When Phil Telfeyan’s Note in the Harvard Law Review hit the news stands, it caused a stir amongst those who hold things like law review, or Harvard, in high esteem. For the most part, it aroused some passion amongst the lawprofs (who by their nature care about law reviews) and bemused disinterest amongst real lawyers who think this is the academy’s way of showing that they take this stuff way too seriously.
But this wasn’t the end of it for Phil or HLR. Yesterday, I received a blast email from a fellow named John Jay McKelvey IV. I don’t personally know anybody by that name. I may have met him at the synagogue, but I can’t be sure. No matter.
JJ (as his close friends call him) has a blog called the Harvard Law Review Review. I think it’s a very funny name, but I’m not entirely sure it was intended to be funny. It seems that JJ is the lineal ancestor of the founder of the Harvard Law Review, and considers it his duty to preserve and protect this national treasure.
My name is John Jay McKelvey IV. More than 120 years ago, my great-great grandfather, John Jay McKelvey, while attending Harvard Law School came up with the idea for the Harvard Law Review. As Time magazine recounted in a 1937 article marking the Review’s th anniversary (here), he was one of the “Harvard Four” who launched the Review. With my great-great grandfather serving as the first editor-in-chief (a title changed to “president” in 1902), the first issue of the Review was published in April, 1887.
What a horrible burden to carry through life, one step above maintaining the Cincinnati Dust Bunny Museum.
Anyway, JJ wrote an open letter to Robert Allen, the President of the Harvard Law Review (who to my mind should be called Grand Poobah or something more Hasty Puddingish). JJ wanted to make sure that this letter was spread far and wide, to ensure outrage at the HLR and its loss of any standards of literary and intellectual decency.
JJ’s letter is quite long, intricately detailed and fully footnoted and cite checked. I’m just going to cherry pick the really important parts.
Almost as soon as the May, 2008, issue of the Law Review was posted online, legal bloggers and commentators began generating what by now total something like 1000 posts attacking various flaws in an unsigned student note which appears on pages 1886 through 1907.
It is titled, Never Again Should a People Starve in a World of Plenty. Both its title and its inspiration are taken from a statue located about 100 feet from the Review’s offices (Gannett House), across the street in Cambridge Common.
Harvard takes its statues very seriously. But apparently, JJ takes the comments of legal bloggers even more seriously. Legal bloggers are very influential at Harvard.
Some of the most extensive coverage of the controversy can be found on Volokh Conspiracy (David Bernstein) (here), Above the Law (David Lat) (here, here, and here), Concurring Opinions (Dave Hoffman) (here), CrimLaw (Ken Lammers) (here), and Prettier Than Napolean (Amber Taylor) (here and here). See here for a fuller listing of blog coverage.
Note that I’ve been dissed twice in one day, especially galling since Ken’s post came out of mine. But I was worthy of the blast email to promote your cause, eh JJ?
Perhaps the principal criticism of the note which risks adverse impact on the preeminent status of the Review as a top-quality scholarly institution involves certain undeniable factual mistakes in the note’s description of the statue on which the note is based. These are unambiguous mistakes for which the Review to date has not apologized.
Preeminent status is strong stuff. I bet the guys over at Yale Law Review Journal (whatever) are fuming.
After providing a litany of faults and flaws with the Note, JJ asks:
[I]f the Review is publishing this sort of thing, shouldn’t it inform readers of its new, sharply lowered, publishing standards?
Finally, we get to the point. I’m with JJ on this one. And in my role as blawgosphere maker of general announcements, here goes.
The Harvard Law Review would like to inform the legal world that, in its efforts to maintain its preeminent status as a top-quality scholarly institution, it has new, sharply lowered, publishing standards.
I bet JJ feels like the weight of the world has been lifted from his shoulders. Now that Harvard Law Review will no longer be saddled with 121 years of finding perpetually stuffy, yet boring, articles with which to fill its pages, it will be free to publish things that someone might potentially care to read. Hallelujah!
And, with reference to the controversy over the other note which has existed for the past couple of weeks, which has yet to be addressed by the Review (would you please do so, sir?), may I ask: what has the Review come to in deciding to publish, in the same issue (not just the same year) two notes as unoriginal and flawed as the “ministerial exception” note and the “Do the Right Thing at Every Moment” note which appear in the May, 2008, issue?
I’m glad you asked, JJ. In a further (and heretofore unannounced special treat), HLR will be offering a centerfold, featuring Nancy Gertner as its inaugural pin-up babe (she’s hot!).
