Michael Domino has an intriguing post at PrawfsBlawg about what makes a textbook "student friendly." As he notes, the phrase is probably used to signal that the cases are heavily edited, that the notes consist mostly of answers rather than questions, and the book produce the illusion that the law is written down in well-understood books, knowledge of which will fill the eager student with all he needs to know of the Corpus Juris (like my well-intentioned but failed plan to read the entirety of the U.S. Code).

As a student, I will throw my lot in-- I find heavily edited cases basically worthless, and usually end up reading the whole thing if the case is of any interest. I also like extraneous information, citations, and aside, but dislike truly stupid questions. In practice, this means I usually like the red-covered textbooks: Brest, Balkin, Levinson, Amar, Siegel for Con Law, Ellickson & Been for Land Use (to name the only two textbooks that I consult seriously now that class is over).

Of course, my experience may be idiocyncratic: and in any case I wouldn't say that the books that I like are "friendly," particularly-- they are odd, digressive, and challenging but fundamentally quite smart. Which more or less covers what I want in a professor, too.

Apparently O.J. Simpson will soon hypothetically confess to the murders for which he was acquitted some time ago. As David Lat points out, the wisdom of the Anti-Federalists makes this feasible, because it means that California cannot try him again. But I wonder-- is it really the case that the Double Jeopardy Clause means that O.J. will get off scot-free? Given the lamentable swell of federal criminal law, I assume that his alleged actions probably violated some federal statute. Presumably a motivated D.O.J. could still haul him in.

Can the President of the United States order the Texas courts to ignore a state procedural statute because it is disfavored by an international court? The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals says of course not. The Supremacy Clause allows the Constitution, federal statutes, and treaties to displace state law. A letter sent from the President to his Attorney General is none of these things. Q.E.D. [ Link via How Appealing.]

The Supreme Court heard this case once, before backing out. They may hear it again.

I realized at some point before I started my clerkship last year that both my clerkship and my current job are "business formal." That is, they require suits. And the law student's One Suit wasn't going to cut it any longer.

So I decided to buy some clothes. And I didn't want to buy junk. It would have to be replaced sooner rather than later. And cost me time besides. In fact, my theory with most things is to buy things of high quality. I've been burned on the cheap stuff one too many a time.

The question, then, was how to collect clothes of that sort without any money, and with a mountain of debt. I reacted in the way I always do to questions like this - I researched. What I'm hoping to do in the next couple of days is outline some of my results. If it's useful to anyone in the same position, then I think I'll have done them a good turn.

Part I: Shirts:

Shirts are probably my favorite part of this whole thing, because they're cheap enough to make the occasional mistake on, and are so pivotal to the work outfit. After all - even in business formal offices like mine, you're not often actually wearing your suit jacket. And as to shirts, the top of the market is very clearly defined. The best shirts are hand made on Jermyn Street (a literal street in London where the shirtmakers used to, and to some extent still, hang out), to your size, out of a big piece of cloth. The next best are the commercially hand made ready to wear products of Turnbull & Asser. But Turnbull, aside from having a completely intimidating store here in New York*, and refusing to sell online, sells its shirts for $250. The top end Italian shirts, which I don't like as much, are even more expensive. $375 for a ready made shirt? Why?

So what to do?

Thankfully, there are a bevy of high quality shirtmakers who do sell online. If you're like most people, the one you might have heard of is the super-aggressive Charles Tyrwhitt, which makes wonderful shirts for about $160 at the very highest end, and $99 usually. But the secret with Tyrwhitt is that you ought never pay full price. There's always some "unprededented" sale around the corner, and the clearance section of the website is well stocked. $55-$70, depending on quality, is the most anyone should pay for even Tyrwhitt's Sea Island (a kind of top notch cotton) shirts. But even if you decide not to go with Tyrwhitt, their catalogue is a great resource for the average fashion blind guy. Don't know what kind of tie goes with that blue stripey shirt? Just flip open the catalogue for some precedent. Can't figure out how a twill shirt differs from poplin? Tyrwhitt has a glossary for you.

My favorite shirts, however, are made by Coles shirtmakers . They fit me a little better, and they have the 15"/34" size that I need, without having to pay an extra $10 to get the 15"/35" shortened as at Trywhitt. And, if you're clever and have found Jermyn Shirts.com's clearance section, you can get quickly delivered shirts from Coles, with a free sterling silver/enamel cufflink, for about $70. Sure, it's expensive compared to the Van Husen you can pick up at Marshalls for $12.99. But my shirts from Coles are still perfect after dozens of washes and cleaning, and they go beautifully with my suits. I'd rather have one shirt from Coles rather than three from somewhere else.

The one worry here is that more and more people are making shirts in China now, and those shirts ares simply not as good. The place to get information on whether what you're getting is good, and for other recommendations (such as the much ballyhooed shirts of T.M. Lewin, which I happen not to like as much as Coles), check out the forums at the awesomely anachronistic Ask Andy About Clothes, a site I'll be returning to in subsequent posts.

* I was at the Turnbull & Asser store on Saturday. First, I couldn't figure out if it was open or not. Then I couldn't find the door. And then I was totally ignored, even though I might well have bought a shirt. Eh.