“Nature’s Trust: Environmental Law for a New Ecological Age” will be the topic of a lecture Thursday, Oct. 9, at noon in the Law Center McQuade Law Auditorium.

Mary Wood, the Philip H. Knight Professor of Law and faculty director of the Environmental and Natural Resources Law Program at the University of Oregon School of Law, will be the speaker.

She will introduce her new book, Nature’s Trust, which provides a strategy to protect the Earth endowment as the just inheritance for all citizens, those living and those to come.

The Earth faces extraordinary damage, Wood posits in her book, as it enters a new ecological age brought about by climate change. Humanity needs to protect the remaining resources essential to its survival. Yet instead of using environmental law to protect nature, regulatory agencies around the world use the law to permit corporations and industries to inflict further damage to priceless resources. This imperils the future.

Wood will argue for a fiduciary obligation to safeguard ecology on the part of government. She describes an ancient yet enduring principle known as the public trust doctrine that designates government officials as trustees of public resources. Such officials remain charged with the legal obligation to protect and restore natural wealth belonging to citizens.

She has published extensively on climate crises, natural resources and native law issues. Wood originated the approach called atmospheric trust litigation to hold governments worldwide accountable for reducing carbon pollution within their jurisdictions, and her research is being used in cases and petitions brought on behalf of children and youth throughout the United States and in other countries.

For more information on the free, public talk, go to utoledo.edu/law.

A seminar titled “Doing Business in China: A Legal and Commercial Review” will be held Friday, Oct. 3, from 8:15 a.m. to 5:15 p.m. in The University of Toledo Law Center McQuade Law Auditorium.

A full agenda and registration can be found here. Ohio CLE registration is also available here.

The UT College of Law, Regional Growth Partnership and the UT Confucius Institute are the lead sponsors for the first part of two programs.

The Confucius Institute spearheaded this seminar to educate local business people and attorneys by bringing together a distinguished panel of academics, attorneys and business leaders to discuss the realties, the myths and the risks of doing business in China.

In 2015, the focus will be on what are the issues of concern to Chinese attorneys, business leaders and their advisers relating to doing business or investing in the United States with a focus on concerns relating to northwest Ohio.

One of the goals of this year’s program is to refute myths regarding intellectual property protection in China and to provide information to begin the risk assessment of whether China represents a good strategic investment for a small- to mid-size business.
A highlight of the program will be a presentation on cross-cultural communication and negotiation for businesses and attorneys who will work with their Chinese counterparts with a discussion on how to avoid miscues and miscommunication. The panels are composed professionals with legal or commercial experience relating to business in China or academics who have taught at Chinese law schools and have scholarship related to the country.

“China is reaching major vitality as a destination for exports from the U.S. and as a location for operations covering all of Asia. It has become the third largest market for Ohio of exported manufactured goods, and exports from Ohio to China have increased by 20 percent to a current level of $3.4 billion in 2013. For the Toledo region, China is also the third largest export market with exports just in the automotive sector of some $40 million in the past year,” Paul Zito, vice president of international development at the Regional Growth Partnership, said. “Being the largest and fastest-growing market in Asia, China is also becoming very popular as a manufacturing and regional headquarters location for U.S. companies to service the Asian markets. The importance of China as a major export destination and as the center of Asia will continue to provide opportunities for Toledo region exporters and manufacturers.”

“We are very proud to have the opportunity to bring together almost all of the major players involved in doing business in China,” said Llewellyn Joseph Gibbons, UT professor of law and chair of the Board of Directors of the Confucius Institute. “Many of the previous programs in northwest Ohio discussing doing business in China resulted in lawyers talking to lawyers or business people talking to business people; however, there was little real communication between these two stakeholders, both of whom are instrumental to the success of any commercial activity.

“This seminar was designed to bring lawyers and business people in the same room to focus on their joint concerns regarding doing business in China,” Gibbons said. “The day closes with the perspectives of experienced business people who will discuss what they know now which they wished they had known before they started commercial activities in China.”

UT students are encouraged to participate.

“The University of Toledo prides itself in experiential learning. Sometimes experiential learning is getting our students out of the classroom and into the community or the workplace. Programs like this one that bring women and men from across the United States who have years of practical experience facing the issues of doing business in China allow our students who cannot experience China firsthand to learn from the experiences of others, and we hope inspire them to provide the next generation of business and legal leadership promoting the economic development of northwest Ohio,” Dr. Sammy Spann, UT assistant provost for student engagement, said. “The Center for International Studies and Programs is proud to facilitate an interdisciplinary program that brings together the College of Business and Innovation, and its centers, the College of Law, Regional Growth Partnership, and the practicing bar.”

