2013 Michigan Indian Law Day — This Friday — UM Law School

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Here:

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Michigan State NALSA Newsletter

Very nicely done! Especially the part at the bottom of page 1 where me and Wenona’s boys Emmett and Owen are eating at their favorite restaurant, Pizza House!

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MSU Indigenous Graduate Student Collective Hosts First Conference Today

About the Indigenous Gradate School Collective (featuring several MSU law students).

Conference materials here:

Anishinabeg e-maawizijig gizhiikamoowad akinoowamaadiwinan

First Annual Indigenous Graduate Student Collective Symposium

Building Campus and Community Bridges

Friday, March 15, 2013

9am-3:30pm

Kresge Art Center, Rooms 41 and 108

 Register for the Symposium Here

Symposium Flyer

Parking Map

There are a few handicap parking places right next to the building otherwise the map can direct you to visitor parking.

Schedule Continue reading

Singel and Fletcher Talk at Cornell

Rose Petoskey, GTB member and Cornell NALSA president

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Wenona Singel

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Cornell’s excellent A:kwe:kon hall

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Pre-College Summer Program at Michigan State

Website here.

The Native American Business Institute is a week-long pre-college summer program for Native American high school students that will be in the 10th, 11th, or 12th grade during the Fall 2013- Spring 2014 school year. Participants work with MSU admissions officers, college counselors, tribal community leaders, and corporate representatives in a seven-day “business boot-camp” that prepares students for the college and exposes them to numerous academic and professional opportunities.

Seattle U. Indian Estate Planning Summer Internship

PAID SUMMER INDIAN ESTATE PLANNING INTERNSHIP!

Application Deadline: April 15, 2013
Job Description: The summer Indian Estate Planning Project provides exceptional direct client experiences that few law student summer internships offer. In our ninth year, the Project places specially trained second and third year law students from ABA accredited schools on Indian reservations throughout Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Wisconsin and Montana. This internship embodies important services for Indian trust land owners that are not provided by any other organization in the country outside of a few legal service offices and a few specially trained private practitioners. The Project provides these services at no cost to clients and without regard to clients’ income.

Duties: Interns attend a one week, fully paid, training session beginning on May 20th at Seattle University School of Law on the history of federal laws and policies creating trust lands and fractionation, trust and non-trust estate planning under federal, state and tribal laws, the federal probate process, the American Indian Probate Reform Act, professional responsibility, will drafting and working within reservation communities. Upon completing the training, interns will serve one assigned tribal community for 10 weeks, providing information on Indian estate planning, interviewing clients, drafting and executing wills, living wills, and related documents. You must have your own vehicle, laptop, and in some instances, relocation for the summer is required.

Qualifications: Students must be in their second or third years of law school and have taken a Wills and Trusts class. A background in Indian Law is a plus but is not required.
Employer Information: The Institute for Indian Estate Planning and Probate is located at Seattle University School of Law and is a project of the Center for Indian Law & Policy.
Application Materials: Please submit: (i) cover letter, (ii) resume, (iii) unofficial transcript, (iv) 3 references to Erica Wolf at wolfer@seattleu.edu.
Salary: Approximately $5500 gross + travel/relocation expenses.

Fletcher/Singel Talks at Cornell Law School — March 12, 2013

Here:

Cornell NALSA 3-12

Fletcher’s paper on tribal amicus briefs in the Supreme Court is here.

2013 National NALSA Moot Court Winners

Congratulations to all!!!!

Here:

21st Annual National NALSA Moot Court Competition

Results:

Best Team

  1. Catherine Hall & Caycie K. Gusman (Team 10 from Hawaii)
  2. Jenny Patten & Natasha Bronn (Team 9 from Columbia)
  3. Veronica Newcomer & Rachel Kowarski (Team 33 from William Mitchell)

Highest Brief Score

  1. Zachary Dilonno & Sommerset Wong (Team 39 from Hawaii)
  2. Andrew Sangster & Jacob Wolf (Team 17 from Columbia)
  3. Anthony Franken & Steven Iverson (Team 66  from University of South Dakota)

Best Oral Advocate

  1. Catherine Hall (Hawaii)
  2. Ryan McCarthy (William Mitchell)
  3. Rachel Kowarski (William Mitchell)

And here are the teams that advanced to the elimination rounds: Continue reading

NNALSA Moot Court Final Round

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The final teams are from Columbia and University of Hawaii. An all women final!! Congratulations to both teams.

 

“The Indians Won” — A Blast from the Past — And a Shout-Out to Law Students

At Sam Deloria’s mention, I found a copy of the long out of print 1970 novel by Martin Cruz Smith (better known for the Arkady Renko mysteries), “The Indians Win”, and read it. It’s a short read. And fun. The edition I have includes commentary from the author who states he researched Indians for a couple months, then wrote the novel in one month. Not to give away the plot (spoiler alert), but in this fictional world, the Indians win. Yeah, the ‘Nishnaabes don’t get much play — it’s all Sitting Bull and Stand Watie and Wovoka — but the Potawatomis get a few good ones in.

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For those not in the know about this novel, here is a quick plot summary. In 1876, rather than Custer’s Last Stand being the Indians’ last stand, all the remaining Indian tribes of the plains and the far west band together. Armed with European arms smuggled down from Canada through Dakota, the Indians win a bunch of military clashes with a post-Civil War American military that doesn’t put up much of a fight. It all ends up with … You guessed it … The Indians winning. Speculative fiction at its early 1970s best and funnest. The best part of the subplot is the 1952 declaration by the “Indian Nation” that they have bomb, but are unwilling to prove to the world they have the bomb by testing it because to do so would unnecessarily injure Mother Earth.

It reminds me of the National NALSA moot court competition. Year after year, law students gather to compete in a fictional world that could be like the one where “The Indians Win.” If you’re like me and you think of this reality as one reality in a universe of infinite parallel … universes, then why can’t the Indians win after all? How else could a dude like me marry the most beautiful and brilliant Odawa woman in the world?

In the end, I say this — have a great competition, law students. The National NALSA Moot Court Competition should be fun. Anything, absolutely anything can happen. US News rankings fly right out the window. Make friends, renew old friendships, network like crazy, and crush your opposition with an iron boot.