Suing is not the answer

Does everything need to be an epic legal battle?

Obviously not but when it comes to some action taken by one or the other side of the political spectrum these days, epic legal battles generally ensue.

Classic recent example: the new law in Louisiana requiring that the Ten Commandments be posted in all school classrooms.

The state governor said he was looking forward to being sued and, sure enough, he was sued last week. The first news story I looked at about this said this was “expected to be an epic legal battle that could end up before the US Supreme Court.”

Why?

Aren’t there at least a few other things that people who took the bait can spend large amounts of time and money on? Is this a battle worth fighting?

Clearly, the best thing liberals could have done was ignore this. That would have really annoyed Jeff Landry, the Louisiana governor.

After all, this is very silly.

Can you remember anything plastered on the wall of your classrooms? Did you think it was fine to murder or steal until you heard about the Ten Commandments? Are first graders committing adultery? What happens when kids ask what adultery is? Is adultery now part of the curriculum?

My favorite is the second commandment: “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image.”

Does that mean kids have to give up action figures? Is playing with Play-Doh now illegal in Louisiana? Will the Joan of Arc statue in New Orleans have to come down?

And then there was the other noteworthy thing that Landry said at his press conference — children can “look away” if they don’t like the Commandments poster.

Now picture how teachers are going to react to students looking away.

My recommendation to Louisiana educators: obey the law and also put up equal-sized posters of the First Amendment right next to the Commandments.

It’s a civics lesson.

A photo of Donald Trump next to the adultery commandment works too.

A lesson. Is assigning homework any way to teach a lesson?

Well, yeah, it is — but only if the homework gets done.

I bring this up because a federal magistrate in New York has assigned homework to a law firm as a way to teach a law firm that it shouldn’t be repeatedly asking for excessive attorney fees.

The ruling involving Troy Law LLC noted that the firm “has not escaped the attention of numerous judges” with its fee requests, has had the fees reduced repeatedly, and still “failed to get the hint.”

So the magistrate came up with an interesting solution: “read all cases cited in this decision and submit sworn attorney declarations confirming that they have done so.”

You can’t play outside until you’ve finished your homework.

The problem with this is kind of obvious — there’s no test at the end of the semester.

And you know the firm is going to try to charge someone for the hours spent reading those cases.

Still, there’s merit to this idea. All you need to do is make rogue lawyers come into court to take exams.

They’re going to do anything to avoid this.

Categories / Law, Op-Ed, Religion