research onlin 1 hr.
reset election law group 1/2 hour.
write settlement letter 2 hours.
biling memo 0.45 hours.
basicly 4 hours so far today.
d=that's close anyway. keep that up thru february.

Embargo do not send
Discussion of legal fees.
Lodestar = hours x market rate x any ajustment factors. + costs.
Rate - $235 is my standard billing rate, and is consistant with prevailing market rates in Indianapolis and Chicago.
$100 is the lowest end of the range. The court is an expert as to prevailing rates in these markets. The named client lives in Evansville while other clients live various places in Indiana and New York, but the work was done in Indianapolis except for one day in Chicago, a bit of work in law libraries including Widener and Tulane, so the Indianapolis market is the relevant benchmark.
$185 is the hourly rate charged by the Matt Gutwein, defense attorney from Baker and Daniels in this case, according to the Star-News, for his representation of city of indianapolis officials in constitutional litigation,and therefore is the best beshmark.
Gutwein is more highly skilled lawyer generally, but here stewart is is an exert in exactly this sort of case, and in this sort of case has skills comprable to guttwein's.
Hours: 200 hours per year in 97, 98, 99, 2000, 0 in 2001, 200 in 2002, will be 200 in 2003 but waivable if settlment soon.

0 97
200 98
200 99
200 2000
0 2001
200 2002
x 2003.
====
(800 + X) ties $185 divided by uncertainty factor. we do not claim upward adjustments, but the following factors go towards no downward mitigation. no add costs. continue later. time 5:56. chat break.

rough draft of settlement letter to counsel - county and state.
Renewed setlement offer in Majors v. Abell.
Dear whoever,
AG not beth henkel, the other one
/Joe Harrison Jr.
cc: Douglas Webber
Baker & Daniels
Katherine Meeker



As you know, Judge Posner and the 7th circuit have reversed Judge McKinney's dismissal of Majors v. Abell.
Summary of letter: At this time I renew my offer to settle this case. If we can come to a reasonable figure to pay legal expenses incurred so far, factoring in that eventual recovery of a reasonable legal fee is likely but not certain, we can accomplish several mutualy desireable goals. We can get the case off our desks and be done with it. Your clients can resume, or rather continue, their unconstitutional illegal and tortious course of conduct without further interferance from me or my clients.Your clients can save the expense of the further legal fees I (and any co-counsel I bring in from this point on) would reasonably incur in arguing the case before the Indiana Supreme Court and then back to the 7th circuit.You can avoid any adverse publicity associated with the case. I have not issued any press releases about the decision in order to consult with you first.
I am willing to settle with either or both the county and state defendants, so long as you can agree amongst yourselves who pays what share, whether 50-50 or some other formula. I am not suggesting a figure in this letter, although I have one in mind.
I am exploring whether there is any interest in settlement at this point, and if there is you can suggest a figure or otherwise open negotiations. I am only seeking costs and reasonable fees, and will accept $0 in damages given the court's ruling, in the interests of furthering settlement discussions.
Body of letter:
Judge Posner found that there as no basis in law for defendants' claim that the case was moot or that some plaintiffs lacked standing. I won't call this claim frivolous, since Judge McKinney fell for it, but I have known all along that the claim was without merit, and I suspect you knew that too. I express no opinion about whether Judge McKinney's erroneous ruling was intentional.
All that has been accomplished by your motion to dismiss is years of delay and lawyer-months of unnecessary legal fees.
At the same time you are to be congratulated on winning the damages issue. While I will be filing a motion to reconsider, this issue is probably dead. The court has alowed your clients' "official immunity" to deliberately defy the rulings of the Supreme Court (in Talley McIntyre ACLF and Watchtower) and the ruling of the district court (in Stewart v Tayor) and get off scot free.
Theoretically, having failed to stablish civil liability, I could seek to press criminal charges of this ongoing unconstitutional conduct under 18 (17?) USC 241, since your clients are engaged in an ongoing conspiracy to violate the civil rights of my clients, in a manner which is a felony under federal law. But that accomplishes nothing useful for my clients, and would probably be ineffective anyway. Whether or not your firm should be considered a co-conspirator in that pattern of illegal conduct is an interesting question.
It does bring up the ethical issue that I reasonably believe your representation of your clients has been enabling an ongoing crime against my clients. The duty of a lawyer is to zealously represent and defend clients for their past crimes, but this does not extend to ongoing or planned future crimes. It is one thing to defend a client for the murder he did yesterday, something else
to zealously defend and enable the murder you know your client is planning to commit tomorrow. My thoughts on this topic come from reading Robert Kennedy's book about corruption in the teamsters union, in which he discusses the ethics of union lawyers using union funds to defend the corrupt and illegal actions of union leaders controlled by organized crime. (title?)
I wrote a letter on this topic several years ago but simply placed it in my files instead of sending it, because this is a touchy area. I feel it is important to let you know where I am coming from and clear the air a little before getting to my main point,
which is to renew my offer to settle Majors v. Abell now instead of spending more time and effort continuing to argue the case
in the 7th circuit, then on to Indiana Supreme Court, then back to the 7th circuit, with or without occasional interlocutory appeals to the US Supreme Court by either side.
There are several possible outcomes of the case at this point, hinted at in Judge Posner's decision.
The Indiana court could say that person means person, and agree with the commission's position as expressed in the brochure,
at which point it would go back to the 7th circuit and be found unconstitutional under Watchtower, at which point I would be awarded reasonable fees, both for the past 5 years of work, and the extra year or two or ten it takes us to reach that point.
The Indiana court could say that person is limited by 3-9-3-1, as argued by the commission's lawyers and Judge McKinney, at which point the 7th circuit would probably erroneously uphold the narrowly construed statute. I say erroneously because such a decision would be at odds with McIntyre, New York Times v. Sullivan, Smith v. California, and related cases. At this point I would be entitled to reasonable attorney's fees, because I would have reduced the chilling effect of the unconstitutionally vague statute and attained one of the objetives of the non-candidate plaintiffs. And I would expect you to oppose such fee request, on the basis that I would have achieved only part rather than all of the relief I sought, as you succesfully did with Judge McKinney.
A third possibility, possibly not forseen by Judge Posner, is that, ala Marbury v. Madison, the Indiana Supreme Court will point out that the question of construing the statute is moot, since either construction violates the Indiana Constitution and is therefor void, especially Section 9 of article I as interpreted in Price v. Indiana. At that point I would be entitled to reasonable attorney's fees, having prevailed in my contention that the statute, whatever it does or doesn't mean, violates the freedom of speech.
Far less likely options are that the case would be accepted for review by either the 7th circuit en banc or the Supreme Court.
Most, but not all, of these possible paths result in me being awarded fees and the state and county having to stop its current pattern of chilling speech by broadly interpreting the unconstitutional stattue. The meter is running. I am curently working hard at preparing motions for reconsideration, outlining the argument to the Indiana Supreme Court, and recruiting allies. You can end this at any time.
If the answer is a definate "no, we would prefer to continue to litigate this into the ground, squandering taxpayer money", please let me know within ten days. I do not recall having received any answer to my last such offer to settle. If we can agree on a figure, and as long as the check clears, I am happy to leave the details of the settlement agreement in your capable hands.
As is my practice, if you are interested in meeting for coffee to kick these ideas around a little, the first round of coffee is on me.
If you'd prefer a conference call any afternoon, I'll leave the details of arranging that up to you, or I am comfortable with discusions via email or chat room. I may have been remiss in not fostering good open lines of communication; I feel that any time spent trying to work things out is not time wasted, even if it ultimately fails.
I look forward to hearing from you at your convenience.
Cordially,
Robbin Stewart
3:30-5:24.

