown '25 
Satire Editor 

If there’s anything we can all agree on, it’s that February is the worst month of law school.[1] It’s cold, the sun sets at 2 p.m., and there’s an unreasonable amount of work to get done—especially for the 1Ls, who have to confront networking events, journal tryouts, LRW fellow applications, and the like. If that wasn’t enough, consider the cherry on top: club leadership transitions, in which beleaguered 2Ls ritualistically find relatively bushy-eyed 1Ls to take over the executive boards of extracurricular activities all across the Law School.

Sure, 1Ls might consider running for conventional roles, like President or Treasurer, of an organization or two that they care about. After all, doing so is “great for their resume” and “will seriously not take that much work, I swear, it’s super chill.”[2] But I write today to discuss the leadership titles we all should honestly include in our clubs at UVA Law this leadership transition season—because not everything that happens in a club can be adequately summed up in a few boring titles.

Vice President of Liking Your Feisty Messages in a Group Chat But Never Coming to Meetings

This person is a hero. Sometimes, you just need bodies to back you up in a group chat with your fellow executive board members, and a simple love react or exclamation mark can go a long way. Even though this person might never actually do their job or come to meetings in the first place, that sad reality can be overlooked by the fact that they’re always on your side when it matters: in deciding petty conflicts.

Secretary of Whining About the Job They Voluntarily Took On

I know this job well because I’ve lived it! My title on the Virginia Law Weekly’s colophon might say “Features Editor,” but it really should read this instead. I signed up to be Features Editor with glee last year—what a joy, I thought! Writing every week for this Law School’s finest institution. No one coerced me into it. Much like Adam Driver’s impassioned admonition to Scarlett Johansson in A Marriage Story, I “chose this life.”[3] But still, I have found myself each week complaining to my Editorial Board compatriots about having to write an article, something that I imagine has only endeared me to the lovely folks on our staff. (Sorry, Nikolai, Monica, Andrew, and Garrett. You are all patient souls.) My personal saga aside, this job is a cornerstone of any club at UVA Law: We all know them, and we all need them. At least they do their job.

Chief of Listservs

Honestly, I don’t know how civilization has made it this far without every club having a designated person just to handle listservs. With the constant requests from recent graduates to be taken off, to the endless throngs of 1Ls that technology seemingly conspires to exclude from listserv access despite my best efforts, this task is like a permanent hum in the background noise of my psyche. Please, for the love of all that is holy, give listserv management its own position. And preferably give that person the power to obliterate listservs entirely and do everything over GroupMe. And then create a new position for the person who has to run the GroupMe, because that’s its own scha-bang. And then ideally scrap the GroupMe too, because I’ve seen that devolve into a fiery hellscape more times than I can count.

Person Who Just Texts, “hiiii can i do anything to help uwu?” A Few Times a Week

I speak from experience as Lambda’s outgoing “Executive Vice President,” a role that could be aptly described as “The Person Who Really Just Is Trying to Help Out the Person Whose Role Actually Matters.” What does that look like in practice? Mostly sending texts like the ones above, while also being on deck to send out both (1) cheery and (2) passive-aggressive texts in the club GroupMe. Clearly a full-time gig.

The Ones Who Somehow Do Everything

I am convinced that almost every club at the Law School could be effectively run by two or three people, because in every organization I’ve been a part of…this is about the number of people who do any work, anyways. They might not always be the President—although they often are—but they step up and put in a herculean amount of effort to compensate for some of the figures above. They deserve a Girl Scout cookie and a nap.

Jokes aside, I think getting involved in club leadership is great. It is a fantastic way to signal your commitment to your identity (through affinity group leadership), a geographic region, or a potential practice area of interest. And you just might meet some new faces and gain marketable skills in the process. So even if you find yourself serving as GroupMe Czar in a few weeks, god forbid, it’s an opportunity nonetheless—and get excited about it!

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bwj2cw@virginia.edu

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[1] bUT WhAt AbOuT feB cLuB?

[2] These are the lines that I’ve been employing in my desperate attempts to recruit 1Ls to run for executive boards. Only time will tell if my persuasion has worked.

[3] I can’t relate to people who haven’t watched this movie enough to quote it at will. A breathtaking piece of cinema.