For more information on the seminar, contact Gibbons at 419.530.4175 or llew.gibbons2@utoledo.edu.

The University of Toledo College of Law is cutting its in-state tuition from $20,579 to $17,900 for the academic year starting fall 2015. Tuition for out-of-state students next year also will drop – to $29,449.

The tuition reduction, approved unanimously by The University of Toledo Board of Trustees on Sept. 15, makes Toledo Law’s in-state tuition the lowest of any law school in Ohio, Michigan, and Indiana. Michigan residents pay Ohio in-state tuition rates by virtue of the College’s automatic Michigan Resident Scholarship Guarantee.

The tuition decrease benefits all students who are enrolled at Toledo Law in the 2015-16 academic year, whether they are new or continuing, full-time or part-time.

“We want to make legal education more affordable and accessible,” said Daniel J. Steinbock, dean of the College of Law. “Students are rightfully price-conscious, and lower tuition helps make law school a better investment. At Toledo Law, you can obtain a nationally-ranked legal education without incurring a mountain of debt.” Merit scholarships are also available for tuition, further reducing the cost of attendance.

Other recent initiatives at Toledo Law include enhanced opportunities for experiential learning during all three years and more emphasis on joint degree programs such as the JD/MBA and new JD/MD. Toledo Law last year enjoyed increases in its national rankings and its employment outcomes for recent graduates.

Total tuition and fees at Toledo Law for 2015-16 are expected to be $19,526 for Ohio and Michigan residents and $31,074 for out-of-state students. Applying to Toledo Law is free, and applications currently are being accepted online for fall 2015.

The Toledo Women Lawyers History Project, a joint effort by the Toledo Women’s Bar Association (TWBA) and The University of Toledo College of Law, seeks to discover and preserve the stories of women lawyers in the Toledo area.

A dedication and ribbon cutting ceremony will be held Thursday, Oct. 2 at 5:30 p.m. in the LaValley Law Library. Daniel Steinbock, dean of the College of Law, and Lindsay Navarre, president of the TWBA, will be on hand to unveil and discuss the project.

“The biggest transformation in the legal profession in the past century is the entry of substantial numbers of women at all levels,” said Steinbock. “We are proud to be a part of this commemoration.”

Twelve portraits depicting courageous and strong-willed women attorneys, created by Paula Mowery, an artist and College of Law graduate, will be permanently displayed on the second floor of the UT College of Law LaValley Law Library. The featured attorneys paved the way for future generations since the Ohio General Assembly first admitted women to the practice of law in Ohio in 1878.

The display will honor attorneys including Clara Millard, the first woman in Ohio to earn a law degree and to pass the Ohio Bar examination; Florence Hartman Wells, the first woman to be elected to both branches of the Ohio legislature; Alice Robie Resnick, the second woman elected to the Ohio Supreme Court and the founder of the TWBA and the Ohio Women’s Bar Association; and College of Law alumna Julia Bates, the first woman elected Lucas County Prosecutor.

Plans for the second phase of the project include a speaker series and an interactive display.

For more information, contact Judge Arlene Singer at the Sixth District Court of Appeals.

Media Coverage
The Blade (Oct. 3, 2014)

The University of Toledo Center for International Studies and Programs will present the inaugural Global Educator Award Friday, Sept. 26, at the Faculty Club in the Radisson Hotel on Health Science Campus.

The event will begin at 6:30 p.m. with a dinner, and the program will follow around 7:15 p.m.

The Global Educator Award is presented by the UT Center for International Studies and Programs to recognize individuals, institutions and organizations that promote intercultural understanding and a respect for cultural diversity through education and educational exchanges.

A committee of UT faculty and staff selected two recipients for the inaugural award:

• Gayle Morgan Schaber, a global educator who was nominated by the UT Confucius Institute for her work in bringing Chinese language and culture classes to Toledo Public Schools (TPS).

Through Schaber’s efforts, the Confucius Institute was able to expand Chinese language and cultural programming to 14 elementary schools. The agreement provides for Chinese language teachers to come from China to teach in TPS elementary schools. Through this program, Toledo elementary school students will be exposed to Chinese language and culture at the earliest stages of their formal education and will be inspired to explore the world as they mature.

She became acquainted with the UT Confucius Institute through her position with TPS and is eager to see the expansion of the Confucius Classroom Initiative from two to 14 elementary schools take effect this school year. Schaber traveled to Beijing and Hefei, People’s Republic of China, as a member of the Hanban 2012 Chinese Bridge Delegation. She retired this week after almost 20 years of service to TPS.

• Toledo Sister Cities International, which is being recognized for its International Youth Academy.

