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Author: William A. Jacobson

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William A. Jacobson

William A. Jacobson is a Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the Securities Law Clinic at Cornell Law School.

He is a 1981 graduate of Hamilton College and a 1984 graduate of Harvard Law School. At Harvard he was Senior Editor of the Harvard International Law Journal and Director of Litigation for the Harvard Prison Legal Assistance Project.

Prior to joining the Cornell law faculty in 2007, Professor Jacobson had a highly successful civil litigation and arbitration practice in Providence, Rhode Island, concentrating in investment, employment, and business disputes in the securities industry, including many high profile cases reported in leading newspapers and magazines.

Professor Jacobson has argued cases in numerous federal and state courts, including the Courts of Appeal for the First, Fifth and Sixth Circuits, and the Rhode Island Supreme Court.

Professor Jacobson has a national reputation as a leading practitioner in securities arbitration. He was Treasurer, and is a former member of the Executive Committee and Board of Directors of the Public Investors Arbitration Bar Association, a professional organization of attorneys dedicated to protecting public investors. He frequently is quoted in national media on issues related to investment fraud and investor protection, and in the past has served as one of a small number of private practice attorneys who trained new arbitrators for the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.

Professor Jacobson is co-author of the Securities Arbitration Desk Reference (Thomson-Reuters), updated annually.

Professor Jacobson is frequently quoted in the media on political and legal topics, has authored many Op-Eds in major publications, and appears on television and radio to discuss politics and the law.

A more complete listing of Professor Jacobson's professional background is available at the Cornell Law School website. The views expressed here are his own and not those of any employer or organization,

The best way to reach Prof. Jacobson is by e-mail here.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 08, 2014 23 Comments
When I saw this segment on The O'Reilly Factor about student grievances at Dartmouth, I thought is was just more of the same. Then I read the List (h/t The Other McCain). Wow. Read it for yourself at the bottom of this post. The students behind the list took over the President's office to demand specific responses to each item on the list. The takeover, and the list, have generated articles in The Wall Street Journal, The Dartmouth Review, and elsewhere. (As an aside, one of the grievances is to force The Review to stop using the name Dartmouth unless it stops using the term "Indian" in the publication.) The list contains 72 (by the WSJ's count) bulleted demands most which seek race-, sexuality- and ethnicity-based treatment of students, staff and faculty. There actualy were a handful of grievances with which I agree, including this one:
Eradicate internal judicial processes for students that break laws, those crimes will be reported directly to police.
There was a lot missing from the list, like a focus on raising academic standards. But college increasingly is not about academics, anyway, it's about "social justice" retribution and entitlement entrenchment. But the one glaring demand missing from the list was this:
That "[students] live [on a campus] where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."
In fact, almost everything on the grievance list is designed to insure that that dream never comes true.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 08, 2014 9 Comments

Might apply to more than one of these bumper stickers. From Deb: I took this pic in a parking lot in Walpole MA. The irony in the inclusion of the Ben Franklin quote leaves me speechless.  This is someone completely unclear on the concept of freedom and security! The...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 07, 2014 22 Comments
Santa Monica High School wrestling coach and science teacher Mark Black is seeing an outpouring of community support after a (alleged) drug dealing student picked a fight with Black, and lost. Coach Black pinned the student to the ground while help arrived. The incident was caught on cell phone video: The We Support Coach Black of Samohi Facebook Page has over 10,500 "Likes" so far -- come on, we can do better than that -- go "Like" the page and spread the link. Coach Mark Black Santa Monica Support Page A change.org petition for Coach Black's reinstatement has over 4000 signatures.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 07, 2014 16 Comments
Opposing the anti-Israel Boycott Divest and Sanction movement is serious business, so it's natural that we tend to be serious about it. But I also think we need to be happy in the fight as well. Contrary to boycott mythology, Israel is thriving economically, with investment and new trade deals being announced almost daily. Israel is a sea of happiness in a region filled with horrors inflicted by Arabs upon Arabs. The anger of the BDS movement doesn't need to be replicated by us -- at least not to the exclusion of humor and happiness.  (Happy Tel Aviv - Yafo here) It's one of the reasons I start my lectures opposing the academic boycott at colleges with statistics showing how Israel has a higher favorability rating in the U.S. than kittens. It always gets a laugh, but a laugh which keeps things in perspective. There is a template for being happy warriors against BDS, the Sussex (England) Friends of Israel (SFI).  We previously featured SFI's video of the Brighton Israeli Apartheid Week March that attracted only a few people, #BDSfail – 8 people show up for Sussex “Israeli Apartheid Week” march. The SFI brings mockery and good humor to the humorless Israel haters, with miraculous results:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 07, 2014 7 Comments

