UC Hastings Students Sweep CA Supreme Court Historical Society Writing Competition

The California Supreme Court Historical Society has announced the winners of its 2012 Student Writing Competition: "For the first time, students from a single school, UC Hastings College of the Law, have won all three places in the competition, notwithstanding entries from as far south as Los Angeles and as far east as Chicago."

Also for the first time, all three winning papers will be published as part of a "Student Symposium on Legal History in California" in the 2012 volume of the Society's annual journal, California Legal History.

• First place was won by Catherine Davidson for "All the Other Daisys: Roger Traynor, Recrimination, and the Demise of At-Fault Divorce" (Professor: Reuel Schiller). She receives a prize of $2,500.
• Second place was awarded to Jeremy Zeitlin for "What's Sunday All About? The Rise and Fall of California's Sunday Closing Law" (Professor: Joseph Grodin).
• The third place winner is David Willhoite for "The Story of the California Agricultural Labor Relations Act: How Cesar Chavez Won the Best Labor Law in the Country and Lost the Union" (Professor: Reuel Schiller).

The three distinguished judges, all of whom are American legal historians, were: Charles J. McClain, Robert F. Williams, and the American Bar Foundation's Victoria Saker Woeste.

"Catey, Jeremy, and David's impressive achievement comes as no surprise to those of us who have had the pleasure of working with them over the last few years," says Professor Schiller. "Each one of them possesses extraordinary research skills, lucid writing styles, and a deep, abiding interest in the interaction of law and American history. Teaching such students is one of the many things that makes being a faculty member at UC Hastings such a delight."

The three papers will be posted on the Society's website with the announcement of the results of the competition (www.cschs.org).