… We touched the very soul
Of holding each and every life
We claimed the very source of joy ran through
It didn’t, but it seemed that way …

Bonus links for lawyers: For a brief period in 1968, as a day job while he was still David Jones, Bowie was a paralegal – essentially making photocopies – based near Lincoln’s Inn in London, at the litigation support (and now ediscovery) bureau Legastat.…

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Indoors or out, no one relaxes
In March, that month of wind and taxes,
The wind will presently disappear,
The taxes last us all the year.

“Thar She Blows“, from Versus (1949) by Ogden Nash

In England, Lady Day – the Feast of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary on 25 March – was the traditional New Year’s Day. Taxes for the year, due at the end of the year, were therefore due on 24 March. In 1752, when Chesterfield’s Act, 1750 (facsimile here) moved England from the Julian Calendar to the Gregorian Calendar (170 years after it had been promulgated), 1 January became New Year’s Day. At that stage, the two calendars differed by 11 days, so Wednesday 2 September 1752 was followed by Thursday 14 September 1752. However, although the calendar year moved, by virtue of section 6 of the Act, the tax year did not; and, as a consequence:

from 1753 until 1799, the tax year in Britain continued to operate on the Julian calendar and began on 5 April, which was the “old style” new tax year of 25 March. A 12th skipped Julian leap day in 1800 changed its start to 6 April.

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The Irish Society of Comparative Law, in conjunction with the School of Law, Trinity College, and the Institute for International Integration Studies in Trinity College Dublin, is hosting a public lecture entitled:

Data Protection and European Developments: a German View

by Professor Heinrich Wolff (pictured left), Professor for Public Law at the Europa-Universität Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder) and Visiting Fellow at the Institute for International Integration Studies in Trinity College Dublin.

The event will be chaired by Mr Paul Lambert, of Merrion Legal Solicitors and NUIG, author of Data Protection Law in Ireland (Clarus Press, 2013); and it will take place at 7pm, on Wednesday 20 March 2013, in the IIIS Seminar Room, 6th Floor Arts Building (map here), Trinity College Dublin.

The theme of this timely lecture is data protection and European developments from a German perspective; and it will be divided into parts:

– the basics of the data protection law,
– a description of European data protection and its reform, and
– an evaluation of the reform from the German perspective.

This event is free and all are very welcome to attend. Annual membership of the Irish Society for Comparative Law is available for €50.…

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Late to this, with apologies, I am told that the Irish Law Journal is still (just about) accepting submissions (email here) for its second edition. Submissions should be no more then 25,000 words in length, on any matter of law. According to its submissions page:

The Irish Law Journal strives to publish novel scholarship that will have an immediate and lasting impact on the legal community in Ireland and abroad. We invite articles from academics, professionals and students of law or related disciplines. Case comments and book reviews will also be accepted. While each issue might have articles focused on Irish law, the journal’s remit is international and we welcome submissions on all areas of the law irrespective of national boundaries.

I think that this is an excellent endeavour, adding to the range of journals available in Ireland. They largely fall into two parts: student run for student publication, and more professional or academic for professional or academic publication. The Irish Law Journal crosses this divide: it is student-run and student-edited, but seeking to publish professional and academic pieces. Not only will such a journal publish valuable new legal research, it will also help in the development of law students.…

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Two letters in the Irish Times can speak for themselves.




This is the first:

Sir, – I read that Trinity College Dublin plans to pilot a radical new approach where student interviews, personal statements and teacher references are used for college entry to law, starting in 2014, (Home News, August 21st).

While Trinity College has always enjoyed imitating the Oxbridge universities, this development should concern all citizens who value equality and indeed equality of access.

Whatever one may say about the CAO system, it is not open to the type of manipulation that I am certain will happen once the ridiculous “personal statement, teacher references, etc” are included in the entry selection process.

Clearly the thin end of the wedge, this development should be seen in the context of the introduction of the HPat exam, namely another attempt by the professional classes to reduce competition for college places for their privately schooled sons and daughters.

As Winston Churchill might have said, the CAO points systems is the worst system for college entrance, except for all the other entry systems that have been tried from time to time. Shameful. – Yours, etc,

CATHAL O’SULLIVAN,

Leinster Road, West,
Rathmines,
Dublin 6.

This is the second:

Sir, – Further to Cathal O’Sullivan’s recent letter (August 24th), I would like to reassure your readers that my colleagues and I at Trinity Law School are acutely aware of the challenges involved in attempting to formulate an alternative university entry system to the existing CAO route.

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Image: In a classroom full of pupils and their lawyers, one child responds to his teacher:

Caption: Miss Finch, my attorney has advised me that I’m not obligated to address the question of what I did on my summer vacation. Nonetheless, I would like to respond.…

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