Cooley Law School Stadium is a Minor League Ballpark

Thomas E. Brennan, former Michigan Supreme Court Chief Justice, and the founder of Cooley Law School, was in Ann Arbor in October 1982 giving interviews to the Michigan Daily, and the now defunct Ann Arbor News as a Republican candidate for Lieutenant Governor.  It was the early-Regan era and I escorted Mr. Brennan through town as Dick Headlee's campus chairperson.

The former justice was asked by a reporter what he would do if Democrat James Blanchard moved into the Governor's Mansion.  Mr. Brennan paused as though the thought had never occurred to him, then said, "I'll go back to running the law school; we're developing an innovative curriculum at Cooley."

He was true to his vision.  There can be no doubt that Brennan developed the "business model" that is the Cooley Law School.  Cooley has tapped deeply into the American Dream, lawyer style.  As a result, it has enjoyed a healthy balance sheet, boasting one of the largest collections of law books in the country, pioneering the use of satellite "campuses", and swelling the ranks of its students to staggering proportions.

The law school dropped just under $1.5 million this week on it's first baseball park sponsorship; the former Oldsmobile Park inside the Capital Loop in Lansing.  The decision was met with mixed reviews from the law pundits and among the extensive network of Cooley Law Alumni.

Ashby Jones of the Wall Street Journal's law blog interviewed Cooley's dean, Don LeDuc, earlier this week about the sponsorship.  Dean LeDuc explained that the idea for the stadium came from past alumni-student gatherings at Tigers games in Comerica Park.  According to LeDuc, Cooley's stadium now allows them to bring the ball game to Lansing, so their students don't have to go so far.

LeDuc listed the advertising benefits of the sponsorship, sounding more like a marketing director than a law school dean.  In the blog interview, LeDuc admitted his was a revenue-driven operation with a multi-million dollar marketing budget.

The blog, Above the Law, was far less polite, calling out the mamoth law school (3500+ students) as a "diploma mill", and speculating that its graduates will be paying-off student loans with jobs at McDonalds.  The ATL blog critiqued the stadium sponsorship in a post that has attracted more than 150 comments; mostly negative.

A recent Cooley Law alumna admitted to me in confidence when discussing the ballpark sponsorship, "Cooley can't figure out whether it's a law school or a community college..."

The nation's largest law school does seem to attract its share of criticism.  It claims to be "ranked" as high as 12 on its own website, using its own criteria.  Most professionals not affiliated with the school, however, relegate it to "fourth-tier" status all day long.

All this raises the question: "Do we really need some 1200 new lawyers pumped into Michigan's service economy each and every year?"  Oakland County already has nearly 11,000 lawyers to Wayne County's 7000.

Over the past three decades, Thomas Brennan's law school business model has been a fiscal success.  Over those same years, I've come to know many a lawyer from Cooley with outstanding lawyering skills.  Former Michigan Governor John Engler is a Cooley graduate.

These days, however, I just have to wonder how many more lawyers we can take; whether or not they graduated from Cooley.  Brennan's vision of the American Dream has been tapped, but good.

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No Joke: What's the Difference Between a Divorce and a Tatoo?

This blog post combines two posts from the SBM Blog and is the original content of the State Bar of Michigan.

As Michigan lawyers go about the work of convincing our state legislators that a tax on legal services would be a fundamental and costly mistake, we face the same response again and again:  "if we exempt one service we have to exempt them all."  In Georgia, policymakers are also gearing up for a tax on services, and a recent white paper from Georgia's venerable Tax Foundation asks: "Can anyone really keep a straight face while justifying a tax exemption for legal services, tattoos, haircuts, car repair,health club memberships and other common services?"  Well, we can.  In fact, we wonder how serious policymakers can keep a straight face equating legal services with personal grooming and adornment services.Bottom line: government shouldn't tax behavior that is good for society. We're all better off when people get the legal advice they need to secure justice or comply with the law.  Tatoos, not so much.

The original SBM Blog post, above, referenced a related post on the same subject, which is reproduced here for our readers convenient reference:

Unfair, Unwieldy, Unwise, Unethical, and Unconstitutional

The prospect of a Michigan tax on services that extends beyond the 26 services already taxed to include legal services is a growing threat, with a group of business leaders actively pushing the idea, legislation already introduced, and the Governor endorsing a services tax. The State Bar has successfully lobbied in the past against taxing legal services, arguing that a tax on legal services is unfair, unwieldy, unethical, unconstitutional, and, ultimately, unsuccessful. The constitutional problems with a tax on legal services are magnified when legal services to businesses are excluded, as is the case with several of the current proposals. See HB 5527, 5528, and 5529. If you haven’t expressed concern about a tax on legal services to your legislator, now’s the time.  Here’s how to connect.  Here’s the State Bar’s position.

Here's a quick rundown of the arguments.  A tax on legal services is...

Unfair – Most legal services are rendered in circumstances of crisis, stress, or misfortune. People who seek legal assistance in cases involving child support payments, child custody, divorce, death, domestic abuse, end-of-life decisions, or bankruptcy seek them out of necessity, not choice. For this reason, a tax on legal services is aptly labeled a  "misery tax".  

Unwieldy – Determining what fees and services would be subject to the tax and which records would or could be subject to audit would be an administrative nightmare. Among other reasons, attorneys often don't receive payment promptly from their clients, making it a potential administrative burden to reconcile payment with the tax obligation.  Administrative complications were one reason why the only two large states that have adopted such a tax – Florida and Massachusetts – repealed it shortly after it took effect. 

Unethical – Collection of a sales tax on legal services could compromise client confidentiality, imposing the state’s tax collection apparatus into the attorney-client relationship. Law firms do pay taxes under the Michigan Business Tax. 

Unwise – Individuals and businesses seek legal advice to ensure compliance with the law.  Such behavior should be encouraged, not taxed. Further, the tax could be counter-productive, causing clients to seek legal services outside Michigan for intellectual property, federal tax, estate planning, legal service, and encouraging law firms providing such services to relocate outside Michigan, or perform such services at satellite offices. Like medical services, legal services are not discretionary. Taxing legal services is taxing justice. 

Unconstitutional – In addition to constitutional concerns about attorney-client privilege and the taxation of criminal defense, the proposal to exempt one class of clients (business) from taxation while imposing the tax on another class (individuals) raises serious constitutional issues.

Unsuccessful - Two states, Florida and Massachusetts, enacted sales taxes on services but repealed the measures when they proved to be administratively difficult and unpopular.  In the three small states that are said to have a tax on legal services, two also tax physician services and the thrid reports that the tax is not enforced because it is so difficult to calculate and collect.


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