Valpo Law: Overview

Today's post is an overview of the three coming posts addressing the closing of Valparaiso Law School (Valpo Law).

Full disclosure I am currently pursuing a federal lawsuit against, and this is confusing, The Lutheran University Association, Inc. dba Valparaiso University and Law School. I have also named Valpo President, Dr. Mark A. Heckler as well as his daughter, Susanne Heckler Johnson, one of a number of Valpo Law grads, the others being Indiana judges that previously decided another case I was party to. As if that isn't enough reason to dismiss everything I have to say about Valpo, both the judge and magistrate over the federal case are Valpo Law grads. So my opinion might surprise you...

The closing of Valpo Law School is a major injustice...

...but not primarily the small injustice to graduates and employees of Valpo Law, but a BIG injustice that will certainly compromise the ability of society's most helpless and indigent to receive due process, likely for generations.


Post #1: Injustice digs into Valpo Law's history of fighting for justice and civil rights and acting as a counterbalance to overdone American capitalism given that the war of blue vs. white collar has had key battlegrounds in neighboring Gary, and nearby, economically conjoined Detroit. And how the now absence of Valpo Law leaves a growing vortex that will almost certainly grow to the point of pulling in even many who are celebrating their recent victory.

Post #2: Doomed to Fail shows that while Valpo Law was fighting for the disadvantaged (and winning), and worse, educating women and minorities before they could legally vote, elitists refocused on the long game. Historically, the voluminous, burdensome, and pointless pomp, even Latin based language of the justice system ensured an advantage to those more sophisticated members of society, or those who could afford representation by one well versed in justice's vain ritual. Swinging the courts back to advantaging aristocrats meant outflanking by targeting breeding grounds for capable advocates.

Post #3: Final Straw dives into developments over the past few years and decisions by Valpo Law leadership that did not help promote survival. At the same time, there appears to have been a failure to ever recognize the actual challenges that should have led to a plan to withstand their opposition. While click-bait seeking surface commentary autopsies will focus on the most obvious and easy answers, here we will follow on the prior post to decisions that appear to have focused on treating symptoms instead of curing the patient. Sure, Valpo Law was going to close anyway. But they could have gone down in flames while fulfilling their mission of justice, warning the entire judicial system, even the nation, of much needed reform. Years from now, even the one-percenters will wish that had happened.