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PODCAST: A Discussion on Appellate Advocacy and Writing with Reyna Marder Gentin

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On this week’s episode of the Touro Law Review Podcast, we are joined by published author and “recovering” attorney, Reyna Marder Gentin.  Gentin is the author of three novels, all written after she practiced law for more than twenty years.  As Gentin discusses with Associate Dean Rodger Citron, she worked in the New York Office of a large international law firm, as a law clerk for a federal judge, and as a public defender.  As a criminal defense lawyer, she worked primarily as an appellate lawyer.   

Though Gentin didn’t realize it at the time, her experience writing briefs helped her become a novelist.  As Gentin explains, being an effective appellate advocate requires the lawyer to be a good storyteller.  When she decided to stop practicing law, Gentin wasn’t sure what would come next.  After taking a class on memoir writing with a friend, Gentin began writing her first novel, Unreasonable Doubts, which is about a public defender on the cusp of making some important decisions.  Gentin discusses the challenges and rewards of writing this novel and two others during the podcast.  And, Gentin says, she’s now working on her fourth novel.  

Brought to you by the Touro Law Review.   

Our guest today is Reyna Marder Gentin .

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PODCAST: Litigating Slavery’s Reach: A Story of Race, Rights, and the Law During the California Gold Rush

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Dred Scott v. Sandford looms over American legal and political history as perhaps the most infamous Supreme Court case of all time. In Dred Scott, the Court struck down the Missouri Compromise, holding that enslaved persons were property under the Due Process Clause and that slaveholders had the absolute right to bring them into any federal territory in the nation.

Did you know that a case raising similar issues as Dred Scott was litigated in California five years before the Supreme Court decided that case? Professor Jason Gillmer provides a thoughtful and detailed account of the California case, In re Perkins, in his forthcoming article, “Litigating Slavery’s Reach: A Story of Race, Rights, and the Law During the California Gold Rush.”  https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=353902. At issue was the California Fugitive Slave Act of 1852, which declared that enslaved persons brought to California while it was a federal territory remained enslaved even after California entered the Union as a free state. Shortly after the statute was enacted, a case arose testing the law’s constitutionality, pitting the freedom of three enslaved men against the alleged Due Process rights of their enslaver. In this Touro Law Review podcast with Associate Dean Rodger Citron, Professor Gillmer explores the story that gave rise to the case, how he researched it, its relation to Dred Scott, and why the story is important to today.

Find Professor Gillmer’s book at https://ugapress.org/book/9780820351636/slavery-and-freedom-in-texas/.    

Brought to you by the Touro Law Review.   

Our guest today is Professor Jason Gillmer.

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PODCAST: New York University President Emeritus John Sexton

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At the start of his legal career, NYU President Emeritus John Sexton achieved an extraordinary clerkship trifecta.  Initially, in 1979, he clerked for Judge Harold Leventhal on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.  Tragically, Judge Leventhal died several months after Sexton began working for him.  He then clerked for Judge David Bazelon, also on the D.C. Circuit.  As Sexton explains, both judges were towering figures on the court of appeals.  Sexton then clerked for Chief Justice Warren Burger, something no other Bazelon clerk ever did.  (Sexton wrote about his clerkship with the Chief Justice for the Journal of Supreme Court History in 2018; see “Chief Justice Warren E. Burger, the Court, and the Nation, 43 J. Sup. Ct. Hist. 173 (2018).)  

In his discussion with Associate Dean Rodger Citron, Sexton talks about each judge and some of the interesting cases and issues that came up while he was clerking.  He concludes with thoughts on what has changed – and what has endured – in the judiciary since he was a law clerk more than forty years ago.  

      

Brought to you by the Touro Law Review.   

Our guest today is President Emeritus of NYU, Dr. John Sexton.

