I teach at UC Irvine and I love the school. (Otherwise, why in the world would I drive two freaking hours each way to harass the young darlings in my care.)
But UCI has done something that plays the worst kind of politics with education.
It seems that sometime not too long ago, Irvine decided to start a law school and, after a wide ranging search, the university selected star constitutional scholar, Erwin Chemerinsky, to be its first law school dean.. About a month ago, they formally offered him the job, and he accepted the position. Then this past Tuesday, UC Irvine Chancellor, Michael Drake retracted the offer. Drake issued a public statement explaining that the university suddenly realized that Chemerinsky “is not the right fit for the dean’s position at UC Irvine at this time.”
O-kay. And they only figured this fit thingy out now? A month ago they had no idea?
The fact that a public university would engage in this kind of nonsense is, frankly, appalling.
The news was first reported yesterday and the reaction from scholars and commentators on the left AND the right was immediate, and very, very negative.
Most alarming of all, yesterday afternoon, Drake-the-dean called the LA Times and said, that “Chemerinsky erred gravely by publishing an op-ed in this newspaper.”
WHAT????
Chemerinsky and [UC Irvine Chancellor Michael] Drake agreed the new dean’s dismissal was motivated in part by an Aug. 16 opinion article in the Los Angeles Times, the same day the job offer was made. In it, Chemerinsky asserted that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was “about to adopt an unnecessary and mean-spirited regulation that will make it harder for those on death row to have their cases reviewed in federal court.”
But Drake and Chemerinsky split sharply on what role the article played in the decision to fire the incoming dean and whether academic freedom was at stake.
“Shouldn’t we as academics be able to stand up for people on death row?” Chemerinsky said.
Drake said “we had talked to him in June about writing op-ed pieces and that he would have to focus on things like legal education in this new role, and then here comes another political piece. It wasn’t the subject, it was its existence. What he said doesn’t matter.”
Here’s the column that so offended Dean Drake.
In this morning’s LA Times (which has been all over the story) there are couple of good, new columns on the subject: This by Dana Parsons: And this, by conservative law professor, Douglas W. Kmiec
Gee, what a truly great message to give potential law students. Nice going guys!
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UPDATE:
Law.com called a lot of people-–liberal, conservative, and somewhere in between—whom Chemerinsky had asked to be on his advisory board (for his once and now past position as dean)—and they had a number of interesting things to say about the Irvine idiocy. The whole thing is doubly clumsy when some of the names of his advisory board are revealed, as it’s clear that Chemerinsky went out of his way to tap an ideologically diverse group—as well he should.
The mess keeps getting messier.
We live in crazy times.
Side note Celeste, I think you meant Dana Parsons. Milbanks is at the WaPo.
Celeste,
If the article on Alberto Gonzales upset the Chancellor at UCI I wonder if he read the article Chemerinsky wrote for the Huffington Post. A quote from Chemerinsky;
“I believe that the greatest threat to liberty in the United States is posed by the religious right, largely comprised of Christian fundamentalists. Across a broad spectrum of issues they want to move the law in a radically more conservative direction, ultimately threatening our freedom.”
Guess who is going to get his underwear in a bunch over that comment?
On a tax site that I check each day, a commenter shared this about Chemerinsky:
As I’ve said before, what goes around comes around.
Now, unless this is just typical liberal whinning, could we show at least a little outrage when conservatives are blocked from becoming professors in universities, are forced to hide their political views if they get in, and are not given tenure or not promoted when they are “found out?” Injustices occur far more frequently against people who don’t follow the left-wing culture of “higher education.”
Professor Mike Adams is a criminology professor and a conservative. Check out his experiences.
http://www.dradams.org/
http://www.townhall.com/Columnists/MikeSAdams
L.A. Resident shared this Chemerinsky quote:
I’d fire Chemerinsky for pure stupidity or lying.
Christians have been in this country since its founding, and our country has survived quite well. Radical Islamic terrorists have made their impact felt in horrible ways just over recent years. Believe me, it’s not Christians that you have to worry about when getting on an airplane.
If Chemerinsky doesn’t view terrorism as our nation’s biggest threat, then he needs to go back to school rather than teach it.
