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Is Ken Starr Supreme Court Justices' "employer"?
March 27, 2007 by Ross Runkel at LawMemo
High Court Advocate Ken Starr Is Justices' Summer Employer is the headline for Tony Mauro's commentary at today's Legal Times.
An interesting story. Ken Starr wears three hats:
- Dean of the Pepperdine Law School in Malibu, California
- Of Counsel at the Kirlkand & Ellis law firm
- Advocate for one of the parties in a pending Supreme Court case. Not just any case. This is Morse v. Frederick, in which a high school principal suspended a kid for unfurling a "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" banner at a parade.
Two Justices - Scalia and Alito - will be employed by Pepperdine Law School this summer to teach in a couple of summer programs.
At the Supreme Court Times blog I've raised the question of a conflict of interests.
Here I want to explore whether it is accurate to say that Starr will be the Justices' "employer."
Most lawyers will insist that the answer is no, a law school dean is not the "employer" of the law school's faculty members. The school is the employer of both the dean and the faculty members. It's probably more accurate to say that Starr will be the Justices' supervisor or manager. (Of course, for purposes of analyzing a conflict of interests, that simply shifts the question.)
Under California law, however, a supervisor can be individually liable for certain violations of California's Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA). Jones v. Lodge at Torrey Pines (California Ct App 02/05/2007).
So Starr will not be in what I would call a traditional "employer" role. Yet he will be in a role which is not exactly "co-employee."
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