Law Students Argue in Front of Justice Alito & Judge Clifton

On January 27th, 2011, law students from the William S. Richardson School of Law's Native American Moot Court team made oral arguments before U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito and Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Richard Clifton.

In this photo, third year law student Maxwell Kaanohi Kopper represented Judge Chippewa and the Rabbit River Tribe with his co-counsel Keani Alapa. Maxwell described arguing in front of Justice Alito as an event he'll "never forget."


Pictured above from left to right are Maxwell Kopper, Keani Alapa, Justice Samuel Alito, Judge Richard Clifton, Jeannin Russo, and Mark Jensen.

Justice Alito and Judge Clifton also took a photo with the Hawaii Native American Law Students Association chapter.

Federal Indian Law class offered.

Ka Huli Ao Center for Excellence in Native Hawaiian Law is offering Law 520G - Federal Indian Law. The course will be taught by Hawai'i attorney and Visiting Assistant Professor of Law, Carl Christensen.

The Federal Indian Law (Law 520G) course examines constitutional constraints on the federal government's recognition of native groups in relation to pending legal challenges to benefits for Native Hawaiians and reviews recent developments and possible future trends in federal Indian law affecting Native Hawaiians.

The class allows enrolled students an opportunity to learn a very complex and unique area of law and the relevance of federal Indian law to Hawai'i. Only a limited number of Hawai'i attorneys have experience in federal Indian law and Prof. Carl Christensen is one of the few.

A fundamental understanding of federal Indian law, largely through the Federal Indian Law course, has been attributed to the William S. Richardson School of Law's Native American Moot Court Team's success in the past several years. For three straight years in a row, Hawaiʻi's Native American Moot Court team reached the final round of the National Native American Law Students Associationʻs annual moot court competition. CLICK HERE to read about this yearʻs win.

In 2007, returning Native American Moot Court team members wrote a commentary, in the Honolulu Advertiser, on the Akaka Bill and federal Indian law. CLICK HERE to read commentary.

$100,000 goes to Hawai'i Law School and the Office of Hawaiian Affairs and the Army reach a resolution?

According to a Pacific Business News article, the law firm of Starn O'Toole Marcus & Fisher will donate $100,000 to the William S. Richardson School of Law for scholarships and the school's moot court program. The article describes the moot court program as nationally-recognized. Mahalo to the law firm for its generosity.

The William S. Richardson School of Law has a variety of moot court teams. Such teams include: Client Counseling team, Criminal Law Moot Court Team, Environmental Law Moot Court Team, Hispanic Moot Court Team, Intellectual Moot Court Team, International Environmental Law Moot Court Team, Jessup International Law Moot Court Team, and the Native American Moot Court Team. Ka Huli Ao Center for Excellence in Native Hawaiian Law is closely affiliated with the Native American Moot Court Team on campus. Because of this affiliation, we would like to take the time to describe the Native American Moot Court Team. The Native American Moot Court Team has a consistent record of success in its participation at the National Native American Law Students Association's annual moot court competition. In 16 years of the competition's existence, the William S. Richardson School of Law captured First Place in the Best Overall/Best Advocates category four times. That's a total of 1/4 of the First Place Award in that category. Additionally, the team has won awards in the other two categories, Best Brief and Best Oralist for a total of 19 awards.

You can read the team's online magazine available at http://www2.hawaii.edu/~nalsa/magazine.html

Here is a short video of the team with highlights from the 2007-08 year and competition.

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The Office of Hawaiian Affairs issued a News Release, that, in part provides, "By agreement, OHA representatives, together with a neutral archaeologist and accompanied by Army representatives, will survey certain Army training areas. Through these and past surveys, OHA and Army representatives aim to ensure the appropriate identification and treatment of cultural and historic resources located in Lihu‘e, the traditional name for the Schofield Barracks region, and other parts of Hawai‘i."

The Honolulu Advertiser also has an article on the topic. The article identifies OHA's concern in noting,

"On July 22, 2006, an unexploded-ordnance removal crew bulldozed across a buffer protecting Hale'au'au heiau at Schofield, according to cultural monitors hired by the Army.

OHA also said there were other incidents involving displacement and damage of petroglyphs, the filling of a streambed known to contain Native Hawaiian sites and the construction of a road over burial grounds."