And please keep me on the email list for new developments from the Harvard Law Review Review, because I care so deeply.
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Awesome post, Scott. Especially the “JJ” bit.
However, I have to correct you on one thing. I received the e-mail, too, as I’ve done a minor amount of blogging on the HLR (much less than you, so I can’t complain about being omitted), and actually took the trouble to e-mail the guy. He takes himself really seriously. I mean, it really does seem he feels all that weight on his shoulders!
Anyway, funny thing is, he INITIALS the end of his posts, with “JJM.” So Scott, he should henceforth be “JJM” to you, not “JJ.”
You know, if my great-great grandfather had been at Harvard Law way back then, I’m confident it would have been the “Harvard Five.” (Who came up with that “Harvard Four” crap, anyway? Maybe “JJM I” — seems like “JJM I”‘s main contribution to the Review, according to the Time article in the post, was to get the money from his NY contacts. Maybe he knew Luce at Time.)
One final correction. At the risk of being unduly “JJM-ish,” I believe you should have said “Yale Law Journal,” not “Yale Law Review.” And I don’t think they’re fuming. I think Amber’s right — I think they have a mole at the Harvard Law Review, one who’s been working overtime. You know, Andrew Crespo has so messed up the place that it occurs to me he may be a double agent.
I’ve stooped to correcting the Yale thing (like I would know whether they call is review or journal), but I refuse to change the JJ, my homage to that bastion of Harvard-like scholarship, Jimmie Walker. Dyn-o-mite!
And thanks for the kind words.
One more thing, before I’ve beaten this to death. [I’ve cross posted this comment on Amber Taylor’s blog, where I’ve been commenting]
What, exactly, does this guy think he’s going to hear back from the HLR president. Something like this?
“Dear Mr. McKelvey,
Thank you so much for your commentary on our May issue. We appreciate your great-great grandfather’s contributions to the Review, and your family’s continued interest in the institution.
In answer to your questions, the note author is _____ [insert name]. We have abandoned our policy of printing anonymous notes, and will henceforth name all student authors. We will be issuing an errata on the other note, correcting and apologizing for the errors in that note.
Please do keep us apprised of your reactions to our future issues.
Yours very truly, etc.”
All joking aside, does anyone thing the president’s going to write JJM anything? He’ll just ignore JJM, right? If so, what’s the end game? Is JJM going to blast e-mail the rest of the U.S. population?
I bet he’s a yuck-a-minute over a beer. And if he cares so much about writing quality, why didn’t he have someone vet his over-the-top whining for its own suitablility to be published?
Don’t think I didn’t notice your comment to Amber :
Yes. That’s exactly right. Only old farts like me get it. And I’m not telling you.
Actually, I’m sure JJM IV has such refined taste that a drop of beer has never passed his lips — probably only drinks fine wines, perhaps only from the family’s private vineyard.
Can you imagine this guy thinks there’s anyone smart enough to be able to improve his writing through edits?
Ah, how the young understand so little. Gin, and large quantities of it, is the beverage of choice. Stirred, not shaken.
Wine is only for meals. And vineyards are for farmers.
According to a google search, the McKelveys DO like their gin — including during Prohibition, when they apparently were involved in bootlegged gin (10th para. on page):
http://truckeehistory.org/history5.htm
I should add that I won’t hold JJM IV’s family misdeeds against him — including his GG granddad starting the Harvard Law Review!
As curator and eighth-niece-oft-removed of the Founding Mother of the Cincinnati Dust Bunny Museum (website and t-shirts coming soon, we swear), I resent your implications that we are somehow an elite group, comparable to the HLR.
In fact, we are quite proud of our midwestern roots, having been educated in the history and science of dustis bunnyology theory at the University of Chicago (not the “University of Chicago of the East,” as Harvard is known in these parts). It was there that we completed our dissertation on the effects of dust bunny imagery in advertising and popular culture on feminism. Think Marshall McLuhan meets Gloria Steinem, only with footnotes.
While we are sure that HLR (or HLRR) likewise has an important history and wish them well in their endeavours, we don’t see how it relates to anything one might find under one’s bed on a daily basis. Pragmatism rules.
Scott, you’re wrong in asserting the Dust Bunny Museum is located in Cincinnati. And Anne’s clearly an imposter.
The museum’s located in Knoxville, TN, and Glenn Reynolds (“Instapundit”) is the curator. They call him “Insta Dust Bunny.” See here: http://mobjectivist.blogspot.com/2005/04/insta-dust-bunny.html
For the record, Scott, five people have beaten you to using the phrase, “Dust Bunny Museum,” you plagiarist!
