1L Section D
v.
Virginia Law Weekly
75 U.Va 5 (2022)
Kulkarni, J. delivers the opinion of the court.
Background
In the September 21 edition of the Law Weekly, one of the esteemed editors of that beloved newspaper published an article critiquing the names that the 1L sections of the Class of 2025 chose for their softball teams.[1] It was a comedic article made in good fun. Softball, after all, is the main pastime of the Law School and is intended to be a relief from the pressures of the classroom. But rather than appreciate the finely crafted jokes as they were presented, a section of 1Ls decided to take the article personally. They were the first 1Ls in my time on this esteemed Court to send in an actual, properly-formatted complaint. 1L Section D decided to spend time that they could have used at softball practice or on readings to formulate a complaint about a humorous article in the Law Weekly. While they attempted to sue only the writer of that piece, their complaint dealt with the institution of the paper itself. Rather than discuss respondeat superior as a concept, we will just move forward assuming that they appropriately named the Law Weekly as their opposing party.
Analysis
That above statement leads to the first point against the plaintiffs here. When this Court discusses real legal issues, it is because we choose to do so voluntarily. When we take on extra work, it is by choice. But this complaint has not led to voluntary work on our part. As recent precedent demonstrates, when a party creates more work for this Court, they should face consequences.[2] Members of this Court had to spend the early parts of this week dealing with motions and actually reading through the complaints, when they could have been 3LOLing instead. That is simply unconscionable. But worse than this, 1L Section D turned to their PA, who aided them in the way counsel would in a real-world case. We did indeed grant a motion for sanctions against that 3L earlier this week and recommend that other authorities investigate this student for betraying his own classmates in favor of 1Ls.
Furthermore, these 1Ls demonstrate their lack of research skills by even making this claim. Simply using evidence of allegedly lackluster past names of the team that the author captained is not enough to impress us. The most basic precedent of our storied court is straightforward and unimpeachable: 1Ls always lose.[3] It is that simple. We are bound by precedent here, and this is no exception. Despite previous 1Ls and 2Ls lamenting this rule, myself included,[4] it stands. These 1Ls have no right to a favorable determination from this Court by the sheer fact that they are 1Ls. In order to gain rights, they must simply suffer through memo submissions, 1L drama, two sets of finals, and journal tryouts.
We could simply dismiss this complaint on these procedural grounds. But we believe that discussing the merits will discourage such complaints in the future. The merits are actually best discussed through the lens of the First Petty Rule of Civil Procedure: We do what we want. These 1Ls can complain all they want, but the Law Weekly writers write what they want. The Triumvirate approves what they want for publishing. If these 1Ls have an issue with that, they can join the paper. It is just that simple. The writer of the piece in question proposed the idea, got it approved, and wrote well. We are dealing with the case at bar because it was well-written. Additionally, none of the other sections have issued complaints. Only Section D. Not that this decision would be any different if they had. It just goes to show how wrong Section D is that none of their friends supported them. By bringing up the writer’s own team names, these students think they are being clever, but the truth is that no one felt the need to write this rankings article over the last year. And now someone has. Much like in real life, they can’t complain that this type of article didn’t exist in the past. They only played softball while the current Law Weekly regime has existed, so they don’t need additional notice.[5]
Conclusion
Without question, this complaint from the plaintiffs fails. For procedural and substantive issues, they have failed to meet the requirements to gain sympathy and support from us. Moreover, next time, don’t talk in ScoCo within earshot of members of the Law Weekly about the article in question (or assume that a man wrote the article). Insulting members of the Court is an invitation for a verbal smackdown.
Walsh, J., concurring.
1L Section D, make no mistake: You earned your eighth-place spot. Calling my writing hypocritical won’t change that, nor will trying to pander to the supposed credibility of the Law Weekly. Plaintiffs are tragically mistaken if they believe that the esteemed justices of this Court—three of whom (not including me) are on the team that Plaintiffs described as “flavorlessly named”—would turn against one of their own just to side with a bunch of 1Ls. As if that were not insulting enough, Plaintiffs attempt to accomplish their mission by claiming that ruling against me is necessary for the sake of the paper’s credibility and reputation. Do Plaintiffs not remember Justice Peterson’s concurrence from just last week? If not, here’s a reminder: “It is unbecoming of this Court to consider arguments which purport to impose standards upon the Court.”[6] Justice Peterson’s words may have been dicta, but that doesn’t make them any less true. This Court will not stand idly by while 1Ls—ones who haven’t even attended a single Law Weekly meeting—attempt to impose standards of credibility or fairness upon the Court.