The nonprofit organization’s International Youth Academy brings students from around the world to Toledo, where they study English, experience the reality of U.S. culture, live with local families, and develop lifelong friendships. This program also enriches Toledo, as students serve as ambassadors for their countries.

Toledo Sister Cities International is a member of Sister Cities International and is dedicated to enriching the community through the spirit of international cooperation. Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush and Obama have served as honorary chair of Sister Cities International.

The Global Educator Award was initiated by Dr. Minhua Wu, interim director of the UT Office of Global Initiatives and interim director of the UT Confucius Institute as part of the Global Confucius Institute Day to honor the individuals who have assisted the institute to promote the study and appreciation of Chinese language and culture over the past five years.

The idea was adopted by Dr. Sammy Spann, UT assistant provost for student engagement, and expanded to an award to recognize all community stakeholders involved in global education. Although still sponsored by the Confucius Institute, the award is presented by the Center for International Studies and Programs to represent UT’s strong commitment to global education and its desire to honor and encourage global educators.

For more information, contact Llewellyn Gibbons, UT professor of law and chair of the UT Confucius Institute Board of Directors, at 419.530.4175 or llew.gibbons2@utoledo.edu.

Former Federal Election Commissioner Hans A. von Spakovsky will discuss “The Reality of Voter Fraud and How to Ensure Election Integrity” Monday, Sept. 29 at noon in The University of Toledo’s McQuade Law Auditorium.

The free, public lecture is a presentation in The University of Toledo College of Law’s Stranahan National Issues Forum and is sponsored by the college and its chapter of the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies.

Von Spakovsky, manager of the Election Law Reform Initiative and Senior Legal Fellow at the Heritage Foundation, says that voter fraud has plagued American elections since the founding and that it continues to do so today.

He proposes measures that states should take to deter, prevent and detect fraud without inhibiting the ability of anyone who is eligible to register and vote. The experience of states that have implemented these election reforms shows, according to van Spakovsky, that the claims made by opponents of election reform are untrue, and that maintaining the confidence of the American electorate in the election process is of vital importance.

“Hans von Spakovsky embodies a rare combination of experience and learning in the field of election fraud,” said Lee J. Strang, UT professor of law. “His time on the Federal Election Commission, his numerous books and articles, and his in-the-trenches service on local elections boards give von Spakovsky an exceptional vantage point.
“Von Spakovsky’s lecture is a perfect fit for Ohio, which faces a major election this fall.”

Von Spakovsky is co-author of Who’s Counting? How Fraudsters and Bureaucrats Put Your Vote at Risk (Encounter Books, 2012). His analysis and commentary have appeared in many publications, including The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Times, Politico and Human Events. He appears regularly on national and regional TV and radio news outlets.

Previously, von Spakovsky worked at the Justice Department providing expertise enforcing the Voting Rights Act and the Help America Vote Act of 2002. He is a former vice chair of the Fairfax County (Va.) Electoral Board and a former member of the Virginia Advisory Board to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.

A 1984 graduate of Vanderbilt University School of Law, von Spakovsky received a bachelor’s degree in 1981 from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The Stranahan National Issues Forum is made possible by an endowment from the Stranahan Foundation. The forum’s purpose is to address issues of national importance through the lens of the American legal system, and von Spakovsky joins a long list of high-profile speakers who have delivered the Stranahan Lecture at the UT College of Law.

Media Coverage
The Blade (Sept. 30, 2014)

Samuel Gross, professor of law at the University of Michigan and editor of the National Registry of Exonerations, will discuss wrongful convictions and exonerations in the United States Tuesday, Sept. 16.

The free, public lecture, “Wrongful Convictions in the U.S.: Lessons From the National Registry of Exonerations,” will start at noon in The University of Toledo Law Center McQuade Law Auditorium. It is part of the College of Law’s Distinguished Speaker Series.

In the lecture, Gross will speak to surprising findings that have been discovered through examining wrongful convictions, including the effect of eyewitness misidentification on false convictions, and the roles of DNA, prosecutors and police in exonerations.

Gross is the editor of the National Registry of Exonerations, exonerationregistry.org, a joint project of the University of Michigan Law School and the Center on Wrongful Convictions at the Northwestern University School of Law.

Launched in 2012, the registry is the most comprehensive collection of exonerations in the United States ever assembled and maintains a detailed online database of all known exonerations in the country since 1989.

“Samuel Gross is one of the nation’s leading experts on wrongful convictions and exonerations. We are delighted to have him speak on how to address these most fundamental failures of our justice system,” said Daniel J. Steinbock, dean of the UT College of Law.

Gross teaches courses on evidence, criminal procedure and wrongful criminal convictions at the University of Michigan Law School. His published work includes articles and books on evidence law, the death penalty, false convictions, racial profiling, eyewitness identification and the relationship between pretrial bargaining and trial verdicts.

