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VISITING PROFESSOR MICHAEL JAMES TEACHES A PRE-LAW CONSTELLATION OF COURSES

(February 20, 2007)   You won't find a UH-Downtown professor more concerned about constitutional law than Michael James, J.D., who teaches three UHD pre-law courses in Political Science (Constitutional Law, Civil Liberties, The American Legal System).  The courses move from a broad perspective of constitutional law and rights granted to Americans to a comparative analysis of legal systems.

James comes to UHD with an illustrious background of having clerked for Judge Damon J. Keith of the Sixth Court of Appeals (an appellate court only one level beneath the Supreme Court of the United States).  Landing a judicial law clerk position in such a high court is extremely competitive.  James was one of three clerks working for Judge Keith.

"It's fascinating but also really terrifying to be a law clerk at the federal level," James says.  "You're just out of law school, yet expected to be able to do the work when you walk through the door." 

Judicial law clerks create a bench memorandum which summarizes all of the legal and constitutional issues on both sides of the case and gives a recommendation as to how the judge should decide.  Most judges accept the opinions and recommendations of their law clerks.  Whew - talk about responsibility!

"I cut my teeth on the Detroit Free Press v. Ashcroft case, which assessed issues with some of the federal government's enhanced anti-terrorism powers following the September 11 th tragedy," James says.

This was the first of such cases after 9/11, and Judge Keith's decision - that the Department of Justice could not, as a blanket policy, hold closed immigration proceedings just because someone was from a specific country or allegedly associated with terrorism - was highly controversial.  

About his clerking experience, James says, "It was fantastic, though at times very stressful and demanding, but an experience I wouldn't trade because I worked for one of our nation's most esteemed senior judges...this is a man who was nominated originally by President Johnson to the District Court and confirmed, and then elevated by President Carter to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals." 

To find out more about academic preparation for law school at UHD, click here.

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