DUOG PORTEOUS
Volume 3, Issue 1, (Originally Published on Monday 4 March 2013)























​The Jessup 2013 team made it through to the semi-finals of the 54th Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition, with team member and second-year JD Doug Porteous earning
‘Best Oralist in the Australian Rounds’.
 
The Melbourne Law School team, consisting of Nicholas Boyd-Caine, Rachel Macleod, Sophie Molyneux, Doug Porteous and Shawn Rajanayagam, spent the summer preparing and arguing a case in the world’s largest mooting competition, with over 550 law schools in more than 80 countries participating.
 
 The Melbourne team went undefeated until the semi-finals, scoring second highest in the preliminary rounds.
 
The journey ended after a very close moot against the University of Sydney in the ACT Supreme Court. Sydney went on to defeat the University of Western Australia in the Grand Final, held in the
High Court before a bench presided over by the Honourable Justice J.D. Heydon.
 
 This year’s competition was beset by a large number of administrative errors, resulting in an incorrect finals draw. A number of universities were unwilling to re-run the finals, and the International Administrators eventually decided that UNSW and Murdoch University should join Sydney and UWA at the International Rounds in Washington, D.C., to be held from 31 March – 6 April 2013.
 
The Melbourne team presented an exhibition moot earlier in January 2013, presided over by the Hon. Michael Black AC QC, former Chief Justice of the Federal Court of Australia. Other members of the bench were the Hon. Justice Marcia Neave AO of the Supreme Court of Victoria Court of Appeal; the Hon. Ray Finkelstein QC, former justice of the FCA; the Hon. Bernard Bongiorno AO, former justice of the Victorian Court of Appeal; and MLS Associate Professor Margaret Young, who was also the Jessup team’s faculty adviser.
 
The exhibition moot bench were unanimous in their praise of the students’ quality of oral arguments, in addition to the quality of their written memorials.
 
This year’s problem involved two fictional states, Alfurna and Rutasia, in a dispute before the International Court of Justice and a wide array of subject matters – climate change, statehood, laws of asylum, human rights and sovereign debt.
 
The competition required the teams to make submissions on four issues, both as the applicant and as the respondent. The question revolved around whether Alfurna, which had to abandon its home islands due to climate change, could remain a state with only a restrictive lease over another island (maybe); whether the Alfurnans who arrived ‘illegally’ in Rutasian waters had a claim for prospective status in international law (no); whether their treatment by Rutasia, where many Alfurnans fled, and a proposed transfer to a third country violated international law (absolutely); and whether the seizure of Alfurna’s assets following its default on a loan was legal (nobody knows).
 
The Jessup team expressed their thanks to (the Hon.) Alex Maschmedt, a final-year JD student from last year’s Jessup team, and Professor Young, for their support, constructive criticism and insight into international law.

​Doug Porteous

Ella Simmons
Volume 3, Issue 1, (Originally Published on Monday 4 March 2013)

First-year Ella Simmons has just begun her law studies at MLS. This is her personal perspective on surviving the first few weeks.
 
In just over two weeks, the new first-year JDs have transformed from bright-eyed and unaware individuals, naïve and somewhat fearful of the intricacies of law school life, to a cohesive cohort, ever victorious in the battle against excessive reading, lack of sleep and code one word limits.
 
Or so we think.
 
Arriving at Orientation Day was a sickening throwback to the first day of school. (Is it still OK that my mum packed me lunch?) But whether by accident or administrative genius, the sardine effect resulting from attempts to pack 350 students into the foyer while we each took a name tag, gave us an opportunity to make friends and breathe a collective sigh of relief that we wouldn’t spend the next three years alone. GM15 seemed much less intimidating with a group of friends.
 
After meeting our professors and the MLS support staff, who succeeded in imparting the message that help is out there for when, not if, we needed it, we were treated to a student panel, who gave us some valuable, if sometimes contradictory, advice about study habits, working and interning, and most importantly, how much they get to see daylight. Their message was: get involved, get passionate, get into it.
 
We were also lucky enough to meet our ‘Pathfinders’ who helped us find our way to the BBQ and later to the pub, as well as to get to know our LMR group.
 
Then we were given our LMR readers, and a life of BBQs and bantering amicably about politics (ie. my Bachelor of Arts degree), came crashing down before our 542 pages of reading. But it wasn’t that bad.
 
Our LMR teachers were inspiring and genuinely helpful, and somehow after two weeks I do feel like a have a solid grip on the basics, and I’m ready for more!
 
I also feel like I’m part of a group of dedicated students who will help each other through the hard times. We’ve already been out for drinks, gone salsa dancing and trivia night is coming up.
 
If nothing else, the past few weeks have taught us the importance of friendship in keeping your sanity, and that I also have a crush ... on Justice Kirby.
 
Ella Simmons