2003 5:40:50 PM | gt bear]
letters:
mom
Hi mom. Thanks for your recent letter. I will probably not be much better at letter writing this year than in past years.
Today has been a good day, running errands, bank, post office, library, plasma center. My income these days, in addition to rents and the oil lease money, comes from giving plasma twice a week, which is not as unpleasant as I expected it would be, and gives enough more income that the bills balance at the end of the month.
With the cold weather I have not been looking for work very effectively. I mostly stay in. I had one interview at a printing plant a block from my house, after filling out on application on the day that I left ofr disney, but they have not called back and probably wont.
Right now I have some work on my cases that will keep me busy for a couple of months or so. Judge Posner agreed with me that it was a mistake for judge McKinney to dismiss my case, and the case is back alive. On the other hand, he did not flat out rule that I am right, but felt that it could go either way, so the next step is that he is sending the case to the Indiana
Supreme Court for an opinion on what the heck does the statute mean anyway, before he decides whether the statute
is unconstitutional. I am both frustrated by this, because he should have ruled that the statute is unconstitutional, and excited becuase I finally get to reach the Indiana Supreme Court, which is what I was tying to do back in 1999.
I have some good arguments to the Indiana court that the statue is unconstitutional under the state constitution.
This is not the question judge Posner wants them to answer, but I think it is the real issue in the case.
Whether I win by getting the statute thrown out as unconstitutional, or win a more limited victory of having the statute narrowly construed, I feel that I have won, and am entitled to have my fees paid, but I know the state will fight that tooth and nail.
to be continued, need to run downtown.
A little later: I went downtown, mailed lindy's birthday present a month late, put joell's rent in the bank, picked up a few groceries. I am getting around by bicycle at the moment; I have been putting off car repairs; one of the guys next door said he would do it but I know he is unrealiable so it shouldn't surprise me he's done nothing. The bicycle is the only excercise i get, but i need to fix the car so I can job search in a wider area.
I passed several places I could be applying, and maybe during february I can work harder on that.
I have been spending alot of time chatting online with one small group of friends. Brian is a retired butler in a british village, sort of a modern jeeves type, and turned 67 yesterday, so I went out to kareoke night downtown for the first time since before disney to drink him a toast, and ended up drinking more than my limit, and couldn't sleep, so I slept in today. Luckily no hangover. It has warmed up enough I am able to get downtown ok. Had my pipes freeze last week but they unfroze with no problem, and I rearranged the heaters so when it was -6 a few days ago the pipes did not freeze. February is a short month and then it should warm up. One of the other guys I chat with has been helping me get organized with to do lists and committing to do two chores a day. Todays chores, not yet started, are to write down my expenses for the month
and make a list of places to apply for work. I have another list of about 10 letters to write,of which this one is the first.
I have gotten it written and I have stamps and envelopes, now I just need to get it printed. I suppose I could add fixing my printer to the to-do list; for a year i've been printing things at the library or kinkos or a friend's law office.
All for now. Oh, no not quite. I guess my majors news is that my mood has impoived a great deal this month.
I no longer feel depressed a lot. I had one bad day where I only got three hours sleep and woke with a sort of panic attack
with a clear understanding of how hopeless my situation is, but the rest of the month has been fine and I will attribute that day to the lack of sleep. The disney trip was fun and might have had soemthing to do with my improved mood. I had some hearings on January 2nd and got all my Health & Hospital cases dismissed, which has been just such a load off my shoulders that I have been able to relax and feel better. So I am gradually more able to take on chores and get stuff done,
and hope that this will be a year of getting back to my normal at-least-barely-coping self. I realize that the list of things I haven't yet done is larger than the list of what I've gotten done, but by accomplsihing a number of these small tasks I am building confidence to take on the larger ones.
OK, I will stop here for now. Wrting to you was one of my new years resolutions,and those usually fade by February,
and I do not promise that I will write again any time soon, but I have enjoyed doing so, and ought to do so, so we'll see.
Love you very much,
Robbin.