As a cooperating attorney for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund Inc. in New York and the National Jury Project in California, Gross litigated a series of test cases on jury selection in capital trials and worked on the issue of racial discrimination and the death penalty.

The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to rule soon on the Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc. case, which looks at the issue of a corporation having the right to not comply with provisions of the Affordable Care Act that require it to provide contraceptive health insurance coverage for employees.

Strang

UT Professor of Law Lee J. Strang said the decision in this complex case concerning politically hot-button issues will have important implications on the free exercise of religion and how corporations operate.

“This case decides how religious people can participate in American business life,” said Strang, who specializes in constitutional law. “The tension in this case is to what extent can religious people bring their faith life and religious commitments into their business life and how that impacts others.”

The Greens, a Christian family who owns Hobby Lobby, is protesting the Health and Human Services Mandate, which they argue requires employers to go against their religious beliefs to provide health insurance with coverage of contraceptive and abortion-inducing drugs.

The Greens claim the mandate violates the First Amendment and Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which prohibits laws that substantially burden a person’s free exercise of his or her religion.

If the Supreme Court rules in favor of Hobby Lobby, Strang says it would require potential employees and customers to be more informed about potential employers and company business practices.

“America is a quilt of different belief systems and the market could accommodate non-mainstream religious beliefs, but it would be on the corporations to give notice of those beliefs and for the employees and consumers to be knowledgeable about the variety of corporations’ religious-inspired business practices,” Strang said. “For example, a consumer wishing to buy a chicken sandwich needs to know that Chick-fil-A isn’t open on Sundays. Hobby Lobby has the potential to expand the range of religiously inspired business practices like Chick-fil-A’s.”

Strang is available to talk discuss the Supreme Court case and its implications.

Media Coverage
WTOL 11 and 13 ABC (July 1, 2014)
The Blade (July 1, 2014)

Martin E. Mohler, a 1973 graduate of The University of Toledo College of Law, begins his term as president of the Ohio State Bar Association on July 1. He was elected to become the OSBA president-elect at the OSBA’s annual convention last spring.

Mohler is a partner in the Toledo firm of Shindler, Neff, Holmes, Worline and Mohler, LLP. His general practice covers both criminal and civil law.

“Marty Mohler is the third Toledo Law grad to head the OSBA,” said Daniel J. Steinbock, dean of the College of Law. “We are very proud of him and our other graduates who serve at all levels of bar association and judicial leadership.”

Mohler is a former president of the Toledo Bar Association and a life member of the Sixth Circuit Judicial Conference. He also is a fellow of the Ohio State Bar Foundation. He has been an active member of the Ohio State Bar Association, most recently having chaired the Government Affairs Committee of the OSBA Board of Governors.

Mohler has a history of service to the Toledo community. He volunteers at a local soup kitchen and serves on the Toledo Bar Association Pro Bono Board. He also chairs the Facility Governing Board for the Correctional Treatment Facility for Lucas County. In addition, he is a former member of the board of trustees of the Toledo Legal Aid Society and Advocates for Basic Legal Equality/Legal Aid of Western Ohio.

Mohler earned his bachelor’s degree from John Carroll University.

Media Coverage
The Blade (June 29, 2014)

The University of Toledo College of Law commencement ceremony on Sunday, May 11 will recognize those 125 candidates eligible for law degrees in December 2013, May 2014, and August 2014. The event begins at 1 p.m. in the Student Union Auditorium.

Rebecca House, the class valedictorian, and Joelynn Laux, the immediate past president of the Student Bar Association, will address their peers during the event.

A. Louis Denton, the president and chief executive officer of the Philadelphia investment management firm Borer Denton & Associates, Inc. and senior vice president of Petersen Investments, will deliver the commencement address.

Denton is a 1983 graduate of the College of Law. He received his A.B. in business and economics from Franklin & Marshall College. He is a member of the Pennsylvania Bar and is a past president of the Philadelphia Securities Association. He is an arbitrator with the Philadelphia Common Pleas Court and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA). He regularly speaks at Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association events, FINRA conferences, and preventative compliance meetings.

“Continuing the tradition of highlighting the variety of paths our graduates have taken to success, this year’s speaker represents one of the many professions to which our law degree opens the door,” said Daniel J. Steinbock, dean of the College of Law. “An incredibly generous alumnus, Lou Denton has not forgotten where he got started.”

Denton’s generous financial support has allowed the College of Law to create the Denton Leadership and Service Scholarships, scholarships that help the school attract outstanding students. In 2010 the UT College of Law dedicated its largest classroom in recognition of Denton’s support.

A reception at the Law Center will immediately follow the commencement ceremony.