When Speech Gives You Lemons...

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Andrew Allard '25 
Editor-in-Chief 

It’s no secret that young lawyers face an increasingly complex world. Finding the right balance between advocating for causes you care about and maintaining your reputation as a rational legal thinker is no easy feat. And as recent high-profile law firm firings show, getting that balance wrong can be costly.

In recent months, student speech has been front and center at the Law School and on campuses nationwide. With a contentious presidential election looming and an ongoing war in Gaza, tensions at the Law School have noticeably heightened. Reports of removed and defaced posters prompted Senior Associate Dean and Chief Operating Officer Stephen Parr to twice send out emails reminding students of the Law School’s Speech and Signs & Postings policies.

But compared with recent events at other law schools, the fight over free speech at UVA looks tame. Last March at Stanford Law, a visit from Fifth Circuit Judge Kyle Duncan made national news after his vicious exchange with protesting students.[1] A year earlier at Yale Law School, more than 120 students protested a talk by Kristen Waggoner, general counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom, leading to a similarly heated confrontation.[2] And just this past October, law students at Harvard and Columbia lost job offers from Davis Polk & Wardwell after signing a letter expressing support for Palestine.[3]

Perhaps with these events in mind, last week, the Federalist Society at UVA invited Judge Wesley Hendrix to offer guidance for students struggling to walk the professionalism tightrope. “The juice is worth the squeeze,” said Judge Wesley Hendrix, alluding to a question posed to Judge Duncan by Stanford Law’s then-associate dean for DEI, Tirien Steinbach. Recognizing the need to be practical, Judge Hendrix had this advice: Try to find the happy medium between head-in-the-sand ostrich and opinionated fire-breathing dragon. “Taking the high ground usually wins in the long run,” Hendrix said.

If this model appeals to you, Hendrix proposed these concrete steps to striking this balance. First, choose your employer wisely. Look at the rules and safeguards they have in place to protect freedom of speech and see what kind of pro bono cases they tend to take on. “Multiple attorneys reported to me that the leftward pressure on firms is real,” Hendrix said, referring to an article in the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy.

Second, leverage your networks. The best way to learn more about an employer’s culture is to ask someone who already works there. “Don’t assume it’s going to all work out, because sometimes it doesn’t.”

Third, look past common assumptions about organizations. Large, worldwide firms aren’t invariably liberal, and Texas- and Florida-based firms aren’t invariably conservative. “Some of those places go out of their way to disabuse people, especially clients, of that assumption . . . They’re concerned that their clients in California or New York might assume ‘That’s a Texas firm’ or ‘That’s a Tennessee firm,’” Hendrix explained, “so they overcorrect.”

Similarly, Hendrix cautioned against assuming that Big Law in New York and D.C. is the only option. Don’t overlook the boutiques—even if they don’t pay market rates. And most of all, work in Texas. “Vote with your feet and come to Texas—we want as many good people as possible.”

Lastly, Judge Hendrix emphasized the importance of working hard and finding the right people. He suggested that young lawyers should find an “anchor partner” who values their development and viewpoints. “Who you work with is more important than where you work.” The right people will stick their necks out for you when you’re in need. And once you’ve found those people, work hard to make yourself indispensable. Ultimately, firms are profit-motivated, so delivering value is the best way to secure your position.

Hendrix acknowledged that, in practice, these steps are not easy. But he thinks those who take this approach succeed in the long run. As an example, Hendrix spoke of a young associate who had joined a firm with a vaccine mandate but had a “good faith religious objection to the vaccine . . . The lack of meaningful accommodations or exemptions from the firm’s requirement made clear that the firm was not going to appreciate his lack of vaccine,” Hendrix said. While the firm allowed the young associate to work remotely, after a year, it became clear to him that he needed a change. “He was quickly hired—as soon as he put his resume on the market—at a better, bigger place, which had a testing protocol for people that had these good faith objections.”

