On law school success
Mr. Robert Steinbuch, have you forgotten what it takes to get through a professional program like law school? Do you no longer recall all of the "little extras" that helped you succeed? I bet your extras included being mentored by someone who understood your needs (and probably looked like you), being accepted to externships where you were guided by someone who understood your needs (and probably looked like you), and study groups with classmates who were influenced by their lawyer parents (and who probably all looked like you).
There are a couple of questions that your research into law school success apparently has failed to answer. First, has affirmative action increased the number of competent lawyers from minority groups compared to the years before affirmative action? Second, how many of the aforementioned extras are available to those who aren't succeeding in law school? A foot in the door helps, but every law student, just like you, needs the extras to succeed.
The major unrecognized irony of your column is how truly limited your understanding of government-sanctioned discrimination seems to be.
JOAN SIMON
Little Rock
Waiting for control
Why does it seem we have so many crooked people in Congress? The parties in the House and the Senate both seem to wait until they have the power of control to get things accomplished that should be accomplished every day, regardless of what party they are in. The Republicans feel they must have control to investigate Joe Biden's son. If anybody in government needs to be investigated for a possibly criminal act, then see that it gets accomplished; the same holds true for Republicans and Democrats. Having to wait for one political party proves someone is thought to be dishonest, because the other party waits till it has the power before it does anything.
If there is suspicion the law has been violated, then investigate, and if evidence is found, file the charges. No one is supposed to be above the law, regardless of who they are.
ROBERT MAYNARD
Hot Springs
Guard victims' rights
Another election season has come and gone. A voice which has yet to be heard in the form of a ballot initiative is that of a constitutional amendment for victims' rights.
Victims/survivors deserve to have enforceable victims' rights. Victims deserve to have their rights protected no less vigorously than a defendant's. No one is asking for defendants to have "less" protection. Thirty-five other states have state constitutional amendments providing victims' rights that have standing. In good ol' Arkansas terms, standing means " a dog in the hunt."
Victims are often treated as a piece of evidence or a witness whose credibility gets to be questioned with little to no protections on how far those questions may reach. Victims are often the people unofficially "put on trial" since the rights to respect, dignity, and privacy lack constitutional enforcement. Many victims have lost their loved one(s) forever and many victims have lost their physical, financial, social, emotional, and spiritual lives as they knew them before the crime.
In the decade since being "victimized," I have spent eight of those years voluntarily helping victims of crime. I need help. The victims of our state deserve to have their fellow citizens step forward by collecting signatures for a ballot initiative providing enforceable victims' rights, or emailing their legislator asking for a ballot initiative providing enforceable victims' rights.
Christmas season of 2019, I was on the phone with a dad whose son's murder case never reached a trial due to the right to speedy trial being violated. Victims deserve the right to a speedy trial. May we all gather together to ask our elected officials and ourselves when the victims of Arkansas will deserve to have a "dog in the hunt" and be treated legally with respect and dignity.
LAURA ABBOTT
Cabot