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lindy
libertarian writing network thingy guy
greyhound 1, 2, 3, 4,
rokita.
ag re majors v abell
client letters re majors v abell
column about open source candidate recruitment.
letter to mark r.
thank you letters to the people who have helped with the case.
more to dos: go thru to do log, see whats been done, not done. make summary for january.
set goals for feb.
example: cle's!!! good time to panic.
write motion for reconsideration for 7th circuit, outline brief to indiana supremes.
outline letters re properties situation.
$100 deposit at last chance.

[edit]

letters:
mom
lindy
libertarian writing network thingy guy
greyhound 1, 2, 3, 4,
rokita.
ag re majors v abell
client letters re majors v abell
column about open source candidate recruitment.
letter to mark r.
thank you letters to the people who have helped with the case.
more to dos: go thru to do log, see whats been done, not done. make summary for january.
set goals for feb.
example: cle's!!! good time to panic.
write motion for reconsideration for 7th circuit, outline brief to indiana supremes.
outline letters re properties situation.
$100 deposit at last chance.

Notes for a letter to eric raymond.

Dear Mr. Raymond,
abstract.
In another window I am reading homesteading the noosphere after finishing the cathedral and the bazaar.
I am writing to call your attention to a recent book by Cory Doctorow, down and out in the magic kingdom.
It is free online at http://www.craphound.com/down . A theme in your writing is reputation capital in the gift economy.
I have had a hard time explaining the concept of reputation capital to mundanes, and I cannot usually get them to sit down and read your essays. Down and Out is a rolicking good read, a sci-fi murder mystery, but it is primarily an exploration of extropian memes. So these days I am more likely to hand them a free copy of down and out, and if they read it I can just say "wuffie" instead of going into some long inarticulate spiel about reputation capital.
Both your book and down and out were recommended to me by wil wheaton, www.wilwheaton.net.

That was the main point of this email, and since you are busy person you may choose to stop reading here, if you have gotten this far.

You are adverse to attending or speaking at conferences, for some of the same reasons as Neal Stevenson is.
"Why i am a bad correspondent" is his essay on that. Nonetheless, I invite you to attend and speak at the 2004
Libertarian Party convention in Atlanta. You might or might not care to give a nominating speech for L Neil Smith; there is a movement to draft him for president. I am not part of that movement; just looking for a hook to lure you there. Will warn you if you show up you might be asked to run for vice-president, the prospect of which probably makes you recoil in horror.LP Cons aren't nearly as fun as worldcons, but they are a receptive audience for your ideas.
I'm currently trying to draft an essay on why my county LP should adopt bazaar methods for its candidate recruitment efforts.

A bit about me: Instead of being hacker of the coding variety, I'm a lawyer. I'm on a mission to establish legal rights for anonymous political speech on the internet. If successful, and for the most part I haven't been, this would be my contribution to the net-based gift economy. I would like to tell you more about this project, but only if you ask.

I found your writings after reading the norad story on www.milk.com. I thought "eric raymond", where do I know that name from?, and googled, and found that you are the author of catb, which I'd been meaning to read, found it, read it,
and only later visited your home page and found that we have many interests in common including the volokh conspiracy.
You may or may not know my brother bill stewart from cypherpunk circles; I only mention this because people often do, and I am able to glom onto a bit of his reputation capital.

I've gone on long enough.
Sincerely,
Robbin Stewart
arbitraryaardvark@themail.com