Hendrix’s advice to students appeared targeted to a conservative audience. When listing group affiliations that a law student would worry might bring them public shame, Hendrix named FedSoc, future prosecutors, and Christian legal society. But among federal judges, Hendrix stands out for his ability to balance between competing viewpoints. Hendrix was first nominated to a federal judgeship in 2016 by then-President Obama. When his nomination expired in 2017, he was nominated again by President Trump. “I was nominated by two different presidents,” Hendrix said. “Do you think I didn’t change my resume a little bit?”

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tya2us@virginia.edu 

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[1] Greta Reich, Judge Kyle Duncan’s visit to Stanford and the aftermath, explained, Stanford Daily (Apr. 5, 2023).

[2] Eda Aker & Philip Mousavizadeh, Yale Law students protest anti-LGBTQ speaker, armed police presence triggers backlash, Yale Daily News (Mar. 15, 2022).

[3] Mike Wendling, Harvard letter: Law students who took anti-Israel stance lose job offers, BBC News (Oct. 18, 2023).

How to Stay Safe Online: Passwords

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Ryan Moore '25
Historian 

Editor’s Note: In the spirit of full disclosure, it must be noted that the author mistakenly sent a draft of this article to the wrong listserv when submitting it for publication. Caveat emptor, dear readers.

As the Law Weekly historian, I typically write about the history of the law school, whether that is about John Kirby, Elizabeth Thompkins, or…John Kirby again. But I am in Professor Randi Flaherty’s Race and Slavery on UVA North Grounds class, and honestly I need a break from history.

Before I went to law school, but after my master’s in international relations, I worked as a private investigator. While I will not openly share stories from my past in the school newspaper, I did learn a lot about online privacy and security. Enough people have asked me for advice with basic online security that I decided to begin a Law Weekly series of articles on the basics of “how to stay safe online.” I do not know how long I will do these articles,[1] but there are certainly many topics to discuss. Today, I want to start with the foundation of all online security: passwords.

The origins of passwords

At first, passwords were simple strings of characters that websites would require of users to log into their accounts and keep malicious actors out. Password requirements were lax—any string of characters would suffice. Most people choose common and easy to remember words, usually the names of pets or children. Eventually, malicious actors noticed people used very basic and easy to guess passwords, often consisting of words found in the dictionary. Hackers would cycle through words in the dictionary (i.e. a “dictionary attack") and hack into accounts. Believe it or not, this worked.[2]

Websites fight back

In response, websites adopted several measures to protect users against dictionary attacks. Today, websites require complex passwords using letters, numbers, and the dreaded special characters. These additional requirements make it impossible for malicious actors to conduct dictionary attacks. Websites also lock out malicious actors who attempt to log into accounts with the wrong password too many times. This prevents malicious actors from just cycling through possible passwords until one works.

Forgot password?

Unfortunately, the complexity of passwords has opened another attack vector for malicious actors. Passwords became complicated and very difficult to remember. Passwords began to require so many special characters and numbers that most people created one password, memorized it, and used it (or a close variation) on every account. This is the most egregious password sin of all.

To understand why, think of each password as a key. You want the key to your house to be different from your gate key, the key to your shed, and your car key. If someone steals your shed key, they cannot also rob your house and steal your car. Reusing your password is the equivalent of using the same key for everything you own.

If malicious actors can access just one of your “recycled” passwords, they now have access to any other accounts that use that password. All they need to do is see if it has been used on other websites. Hackers share these cracked passwords with other hackers, or post them on the dark web, where I would find them for my clients. There are countless websites that contain folders filled with cracked passwords. Pastebin,[3] a text editing and storage website, is often used by hackers to share breached credentials. No matter how strong a password is, it is completely useless if everyone knows it.

Best practices

Fortunately, there are steps everyone can take to protect themselves online. Most importantly, I suggest using a password manager. A password manager encrypts all your passwords and stores them securely. Instead of remembering multiple passwords, or reusing variations of a single base password, you only need to remember one password—the one you use to log into the password manager. Personally, I use Bitwarden.[4] Bitwarden can generate unique and randomized passwords up to 99 characters long. It will also automatically pre-fill your password into websites, so you do not have to manually type in a 26-character password. Every one of my passwords is randomly generated and stored in a password manager.