Woody said…………
Believe me, it’s not Christians that you have to worry about when getting on an airplane.
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This is the Southwest Airlines latest “worry”.
Kyla Ebbert – Airline Terrorist
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Thanks listener. (Need mo-o-o-ooooore sleee-ee-e-e-eeep)
And also thanks to Woody and GM for the added inspiration to post on the subject. I’d seen the news story but was dithering. They (quite rightly) posted on it yesterday.
http://gmroper.com/
If you saw the LAT you noticed the sidebar on the woes that UCI’s Med School has had over the years from Fertility clinic capers to misallocation of funds. That certainly hasn’t helped that school despite Irvine’s rep despite its nationally known programs in the life sciences and bioengineering.
Now this. Laurie Levinson, who teaches at Loyola Law and was being wooed by Chemerinsky to be a founding faculty member there put it succicntly when she said that perspective faculty and staff would now twice about going to that place. Oh, they’ll find applicants all right – the second raters who will say anything to get a job. Is that good enough?
Woody can send his clients to graduates of Regent University – a “Fourth Tier ” law school where no one has any original thoughts – or passes the bar either.
Chemerinsky’s views, like the one above calling Christian fundamentaliss “the greatest threat” to the U S reflects what an extreme leftist he is, and hence unsuited for the job. It is just idiotic to say that “rightwing Christians” are a bigger threat to our liberties than terrorists who have already managed, through portions of the Patriot Act, to take away some of our liberties and head us toward Big Brother.
We can dismiss fundamentalists as fools insofar as they take creationism literally, and in some school districts give kids the false notion that their views are just as valid as mainstream evolutionary theory, and their views on abortion strike me as reactionary. (But they’re no different from what the Pope has been saying, and it would be absurd, for all its faults, to claim we think the Catholic Church is a bigger threat to our freedoms than other forms of tyranny.)
The Regents’ handling of the matter was inept, at best. If they objected to Chem’s so politicizing the law school before he even got there, they should have said so. While many noted legal scholars, Dershowitz at Harvard being oneof the more prominent, have very distinct views and speak out about them, they are operating from established schools where one can assume there is greater diversity in the views of the faculty. There’s no doubt that educ. institutions tend to be dominated by the (extreme) left in general.
I agree, Celeste, that the Regents should have done their full homework on the guy before offering him the job — it’s not like his views have been a secret, since he’s writing editorials all over the place.
The biggest concern any law faculty might have in working in that environment is answered to a Board of Regents which seems to be more controlling than in control.
As a 15 year resident of Orange County and grduate from UCI – I can’t say I was surprised by this.
I WAS surprised (and pleased) when the story came out a couple weeks ago that Chemerinsky was a contender -and I worried then what that early story meant -and feared the worst.
For what it is worth, I’ll be encouraging our academic senate (I teach at the nearby community college in Irvine) to consider a resolution condemning this chilling violation of academic freedom. On our blog, we’re also encouraging folks to write Chancellor Drake.
He can be reached at chancellor@uci.edu
Woody,
Hurry up and write to Chancellor Drake at UCI, the future iberals lawyers need to learn about the threat of Christian fundamentalists to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
He can be reached at chancellor@uci.edu
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/erwin-chemerinsky/time-to-fight-the-religio_b_8048.html
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I often enjoy listening to Erwin Chemerinsky and John Eastman (Dean of Chapman University Law School) debate/discuss constitutional law on Hugh Hewitt’s radio segment titled (The Smart Guys). Hugh Hewitt is an active Republican who teaches constitutional law.
Even though I rarely agree with Chemerinsky, I think he deserves better than to be hired and then fired before even setting up his office in Irvine and without a hearing before the regents.
Michael Drake gets the award for Incompetent Impotence, for the way he handled this major hiring decision. What I find especially troubling is that Dr. Drake did not have the spine to stand behind his decision or was to afraid of losing his $350,000 a year position at UCI which he just received in July 2005.
