Los Angeles Lawyer October 2008 - Gray Plant Mooty

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SERVICES FOR BOTH SIMPLE AND COMPLICATED DISPUTE RESOLUTION REAL ESTATE ARBITRATION & MEDIATION tel 818.790.1851 fax 818.790.7671 e-mail dave@mediationla.com web site www.mediationla.com David W. Dresnick, President • ARBITRATOR/MEDIATOR LosAngelesLawyer VISIT US ON THE INTERNET AT www.lacba.org/lalawyer E-MAIL CAN BE SENT TO lalawyer@lacba.org EDITORIAL BOARD Chair ANGELA J. DAVIS Articles Coordinator DAVID SCHNIDER JERROLD ABELES DANIEL L. ALEXANDER ETHEL W. BENNETT R. J. COMER CHAD C. COOMBS ELIZABETH L. CROOKE KERRY A. DOLAN GORDON ENG HELENE J. FARBER ERNESTINE FORREST STUART R. FRAENKEL MICHAEL A. GEIBELSON TED HANDEL JEFFREY A. HARTWICK STEVEN HECHT LAWRENCE J. IMEL MEREDITH KARASCH JOHN P. LECRONE THANAYI LINDSEY KAREN LUONG PAUL MARKS ELIZABETH MUNISOGLU RICHARD H. NAKAMURA JR. DENNIS PEREZ GARY RASKIN JACQUELINE M. REAL-SALAS CAROLIN SHINING HEATHER STERN GRETCHEN D. STOCKDALE TIMOTHY M. STUART KENNETH W. SWENSON CARMELA TAN BRUCE TEPPER R. JOSEPH TROJAN PATRIC VERRONE JEFFREY D. WOLF STAFF Publisher and Editor SAMUEL LIPSMAN Senior Editor LAUREN MILICOV Senior Editor ERIC HOWARD Art Director LES SECHLER Director of Design and Production PATRICE HUGHES Advertising Director LINDA LONERO BEKAS Sales and Marketing Coordinator AARON J. ESTRADA Advertising Coordinator WILMA TRACY NADEAU Administrative Coordinator MATTY JALLOW BABY LOS ANGELES LAWYER (ISSN 0162-2900) is published monthly, except for a combined issue in July/August and a special issue in the fall, by the Los Angeles County Bar Association, 261 S. Figueroa St., Suite 300, Los Angeles, CA 90012, (213) 896-6503. Periodicals postage paid at Los Angeles, CA and additional mailing offices. Annual subscription price of $14 included in the Association membership dues. Nonmember subscriptions: $28 annually; single copy price: $4 plus handling. Address changes must be submitted six weeks in advance of next issue date. POSTMASTER: ADDRESS SERVICE REQUESTED. Send address changes to Los Angeles Lawyer, P. O. Box 55020, Los Angeles CA 90055. Copyright © 2008 by the Los Angeles County Bar Association. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited. Printed by R. R. Donnelley, Liberty, MO. Member Business Publications Audit of Circulation (BPA). The opinions and positions stated in signed material are those of the authors and not by the fact of publication necessarily those of the Association or its members. All manuscripts are carefully considered by the Editorial Board. Letters to the editor are subject to editing. 4 Los Angeles Lawyer October 2008
HONORABLE LAWRENCE W. CRISPO (RETIRED) On September 29, 1967, Time magazine devoted its cover story to the wedding of Margaret Elizabeth Rusk, daughter of then Secretary of State Dean Rusk. Although news magazines have long held a fascination with the nuptials of the young and elite, what landed Peggy Rusk, a Stanford undergrad and past recipient of a D.A.R. prize, on the cover of Time was a particular distinction. A foremost member of President Johnson’s cabinet had, in the parlance of the day, “given his…daughter’s hand to a Negro.” Time found the whitegowned Peggy “fetching” and the bridegroom, Guy Gibson Smith, a Georgetown graduate ranked at the top in his ROTC cadet corps, “equally poised.” But, as Time observed, this wedding was “social history, rather than society-page fare.” Only two decades earlier, before the California Supreme Court’s decision in Perez v. Sharp, California law would have made the Rusk-Smith union illegal. And, only three months before, when the U.S. Supreme Court in Loving v. Virginia eliminated all antimiscegenation laws, 16 states similarly banned interracial marriage. But, while legal authority—and, evidently, the editors of Time—unequivocally supported the Rusk-Smith marriage, prevailing social conventions did not. Several publications reported that Secretary Rusk offered to resign from the Johnson cabinet, lest his daughter’s marriage prove too scandalous for the administration. In like manner, the Stanford Chapel dean agreed to a shortened ceremony, the guest list was limited to 60, and the groom’s parents were the only other African Americans in attendance. The timeline from Perez (1948) to the Rusk-Smith wedding (1967) illustrates what is often the relationship between evolving legal issues and day-to-day realities—namely, that legal developments often precede common perceptions, or, more precisely, our comfort levels. Although Dean Rusk supported his daughter’s marriage to the man of her choosing, his sense of loyalty to a Southern president required an offer to relinquish his cabinet position. In preparing this issue of LAL, we have been reminded how frequently legal developments have preceded assumptions now taken for granted. The impropriety of a prosecutor summarily dismissing all African Americans from a jury pool, the reality that sexual orientation is not indicative of mental illness, and the manifest unfairness of withholding court access from individuals with disabilities are just a partial list of examples. Production of this issue also coincided with the California Supreme Court’s decision, In re Marriage Cases, striking down the ban on same-sex marriage. In June 2007, the LACBA Board of Trustees voted unanimously to join an amicus brief in support of same-sex marriage. The board members concluded this position was consistent with LACBA’s longstanding commitment to equal justice, and that, upon rereading Perez, the ban on same-sex marriage in 2007 was legally indistinguishable from the antimiscegenation law of 1948. Nonetheless, it is hardly surprising that this legal development has spurred any number of opponents as well as an effort to rouse popular support for a ballot initiative that would curtail, rather than expand upon, civil liberties. After all, most of us grew up with the notion that whatever marriage was (or was not), it was always between a man and a woman. But the lessons of Perez and other landmark decisions should make us cautious about opposing legal developments that strike at the heart of our comfort levels. ■ Daniel L. Alexander is an attorney with Coleman Frost LLP, where his practice focuses on commercial litigation and appeals. Angela J. Davis is the 2008-09 chair of the Los Angeles Lawyer Editorial Board. Richard H. Nakamura Jr. is an appellate attorney in the Los Angeles office of Morris Polich & Purdy LLP. Alexander, Davis, and Nakamura are coordinating editors of this special issue. Mediator Referee Arbitrator Forensic Analysis & Investigation of: • Construction Defects 213-926-6665 www.judgecrispo.com FORENSIC CONSTRUCTION DEFECT & ENGINEERING, INC. A PROFESSIONAL CORPORATION • Structural, Civil, Environmental, Industrial Engineering & Issues for All Types of Structures and Buildings • Regulatory Compliances & Building Codes This Corporation can also provide expert witness in the areas of Malpractice Litigation or Real Estate transactions. MASSIE MUNROE, M.S., P.E. PRESIDENT & CEO • EXPERT WITNESS Tel: 213-632-1310 Fax: 213-632-5299 E-mail: massie@ConstructionDefect.us www.ConstructionDefect.us Los Angeles Lawyer October 2008 5
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Los Angeles Lawyer October 2008 - Gray Plant Mooty

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