Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Meet Archie and Ned McAdoo, Attorneys at Large

Father and son legal eagles, Archie and Ned McAdoo, will be featured in the simulation materials that will be featured in the online course I am developing on "Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism." They have been around for more than a decade, both in novels...

Why My Dad Hates Ice Cream
By Jim Castagnera
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Paperback, 131 pages
. . . . .

Why My Dad Hates Ice Cream
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Price: $12.00
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Lawyer Archie McAdoo and son Ned wrestle with a controversial case involving a gay client who claims he was fired for being HIV-positive. As ever in the law, truth and justice are a lot more complicated and elusive than they seem on the surface.
Available at: http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/why-my-dad-hates-ice-cream/2998752

And:

They also have featured over the years in many magazine and newspaper stories.
Here are some examples:

McAdoo Weighs in on Affirmative Action
by James Ottacio Castagnera

Fall 2003, Vol. 66, No. 3
On June 23, 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court announced its two, intensely anticipated opinions on the University of Michigan’s affirmative-action admissions programs. On June 24 I was on the phone to my labor-lawyer friend, Archie McAdoo, to get his take on the two opinions. I guessed correctly that if I called early I’d catch him at his desk in his suburban Philadelphia office, consuming his first cup of coffee and a buttery croissant. Between slurps and gulps, he shared his first impressions.

“Overall the Supremes sang a sweet song, so far as higher education is concerned,” he ventured. “Justice O’Connor’s opinion in Grutter v. Bollinger—that’s the Michigan Law School case—confirms two of the most important principles in higher education law today.” “And they are?” I prompted him as the sounds on the other end of the line suggested that his train of thought might be lost in the ecstasy of a latte with a double shot of mocha flavoring, in my experience a McAdoo favorite for kicking off the day’s endeavors.

“First,” he finally resumed, “the five-justice majority bought the argument—being pushed hard by higher education for the past decade or so—that ‘student body diversity is a compelling state interest.’ This was a notion that Justice Powell floated way back in 1978 in the Bakke case.”

“Wasn’t that the one where the court outlawed racial quotas in college admission decisions?” I asked, a dim bulb flickering in the back of my brain.

“You got it, pal,” Archie confirmed. “The Supremes were each singing solo tunes in that case… half a dozen separate opinions, if my memory serves. But it was Powell’s opinion that pulled the majority of the justices’ positions together and gave the decision a couple of direction signs.”

“Such as?”

“Well,” McAdoo said, “on the one hand the University of California’s medical school was violating the Constitution when it set aside some sixteen seats in the first-year class on the basis of race. But on the other hand, Powell suggested that race could be taken into account in individual admissions decisions on the ground that a diverse student body was a worthwhile institutional goal. Lots of colleges and universities fashioned their admissions policies to conform to Powell’s sign posts in the quarter century following Bakke, and especially after other affirmative action decisions in the 1990s really narrowed the legitimate options available to an organization that wanted to take race into consideration in hiring or admissions.”

“So racial quotas are still verboten?”

“You betcha,” he replied. “That’s the gist of the second new opinion, the one in Gratz v. Bollinger. There Chief Justice Rehnquist writes for a six-justice majority that the University of Michigan’s liberal arts college ran afoul of the Fourteenth Amendment and the federal civil rights acts when it awarded a flat twenty points on its admissions scorecard to every African-American student who applied. That comes too close to a quota and can’t be done. Justice O’Connor’s Grutter opinion confirms this. Listen: ‘The importance of individualized consideration in the context of a race-conscious admissions program is paramount.’ Close quote.”

I reminded him that he had counted not one but two important legal principles confirmed in the Grutter decision.

“Oh, yeah, right,” he resumed. “The other is academic freedom. Although O’Connor devoted some space in her decision to amicus curiae briefs by General Motors, among others, about the need to expose students to diversity to prepare them for the real world of work, she says flat out that ‘The Law School’s educational judgment that such diversity is essential to its educational mission is one to which we defer.’ ”

“So, overall, we educators should be satisfied with the University of Michigan decisions?”
“If affirmative action to achieve a diverse student body is one of your school’s goals,” answered Archie, “then, yes, I’d say that on balance you folks have come out the winners on this one.”

“What about race-based scholarships?” I inquired, probably pushing the limits of my free consultation.

McAdoo pondered for a long moment. “Well, I can see it both ways,” he finally responded.

“Typical lawyer,” I thought, but held my peace. Having a law degree myself, who was I to call the kettle black?

“On the one hand,” he continued, “under Gratz, earmarking financial aid bucks for blacks and Hispanics, for instance, looks a lot like awarding twenty points automatically on the basis of minority status. If the Court in some future case adopted that analogy, you’d be in trouble.

“But on the other hand, if a university follows the Grutter model of including race as just one factor in each individualized admission decision and then puts some money aside to ensure that those minority students admitted can actually afford to attend… well, I don’t know, but that just might pass muster with Grutter’s slim majority.”