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&as_q=&as_epq=dust+bunny+museum&as_oq=&as_eq=&num=100&lr=&as_filetype=&ft=i&as_sitesearch=&as_qdr=all&as_rights=&as_occt=any&cr=&as_nlo=&as_nhi=&safe=images
Is that really how Harvard Law Review types write nowadays?
Did nobody ever bother to teach them the difference between a restrictive clause (a “that” clause, which is not set off with commas) and a nonrestrictive clause (a “which” clause, which is set off with commas)?
Should one really write “something like” when what one means is “approximately” and then, in the same email, write something like:
“Perhaps the principal criticism of the note which risks adverse impact on the preeminent status of the Review as a top-quality scholarly institution involves certain undeniable factual mistakes in the note’s description of the statue on which the note is based. These are unambiguous mistakes for which the Review to date has not apologized.”
And in what metaphorical universe are things “lowered sharply”?
If this JJ guy were a lawyer, he’d be a serious contender for a special ADA.
>It seems that JJ is the lineal ancestor of the founder of the Harvard Law Review…
Surely you mean “lineal descendant”, unless this story is even stranger than it appears.
I just left a long, related comment on Amber Taylor’s blog (where Scott left a comment). It regards what I think the Law Review ought to do by early next week. You can read it here:
http://www.haloscan.com/comments/bamber/3942803595211047086/#278670
I just had one more thought. “McKelvey” is Irish, right? Does that mean a key founder of the Harvard Law Review was Irish? If so, no wonder his great grandson’s pissed — apparently, one of the May notes uses the statue in Cambridge Common, which is a memorial to the victims of the Irish potato famine, to make a left-wing argument totally unrelated to the whole point of the statue.
Some say it’s a genocide memorial, which McKelvey mentioned. No wonder he’s pissed: the Review was started by a survivor of the famine, and now it’s dumping on a memorial to it?
What if we were in 2108, and the Review had been started by a Holocaust survivor, and the Review publishing something misusing a Holocaust memorial in Cambridge Common? Would that be okay? Maybe that’s how Irish people see it.
Nuh uh. I didn’t leave no comment at Amber’s.
While your theory is interesting, I strongly doubt it. The statue is the example, not the problem. The problem is the inclusion of a polemic in the revered HLR, besmirching its preeminent status.
Sorry, my mistake. Guy named Ted Frank recommended your post, in a comment left about 8 a.m.
I take it your’re sarcastically summarizing JJ’s “problem,” and not offering it as your own analysis of the “problem.” Based on a reading of JJ’s post you’re probably right, but I’m just guessing that the Irish factor could have been one motivation (maybe he didn’t mention it to avoid looking petty).
Sarcastic? Moi?
Actually, you caught me. Ted Frank is my alter ego. Just don’t tell Ted.
Oh oh! Now the Review’s in trouble with the Canadians:
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/legalpost/archive/2008/06/04/harvard-law-review-troubles-continue.aspx
Which means, I guess, that JJM — JJ to you, Scott — in addition to e-mailing me, you, Amber, and presumably every other blogger who ever said something about the Review, has also been e-mailing JOURNALISTS IN OTHER COUNTRIES.
Which, in light of Beth’s comment, leads me to ask: WHAT IF THE IRISH GET HOLD OF THIS? Is JJM about to plunge us into a diplomatic crisis with . . . Ireland?
Whether it’s real or satire, it’s hilarious. It perfectly captures HLR’s combination of arrogance, insufferability, and tin ear for rhetoric.
Please count me among the indifferent (too indifferent to be bemused or to read all these Comments). I suggest, however, that you might enjoy reading the late Yale Law professor Fred Rodell’s “Goodbye to Law Reviews,” 48 Va. L. Rev. 279 (1962). Among many other things, Rodell asserts that “There are two things wrong with all legal writing. One is its style. The other is its content” And, “The average law review writer is peculiarly ale to say nothing with an air of great importance.”
http://www.fredrodell.com//pdf/Goodbye_to_Law_Reviews.pdf
“Too indifferent to . . . read all these Comments.”
I’ve long admired the way you Harvard boys have with words — I doubt that I could ever squeeze so much superciliousness into so few words.
Lawprof Rodell is very funny (naturally, from Yale and not Harvard). Thanks for the link, David.
Very impressive, SHG. Too insightful for words!! What say ye, Bonesmen?