I could end my concurrence there, since ordinarily, I would not deign to respond to the allegations of 1Ls. However, they managed to get their 3L PA to represent them—and I don’t like that they called me out personally—so onwards this concurrence shall go. Plaintiffs believe that because I co-captain a team called §A & Pals, I am inherently unqualified to critique the names of other softball teams. What Plaintiffs fail to consider is that that’s just how the law is, baby. Everything is made up, and no one is really all that qualified to be doing what they’re doing, anyways.
Another point that Plaintiffs fail to consider: §A & Pals has co-captains. Not only is this omission outrageously rude to Jack Brown ’23—who deserves recognition as an original captain of the team and a fantastic co-captain—it also causes Plaintiffs to miss the fact that I’m not the person who named the team orwho submitted that name when registering with NGSL each semester. Could we have renamed the team at some point during my tenure as co-captain? Sure. But by the time I became co-captain, we already had “jerseys” (t-shirts) with the name “§A & Pals” on them,[7] and I wasn’t about to cough up more money (or force my team to do the same)[8] just so that we could rename the team. That’s not hypocrisy—that’s being budget friendly.
Plaintiffs also seem to miss the fact that I was ranking 1L section softball team names. When I set forth my ranking methodology, I explicitly stated that it applied to “1L section softball team” names; nowhere did I say anything about the names of any other kind of team. Plaintiffs can’t even criticize my 1L section’s softball team name, since, by their own admission, they don’t know what that team’s name was. At the end of the day, I might be throwing rocks from a public perch, but at least I know what I’m throwing at.
Now that I’m done defending my writing’s honor, I can move on to the true legal basis for my concurrence: Not only do “1Ls lose,”[9] so do gunners.[10] And getting your PA to file a formal complaint and a motion for disqualification on your behalf—rather than just complaining about the rankings in your section group chat (or loudly complaining in ScoCo while I sit less than six feet away)[11]—because you didn’t like how I ranked your team’s name? That has astronomically high levels of gunner energy. You sat down with your Civ Pro (arguably the most gunnery of the 1L subjects) textbook, and you thought to yourself, “Reading thirty pages of this three times a week isn’t enough; I want more”? That’s a level of gunning that should honestly be illegal. However, I do not write today to decide where the line between legal and illegal gunnery is. Instead, I write to say that due to Plaintiffs’ status as both 1Ls and gunners, they, like their section team’s name, “never stood a chance.”[12] The law says that they lose, and so they shall.
Accordingly, I concur.
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omk6cg@virginia.edu
saw8rc@virginia.edu
[1] Sarah Walsh, Ranking 1L Section Softball Team Names, Va. L. Wkly., Sept. 21, 2022, at 3.
[2] Readers of the Virginia Law Weekly v. Virginia Law Weekly, 75 U.Va. 4 (2022).
[3] 1L Gunners v. Everyone Else, 324 U.Va. 22 (2019).
[4] 1Ls v. God, 73 U.Va. 16 (2021) (Kulkarni, J., dissenting).
[5] I don’t care if this isn’t how real law works. WE. DO. WHAT. WE. WANT.
[6] Readers of the Virginia Law Weekly v. Virginia Law Weekly, 75 U.Va. 4 (2022) (Peterson, J., concurring).
[7] And the team motto: No thoughts, just dingers.
[8] We have a future public defender on the team, for Christ’s sake—we can’t just be throwing money out left and right.
[9] 1L Gunners v. Everyone Else, 324 U.Va. 22 (2019).
[10] 2Ls Who Are Way Too Eager to Post on LinkedIn v. Everyone Else, 75 U.Va. 2 (2022).
[11] That’s right, I heard you.
[12] Sarah Walsh, Ranking 1L Section Softball Team Names, Va. L. Wkly., Sept. 21, 2022, at 3.