Already in my criminal law textbook (Kadish, Schulhofer, & Steiker, 8th Edition), there have been two citations to articles authored (or co-authored) by sitting US Senators. This is shocking, since I always sort of assumed that when US Senators wrote articles, they never said anything worthwhile. Yet here they are, apparently key elements of the criminal law.
The one I saw today was written by Jon Kyl (R-AZ), along with Steven J. Twist & Stephen Higgins, On the Wings of Their Angels, 9 Lewis & Clark L. Rev. 581 (2005) [pg. 1015 in the book]. At this point, Kyl had already been Senator for 10 years.
But the one I spotted yesterday was, if anything, even more amazing. Found on page 13, it was an excerpt from a book review written by one Arlen Specter (R-PA), cited at 76 Yale L.J. 604 (1967). In 1967, Specter was still a mere district attorney in Philadelphia, embarking on a failed run for mayor of that lovely city. He would proceed to lose re-election for his DA position, lose in a Republican primary for Senate, and lose in a Republican primary for Governor, before finally breaking through to the US Senate in 1980, where he has remained ever since.
I'm not surprised that senators with law degrees would either have published a decent article while they were young (Specter) or written a highly cite-able statement about the justification for a bill they're sponsoring in Congress (Kyl). Kyl was editor of the Arizona L. Rev., and Specter graduated from Yale Law.
ReplyDeleteI will be surprised if you find a non-legally-trained Senator in your book, though.