Did you know that John G. Roberts, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, was at the Law School a few days ago judging the final round of the Harlan Fiske Stone Moot Court Competition? Neither did we.

But he was! Roberts and three other appeals court judges heard two cases presented by law students. The Times calls Roberts an "acknowledged master" of appellate argument, which Roberts explains as when "the judges are debating among themselves and just using the lawyers as a backboard. One of the real challenges for lawyers is to get involved in that debate." (Bwog's still fuzzy on the details.)

After Roberts finished critiquing the students, the other judges took their turn critiquing Roberts. "Two of the appeals court judges said the Supreme Court might work a little harder to establish clear principles."

The article is a bit technical and hard to follow if you're not law school-bound, though the law school's own recap is not as jargony and features lots of photos. Imagine all this, right under our undergraduate noses.

Bwog editor Pierce Stanley weighs in from the Egyptian Ambassador's visit to the Law School.

While the Egyptian nation-state has been a sleeping giant in the game of international relations as of late, choosing to remain remarkably low-key in a region known for its instability, the Egyptian ambassador to the United Nations, Maged Abdelfattah Abdelaziz, has always exhibited a fiery charisma quite unlike that of the general malaise that has characterized Egyptian politics in recent days. An official who is known to speak his mind and act as he pleases, just months ago, Ambassador Abdelaziz was arrested by secret service agents outside of the UN for jumping a barricade without identifying himself and allegedly spitting on an agent as he resisted arrest. Indeed, the ambassador's diplomatic career has been defined by such moments of candor, charisma, and awkwardness.

Today we celebrate Constitution Day, a new fake holiday the venerable Senator Robert Byrd (right) created in 2004 when he slipped an extraneous rider onto an appropriations bill. Under Byrd's guidelines, all students and government employees are legally required to set aside some time to reflect on the power of "the foundation and the guardian of our liberties." Because, you know, they're not too busy cramming for standardized tests or keeping this old ship running or anything.

At the Law School, however, professors took Byrd's stipulation at face value; they would discuss the Constitution, but primarily in light of the historical and modern disregard for its laws.

And so, Jack Greenberg, who argued for Brown v. Board of Education back in the day(he's in his 80's and yet owns and flaunts a swanky PDA), discussed the legacy of racism in Supreme Court decisions. Sarah Cleveland neatly dismantled the Bush administration's legal basis for denying Guantanamo detainees habeas corpus. Suzanne Goldberg deplored the state of gay equality, and Katherine Franke, who urged the assembled students to become section 1983 lawyers with her, noted that while New York and national crime rates have fallen, the number of reported cases of police brutality has skyrocketed. As far as what changes in Washington and the Supreme Court could bring in the near future, Prof. Greenberg commented, quoting Humpty Dumpty and then shaking his head, "we'll just have to stay tuned."

-KER

We here at Bwog were literally convulsing with excitement when we heard t hat a Columbia alum was nominated for Attorney General (Princeton you are soooo wiretapped...). If you're like us, you can pass your congratulations along to mmukas@law.columbia.edu --Mukasey was a lecturer in the Law School, and team-taught a seminar on Advanced Trial Practice in the Fall of 2006. Could his teaching tell what to expect during his upcoming 18-or-so months as the nation's top law enforcement official? Law students?

And yes, this is the least grainy picture we could find of him online.

What? You're not already sick of the amateur parodies of SNL's "Special Christmas Box" that have been pollinating YouTube for months? You want to see law students pretend they have an iota of creativity by donning fake beards and Orthodox Jewish outfits to present you with boxes full of...Bagels with Lox? That's the theme of the featured hit for this year's Law Revue (get it?), "A Special Finals Care Package" (keep them coming...)

For those who haven't caught on, the Revue is a sort of V-Show equivalent bred among the huddled masses yearning to breathe free in Jerome Greene's claustrophobic library (Bwog enjoys waving to them enroute to EC, hoping to get some response). This year's title (referencing said library, and indicating writers who just can't seem to pun enough): "Arthur Diamonds are Forever".

-CJS

Looks like the scales of justice just got a little more balanced at the Law School, where a sharp eyed tipster noticed that the older, traditional, decidedly Christian logo:

has been replaced by something more sleekly innocuous:

As we noted before, Columbia did decide to stick with the royalist crosses, but apparently takes a federalist attitude towards its satellite institutions. Besides, spades are so in these days.