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PODCAST: What to Expect from the United States Supreme Court With Professor Barry Friedman

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On this week’s episode of the Touro Law Review Podcast, we are joined by New York University Law School Professor Barry Friedman, an expert on the Supreme Court and public opinion, discusses the current Supreme Court.  According to the Pew Research Center, “Americans’ ratings of the Supreme Court are now as negative as – and more politically polarized than – at any point in more than three decades of polling on the nation’s highest court.”  (See Views of Supreme Court Far Less Positive After Abortion Ruling Reversing Roe v. Wade | Pew Research Center.)       

Professor Friedman puts this research in historical context, noting that the public’s view of the Court has waxed and waned over time.  During the New Deal, for example, the public’s view of the Court declined during its clash with President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the mid-1930s.  Professor Friedman explains why he believes the situation with the Court today may be different from dips in public opinion in prior eras.  He suggests that this may be due, in part, to the erosion of political checks on the Court that previously were stronger.  Along the way, Professor Friedman and Associate Dean Rodger Citron discuss a number of the current justices and some of the most important cases of the Court’s 2021-22 term.

      

Brought to you by the Touro Law Review.   

Our guest today is Professor Barry Friedman.

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PODCAST: Robin Peguero: With Prejudice

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On this week’s episode of the Touro Law Review Podcast, Associate Dean Rodger Citron talks with Robin Peguero about his first novel, With Prejudice, and his views about the criminal justice system.  After graduating from Harvard Law School, Peguero worked as a prosecutor in Miami, an experience he drew on while writing the novel.       

The conversation begins with Peguero talking about his life-long interest in writing stories.  It then turns to a discussion of the jury – its critical role in a trial, its composition (which is intensely contested by the lawyers trying the case before them), and its operation.  What do we mean when we talk about “a jury of our peers?”  To what extent does deliberation give us confidence in the jury’s verdict?  Peguero addresses these questions and others during the conversation, exploring them from his perspective as a lawyer and a writer.      

Brought to you by the Touro Law Review.   

Our guest today is Robin Peguero.

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PODCAST: What’s Next from the Supreme Court with Professor Thane Rosenbaum

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On this week’s episode of the Touro Law Review Podcast, Professor Thane Rosenbaum talks with Associate Dean Rodger D. Citron about several recent Supreme Court decisions.   

The conversation begins with Professor Rosenbaum’s views on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.  In Dobbs, the Court overturned Roe v. Wade and held that the regulation of abortion is a matter for states to address.  Among other things, as Rosenbaum notes, Dobbs illustrates the challenge for Chief Justice John Roberts of maintaining the Court’s institutional legitimacy.  The conversation then turns to New York State Rifle & Pistol Assoc., Inc. v. Bruen, in which the Court ruled in favor of the petitioners challenging a New York law requiring an individual to show “a special need for self-protection” in order to obtain a license to carry a handgun for that purpose.  Bruen, as Rosenbaum explains, illustrates the current Court’s commitment to originalism.  The conversation concludes with a discussion of the “Independent State Legislature” case, Moore v. Harper, that will be argued before the Supreme Court in the 2022-23 term.   

Brought to you by the Touro Law Review. 

Our guest today is Professor Thane Rosenbaum.

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PODCAST: Provost Patricia Salkin – “Lawyers Leading Higher Education”

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On this week’s episode of the Touro Law Review Podcast, Patricia Salkin, Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs for Touro University and Provost of the Graduate and Professional Divisions in New York, talks with Associate Dean Rodger D. Citron about lawyers as leaders in higher education.  Provost Salkin is an expert on the subject, having completed her dissertation on the subject while serving as a senior administrator at Touro.   

The conversation begins with Provost Salkin setting the stage for lawyers increasingly serving as presidents of colleges and universities.  Among other things, lawyers possess the set of skills necessary to navigate the complex landscape of higher education – one that is substantially regulated and includes litigation risks.  Provost Salkin then discusses the data she compiled and conclusions she reached in her dissertation.  Perhaps the most important aspect of her work is that she has gathered and analyzed a comprehensive data set, one that will be invaluable to future research in this area.       

Brought to you by the Touro Law Review. 

Our guest today is Provost Patricia E. Salkin.

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