Comments on: Strangest Law Review Story Ever

By: Steve Lubet

Steve Lubet — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 21:15:32 +0000

Back in the days of snail mail, I once wrote to a journal to withdraw a piece after I’d accepted another offer. In reply, I got a very snotty letter telling me they had no record of ever receiving my article in the first place. Of course, I had their acknowledgement letter in hand, which I copied and sent back. Then I took that journal off of my submission list for the rest of the year.

By: anon

anon — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 05:52:16 +0000

Good luck with the revised manuscript.

By: marty lederman

marty lederman — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 05:22:28 +0000

You can make the contracts hypo even more interesting by adding a dollop of IP: Did you incorporate some of their substantive edits? Could you?

By: Nate Oman

Nate Oman — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 05:03:50 +0000

anon: Delusions of grandeur, of course…

By: anon

anon — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 04:25:21 +0000

For someone who’s rocking a solid three publications outside of his law review note, I’m curious why you’d be so quick to turn down an offer, especially on one that had been rejected by everyone else to whom you’d sent it.

By: Matt Lister

Matt Lister — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 03:34:16 +0000

I had a somewhat similar experience with the very first philosophy conference I submitted a paper to- the Mid-South Philosophy Conference which takes place in Memphis every year. It’s a fun conference that gave me a chance as a completely unknown grad student, so I don’t hold anything against them. But, since I was a first-year grad student at the time it was somewhat traumatic. I submitted my paper but heard nothing from them so assumed it had been rejected. About a week before the conference I got comments from the person who had been assigned to respond to my paper and a message saying he was looking forward to our session. That was the first I’d head about it at all. I decided to go ahead and go even though the conference hotel was by this time sold out. Later I was told that people were annoyed that I didn’t show up to comment on someone else’s paper that I had been, apparently, assigned to. I’d not volunteered to do that, and even if I’d found out about it I couldn’t have done it since I’d never been sent the paper. It was quite a screw-up, but the conference in general was still fun and I went again the next year, and now whenever there is a screw-up at some conference I’m in I can just think, “well, at least it’s not as bad as the Mid-South all those years ago.”

By: Dr. Weevil

Dr. Weevil — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 01:06:00 +0000

It’s a whole different field, but I once had an article on Greek tragedy forthcoming in two different journals simultaneously. I thought it had been rejected by the first one I sent it to, since the editor wrote something (in Italian) along the lines of “I would not recommend publishing this article”. I naturally assumed was a rejection, and submitted it to a second journal, but he sent it on to his staff to be typeset. It was quite embarrassing when I received the proofs to correct and had to tell him to cancel it, because it had since been accepted by the second journal.

By: Eric Goldman

Eric Goldman — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 00:26:50 +0000

At least you got an offer on your article! Eric.

By: TJ

TJ — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 23:33:21 +0000

Agreed, change the hypothetical to a journal with an exclusive submission policy, and there will be even more issues to discuss.

By: Bruce Boyden

Bruce Boyden — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 23:27:44 +0000

Wow, what a great contracts hypothetical — with just a little tinkering with the facts you can get a lot of mileage out of this one. Promissory estoppel, advertisements and offers, acceptance by performance, acceptance by silence, consideration — it’s all in there. I was constantly selling my car in class, but that was a good which was an awkward fit with the Restatement.