The classic rephrased by Jeb Bush: "Robbing from Committing Acts of Love on the rich and giving to the poor" Spotted in Ithaca, at the mall parking lot. (Yeah, you can feel sorry for me.)...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 07, 2014 10 Comments
We previously covered the UCLA anti-Israel divestment resolution, which was voted down 7-7 by the student council after an intense and contentious all-night session. One of the co-sponsors and a strong supporter of the resolution was Community Service Commissioner Omar Arce, as reported by The Daily Bruin (emphasis added):
Facilities Commissioner Armen Hadjimanoukian of the Bruins United slate, Community Service Commissioner Omar Arce, an independent councilmember, and General Representative Lizzy Naameh of the LET’S ACT! slate sponsored the resolution.... In a second straw vote later in the meeting, no councilmembers changed their vote. Student Wellness Commissioner Savannah Badalich, Naameh, External Vice President Maryssa Hall, Cultural Affairs Commissioner Jessica Trumble and Arce still said they would support the resolution.
Arce not only sponsored the resolution, he also endorsed a letter claiming "Islamophobic commentary" in opposition to the divestment resolution necessitated a "Diversity Requirement." The Daily Bruin reports that Arce has been arrested on charges of false imprisonment related to alleged sexual batteries:
An undergraduate student council member was arrested by university police Wednesday on a charge of false imprisonment. On Wednesday, a female student reported a series of sexual batteries between October and March. The report led to 21-year-old Omar Arce’s arrest, according to a police report released Thursday afternoon. UCPD arrested Arce, the Undergraduate Students Association Council Community service commissioner and a fourth-year international development studies student, at 10:47 a.m. Wednesday and transported him to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department in West Hollywood. Arce was booked about 11:30 a.m. on $50,000 bail. He is currently being held at the Men’s Central Jail in downtown Los Angeles.
The local Fox affiliate further reports on the arrest:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 06, 2014 48 Comments
Jeb Bush (emphasis added):
"A great country ought to know where those folks are and politely ask them to leave," he said, adding later that properly targeting people who overstay visas "would restore people's confidence" in the nation's immigration system. "There are means by which we can control our border better than we have. And there should be penalties for breaking the law," he added. "But the way I look at this -- and I'm going to say this, and it'll be on tape and so be it. The way I look at this is someone who comes to our country because they couldn’t come legally, they come to our country because their families -- the dad who loved their children -- was worried that their children didn’t have food on the table. And they wanted to make sure their family was intact, and they crossed the border because they had no other means to work to be able to provide for their family. Yes, they broke the law, but it’s not a felony. It’s an act of love. It’s an act of commitment to your family. I honestly think that that is a different kind of crime that there should be a price paid, but it shouldn’t rile people up that people are actually coming to this country to provide for their families."
Mickey Kaus calls it a "cunning strategy":
Jeb’s Jejune Swoon: Why did Jeb Bush say those provocative, seemingly jejune things about illegal border crossing being “not a felony” but ” an act of love? Obviously it’s what he actually thinks. But, again, why did he say it? Two theories: 1) He’s running in 2016 and thinks he can compensate for giving amnesty to all the illegal border crossers (mainly from Mexico) by cracking down and even deporting visa-overstayers (who aren’t so  much from Latin America).  It’s a weak attempt to appease immigration hawks–but it’s also a double-pander to many Latinos, who (rightly) resent politicians who talk about building a Southern fence while ignoring the visa-overstay problem. Clever!  I don’t think the immigration hawks will be fooled, though, since Bush also endorsed the Gang of 8 bill, which legalizes instantly while postponing enforcement until later. Or …

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 06, 2014 16 Comments

From Jan T., taken in Gig Harbor, Washington State: Since you kindly published my last one (a Prius with an obnoxious bumper sticker), I’m encouraged to send you another ...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 05, 2014 19 Comments
I don't know much about Chris McDaniel, who is challenging Thad Cochran in the Mississippi Republican Senate primary. I also don't know much about Thad Cochran. I haven't studied the race, or taken a position. I don't back a challenger just for the sake of backing a challenger. The National Republican Senatorial Committee, however, backs an incumbent just for the sake of backing an incumbent. NRSC is, in Prof. Reynold's words, "an incumbent-protection club. That’s basically its job." Which means backing any Republican Senate incumbent, no matter how bad and no matter how good the challenger. That means Arlen Specter over Pat Toomey; Bob Bennett over Mike Lee, and so on. Brad Dayspring is the Communications Director and Strategist for NRSC. While his Twitter feed has the obligatory disclaimer that his tweets are his own, he does seem to use his Twitter feed as part of his NRSC mission. A tweet on April 3 by Dayspring about McDaniel accused McDaniel of "associat[ing] with white nationalists & segregationists" based on a linked story at Talking Points Memo. (H/t The Other McCain) The TPM story reported that McDaniel backed out of an event after it was revealed -- by a local pro-Cochran blog -- that one of the vendors displaying at the event was pro-segregation. That's it. No allegation that McDaniels himself was pro-segregation, or speaking at a pro-segregation event. Only that there was a vendor at the event. That's the sort of guilt by remote association we expect TPM and others to use against Republicans. Robert Stacy McCain, who has an extensive write up on it, correctly states:
The attempt to turn this into a scandal is like saying that if a candidate campaigns at a county fair, he thereby endorses every rip-off carnival game at the fair.
It's not surprising that NBC picked up on it, which Dayspring also tweeted out, asserting that McDaniel was not vetted:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 05, 2014 32 Comments
The last time we visited the Dominican Republic, the only English-language news channel in the hotel was CNN-International. Which is like not having access to the news. This time, however, all of the major network and cable news channels were carried. I saw this live on Megyn Kelly's show, and found it of great interest. Here's the trailer from The Honor Diaries:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 05, 2014 15 Comments

We're back in Ithaca after a great vacation in the Dominican Republic. The featured image is the view from our room. One of the readers guessed the location -- almost. We stayed at the Barceló Bavaro Beach Resort, not the "Palace." We stayed...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 01, 2014 14 Comments

Wait, don't answer that. Enjoying celebrating our 30th wedding anniversary in the Dominican Republic. Great weather, great hotel on the beach, doing my best to stay off the internet (thanks Mandy for posting these photos for me) with modest success. For those who wondered, yes "the wife" actually...

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