I thanked McAdoo for his thoughts. “On the whole I’m feeling better than before I called you,” I said. “Still, I can’t help feeling some anxiety about this whole affirmative action issue, especially when you remember that the bare majority in Grutter could be shifted by just one retirement while George Bush is President. One more conservative on the Court and the Powell/O’Connor approach could be out the window, right?”

Archie let out a long, satisfied sigh. “Relax,” he said. “Walk over to that snack bar on campus and get yourself a grande cappuccino and one of those big, fat blueberry muffins I had the last time I was up there. Trust me… that’ll help you put all this in proper perspective.”

“Easy for you to say, Arch,” I thought, but didn’t say, as I placed the phone back in its cradle on my desk. Then I thought, “Aw, what the hell,” and headed off in the direction of the campus snack bar.

© 2011 Philadelphia Bar Association

Posted on Fri, Feb. 06, 2004

Joining the rush for reparations
JAMES OTTAVIO CASTAGNERA
Guest Columnist

'You can go right in. He's expecting you," Archie McAdoo's secretary said.

I found my long-time lawyer staring intently at his computer screen, and had to clear my throat twice before he noticed that his nine o'clock client had arrived.

"What's so important, Arch?" I asked.

"I've found my Holy Grail," Archie answered, his eyes ablaze as only two things '”- idealism and greed '”- could fire them. He handed me a page from the printer. A draft of a newspaper ad:

"Archibald Edwin McAdoo III '” Reparations Lawyer," read the header. My mouth dropped in amazement. "What the heck is this?" I inquired incredulously.

"This," Archie intoned, his wild eyes flashing disapproval at my apparent skepticism, "is the next big thing in lawsuits. Look, I missed the asbestos bonanza and the multibillion-buck tobacco settlement. I could have had myself a piece of the Dalkon Shield class actions, but let them pass me by. Not this time, JC. This time I'm getting in on the ground floor."

"I assume you're referring to the suits being brought on behalf of African-Americans against companies that allegedly profited from slavery 200 years ago," I pressed, my cynicism undiminished. "Didn't a federal judge out in Illinois just dismiss one of those cases?"

"True," he conceded. "But, hey, hundreds of tobacco lawsuits were tossed out of the courthouses before the plaintiffs' lawyers learned how to win them. Besides, I see no reason to limit reparations cases to the descendants of slaves.

"Look here," he continued. "If slave labor deserves compensation, why not the children of immigrants whose ancestors were exploited in sweatshops? The descendants of coal miners who died young and poor from black lung disease? And then there's'¦"

"There's almost everybody," I interrupted. "Who couldn't claim an ancestor like that?"

McAdoo sat back in his chair, a smug smile spreading across his face. "Now you've got it," he said. " Every major corporation in America is a potential defendant. The sky's the limit!"

I picked up Black's Law Dictionary from the corner of Archie's desk. "Reparation'¦ redress for a wrong done." Jeez, I thought, could my fat friend be right? "B'¦b'¦but, the descendants of slaves and immigrants and other exploited workers '¦ the wrong wasn't done to them," I protested.

"Since when has a mere technicality like that gotten in the way of a good, juicy lawsuit in this country?" he asked rhetorically. "If your objection had any merit, JC, punitive damages would have been outlawed ages ago. Far from it. Remember the old lady who got scorched when she was dumb enough to put a hot cup of McDonald's coffee between her legs as she drove from the pick-up window? The jury awarded her millions in damages that had nothing to do with her actual injuries. And she's just the tip of the iceberg. A lot of potential jurors hate big business. They know who's sending their high-paying manufacturing jobs to China and Vietnam and their high-paying computer-programmer jobs to India. They know why their best chance of a new job is as a Wal-Mart 'sales associate.' And they don't know what to do about it."

I wasn't ready to concede. "What about the judges, like the federal district judge in Illinois, who ruled this week that the African-American reparations suit was without merit?"

McAdoo, unflustered, replied: "I've got that covered. 'Reparations Law' is a forum-shopper's dream. Potential plaintiffs live in every state of the union. The target companies do business everywhere. Believe me, pal, somewhere out there," he spread his arms expansively, "are judges ready, willing and able to swallow this legal theory hook, line and sinker."

I could see there was no stopping him. "So where do you propose to find your first plaintiff?" Archie raised his eyebrows and eyeballed me dramatically. "Your dad died of miner's asthma, didn't he?"

"Oh, no," I nearly shouted, leaping to my feet. "I only came in today to go over my will." I headed for the door, hoping vaguely he wouldn't bill me for the wasted visit.

"All right," he called out behind me. "But if you change your mind, I'm giving current client's a special deal. I'm only taking a 25-percent contingency fee." I brushed by his secretary without even a goodbye nod.

"Sleep on it," his voice followed me out to my car. "You could be my test case."

Castagnera, a Philadelphia lawyer and writer, is the associate provost at Rider University and the president of Pinnacle Employment Law Institute.

Many more such pieces are included in my collection of "Attorney at Large" columns:

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