By Bill Williams, CounterPunch, 2 July 2007
Over the last few weeks, as I have thought hard about how the Finkelstein and Larudee tenure denials went down the way they did, I repeatedly stumble upon a troubling, but perhaps plausible, scenario. Imagine the following phone conversation between the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard, Alan Dershowitz, and John Simon, the Chair of DePaul’s Board of Trustees:
Alan Dershowitz: “Is this Finkelstein tenure denial really going to go down without a hitch? There’s a lot riding on this.”
John Simon: “We’ll take care of it Alan. No need to worry. The players are in place. It’s a lock. You have my personal assurance.”
Alan Dershowitz: “Thanks, John.”
In May 2004, a mere one month before fifty Jenner and Block attorneys attended a Jewish United Fund/Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago Lawyer’s Division dinner in Chicago, where Alan Dershowitz delivered the keynote address on “The Case for Israel,” John Simon, a Jenner and Block partner, was elected Chair of DePaul’s Board of Trustees. In October 2004, he assumed the position of chair of the Board of Trustees after having served as a Trustee since 1990.
You read that correctly: one month before Dershowitz made the case for Israel in front of the Chicago JUF and the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago Lawyer’s Division, with fifty Jenner and Block attorneys in attendance, John Simon became chair of DePaul’s Board of Trustees. Three months after Dershowitz makes the case for Israel before fifty Jenner and Block attorneys and 2500 die-hard supporters of Israel at a JUF fundraiser, John Simon officially began his stint as chair of DePaul’s Board of Trustees. (See p. 28 and this video). Simon received the ORT Jurisprudence Award in 1999. A little digging allowed me to learn that:
ORT (was created in 1880 by Russian Jews who established new colonies and agricultural schools and model farms to help newly displaced Russian Jews adapt to an agricultural existence. Known as the ‘Obschestvo Remeslenovo i. Zemledelcheskovo Trouda,’ which translates into the ‘Society for Trades and Agricultural Labor,’ ORT has developed into an international non-governmental educator that has had schools and programs in 88 countries throughout the world and that helps to educate 300,000 students each year. Today, ORT is a world leader in technological and general education, teaching the skills necessary for success in today’s world. (See press release)
Was John Simon in attendance at Dershowitz’s talk before the Jewish United Fund and the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago Lawyer’s Division? Are Simon and Dershowitz acquaintances? Friends? Was John Simon elected chair of DePaul’s Board of Trustees to take care of Norman Finkelstein’s tenure case, as a favor to Alan Dershowitz? Who knows? The answers to these questions are merely speculative at this point, but they are certainly worth asking. You can email John Simon at jsimon@jenner.com and ask him for some answers to these questions.