Maybe it was the fact that the $120 million in private gifts and grants from conservatives in Orange County for 2007 might be rescinded which made Dr. Drake change his mind about Chimerinsky. In any case Drake should have thought of that a long time ago. Either he is just plan incompetent or just too ignorant to be making important administrative decisions that have political overtones.
It is worse than that Pokey. Chemerinsky had already begun to assemble an outstanding faculty. He established a board of advisors that included three Federal Judeges in OC (including one just appointed by Shrub) and the Deans of Boalt (Berkeley) and Virginia Law Schools. His overtures to Laurie Levinson of Loyola Law have already been mentioned but stories are out that he had positive feelers out to five profs at “Top Twenty” schools. It was Chemerinsky’s intent to make UCI a Top Twenty School in record time and all the moves suggested that he would have given the new school instant credibility and luster. And that’s important – firms look at where JDs are fromj in their hiring decisions.
Now thanks to Drake the image is trashed before it begins. Who will he get to be Dean now? Think it will be anyone as well known and thought of as Erwin (Note he turned down the North Carolina Deanship and was a finalist at Duke – that’s how well thought of he is)? Doubtful. And the same will go for faculty. First raters will steer wide. A school that bends this way is no place to hang your hat. And what will perspective students think? I understand that the tuition there will be quite high as this is the school’s brainchild and not a Regent approved project. So it won’t attract on cost.
And the other sad thing is the fear of antagonizing conservative donors was probably overblown. Today Donald Bren said he’d never heard of Chemerinsky and had no input and I think that is right. What Bren and th others want is an institution that is world class. That is what the Biological Sciences Division and the Engineering School have become and the donors there don’t ask about politics. But Drake has screwed the pooch. I think he’s dead meat. Watch for the faculty Senate there to scold him. And watch the professional journals like CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION in the days ahead. He’s given his University a big black eye.
This reminds me of when The University of Alabama hired Mike Price as head coach and then fired him before the season started after Price went to a stip club in Pensacola and took the stripper to his room. We’re still trying to figure out why he was fired.
Maybe Chemerinsky stepped on someone’s toes and maybe that was in the airport men’s room.
Michael Drake: Why I let Chemerinsky go
I made a management decision — not an ideological or political one — to rescind the job offer, says the UC Irvine chancellor.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-oe-drake14sep14,0,2647867.story?
Erwin Chemerinsky: Dumped over an Op-Ed
Erwin Chemerinsky, unhired as UC Irvine’s founding law school dean, says his ordeal is a lesson in academic freedom.
By Erwin Chemerinsky
September 14, 2007
After so many years of commenting on the news, it is strange to be the news. But, in a sense, this story isn’t really about me, it’s about academic freedom in our deeply polarized times.
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-chemerinsky14sep14,0,1499542.story?
What do you all think of Supe Mike Antonovich apparently getting active among his fellow Republicans to block Cher’s appointment? What business is it of a Supervisor in L A County to meddle in the affairs of the O C? Are funds for UCI somehow part of what he is approving for L A County/UCLA?
Not that I’m sure Cher would have been suitable. He has done some good work and earned respect, but also is dogmatic vs. anything Christian, and tried to get Guantanamo declared unconstitutional. He’s very much a leftist activist. Still, Drake and the UCI Regents come across as illiterates who made an offer without doing basic research.
Screw “academic freedom.”
When you work for an organization and are identified with it, then what you say or do in public reflects on that organization and gives them the right to fire you if you do bring unacceptable attention or consequences to that organization–in this case, with a big ultra-liberal mouth, but it could be anything. Trust me, a lot more conservatives are ostracized by liberal college administrations than the other way around.
Academic freedom is a made up term by educators that only fools people stupid enough to believe that school employees should be only ones exempt from being held responsible for what they say in and out of work. Don’t give me the so-called advantages of “outside the box” thinking to help the students, because I’ve seen and heard it all. It’s phony rhetoric to cover smothering students with left-wing propaganda. Teach the damn subjects and keep your personal politics out of it.
In this case, I think that Chemerinsky hacked off a big money donor, and that donor had the right to ask the school to choose between his cash and the professor’s lip.
The school will find a suitable or, likely, better replacement, so I don’t worry about it.