In addition to using a password manager, there are three other ways to protect yourself and your passwords. First, make your passwords long and complex. The longer and more complex your password is, the harder it is to guess/crack. Second, do NOT reuse passwords. I cannot stress this enough. Third, changing your passwords regularly, and especially if you are the victim of a data breach, prevents hackers from using your breached password. Some websites, like Have I Been Pwned,[5] allow users to see if their emails and passwords are present in any data breaches.

And finally, I am always more than happy to answer any questions. You can catch me in the Virginia Tax Review office stealing more than my fair share of coffee, or at ScoCo playing RetroBowl College on my iPad.

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tqy7zz@virginia.edu

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[1] Probably until I get bored and find another John Kirby article to write.

[2] A lot.

[3] https://pastebin.com/.

[4] https://bitwarden.com/.

[5] https://haveibeenpwned.com/.

An Idealist President Who Didn't Jibe With the Law

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Garrett Coleman '25 
Executive Editor 

In honor of our not getting President’s Day off, I felt obligated to write this article a week late. Fortunately, the lessons from Theodore Roosevelt’s life are always timely. It may surprise some to learn that our 26th President had a short stint in law school—just a single academic year from 1880-81. While Columbia Law School broke up the next year (classic levels of collegiality from Columbia), Roosevelt was given a posthumous J.D. in 2008. Still, our fellow lawyer’s time in school can tell us something about the importance of not getting bogged down by our peculiar career.[1]

For anyone not as passionate about Theodore Roosevelt (TR) as me, a brief synopsis of his life is in order. The quintessential American president was born in 1858 to a New York patrician family. While a sickly child, he never wanted for vitality. During the Civil War, when bothered by his Southern mother, he would loudly pray that the Union soldiers “grind the Southern troops to powder.” After TR’s father, in typical Victorian fashion, told his asthmatic son, “You have the mind but you have not the body,” TR began a lifelong obsession with physical fitness and outdoor activity. He would go on to row for Harvard’s crew team, serve in the New York State Assembly, venture out to the Badlands of South Dakota to begin a ranching business, serve as the New York City Police Commissioner, lay waste to the Spanish army with a unit of hand-picked convicts at his back, and, of course, learn that he became the President of the United States while atop a mountain in the Adirondacks. This man was fun.

But while a law student, he was something of a fish out of water. He would uncontrollably burst out of his seat during lectures, arguing for “justice and against legalism.” He found caveat emptor to be “repellent.” And he despised the “sharp practice” that he thought characterized the profession of corporate lawyers. As you can imagine—and you may be thinking of particular sectionmates at this point—TR was not universally admired by his law school class.

 To me, it seems rather fitting that a man with so much energy and passion was a bit turned off by the law. Much of our education revolves around learning how to adapt to the lay of the land. We follow precedent rather than policy. When we start representing clients, their interests dictate what we can say. If we are lucky enough to become a judge, most of our work will focus on addressing problems that have already happened rather than preventing them in the first place. So, for the creative spirit that wants to build and leave her mark on the world, the law can often feel confining.

And I also find it interesting how someone who was obsessed with being the center of attention had more success outside of the law than within it. Even though many of us enjoy public speaking, law school teaches us to do so in a regimented fashion. Whether in moot court, mock trial, or a legal issue presentation to fictional partners, how we speak is severely curtailed. I imagine that this makes the real public speaking enthusiasts long for an unfiltered political speech, the kind that TR was so successful with.

This is not to say that TR was right while in law school. He was an idealistic young man with a somewhat off-putting sense of righteousness. And his second presidential campaign for the Bull Moose Party displayed his impractical and vindictive side. Law school can certainly be a place for the idealistic. Between pro bono practices, clinics that lobby the state legislature for much-needed bills, and appellate practice aimed at altering the legal practice, there are many opportunities to set your sights on an impactful legacy. But I think TR still demonstrates a good impulse that we lose too readily in law school. Question why legal doctrines are what they are, don’t quiver at the negative impression some people have of you, and be brave enough to mold your career to what you want the world to be rather than what it already is.

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jxu6ad@virginia.edu

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[1] All the facts for this article are taken from Edmund Morris, The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt (1979). To improve readability, I omitted the constant ids. However, I would hate to disrespect the greatest biographer of all time, so please read his book and the other two in the TR trilogy (yes, trilogy).