Election Law
Election Law Blogger Responsible for Free Ben & Jerry’s
Posted Nov 5, 2008 8:57 AM CST
By Debra Cassens Weiss
Hasen. Courtesy of Loyola.
Election law blogger Rick Hasen of Loyola Law School is taking credit for an expanded free ice cream promotion by Ben & Jerry’s.
The ice cream purveyors had originally offered free ice cream to anyone who could show they voted. Hasen pointed out on his Election Law Blog that the promotion could violate a federal law barring compensation for voting. “If I were Ben and Jerry's lawyer, I'd tell them to shut this down,” he wrote.
Instead, Ben & Jerry’s offered free ice cream to everyone on Election Day, Hasen told the National Law Journal. I'm now responsible for thousands of children and others getting free scoops on Nov. 4,” Hasen told the NLJ.
Starbucks and Krispy Kreme did the same thing, expanding their respective offers of a free coffee and a free doughnut.
The NLJ interviewed Hasen and another election law blogger, Ned Foley of Ohio State University’s law school. Foley said the busy election season “feels a little bit like being a tax attorney around April 15.” Foley’s blog is Election Law @ Moritz.
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Comments
Lauryn Slotnick
Nov 7, 2008 8:15 AM CST
Are you trying to put them out of business, Hasen? Not only were they not asking who you voted for, but all you had to do originally was TELL them that you voted, and your word was your “proof.” Thus there was nothing illegal about their original offer, and your efforts to force them to expand the offer to everyone who walked in the stores is baseless, and a crude act where businesses are being affected by a downturn in the economy as it is.
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Whoa there
Nov 7, 2008 9:02 AM CST
Goodness, Lauryn. This is a LAWYER, who offered his LEGAL opinion, on his own, personal LAW blog… I don’t see where he filed a lawsuit or otherwise sought any type of frivolous injunction or other action challenging the legality of B&J’s free ice cream offer. While I personally find the entire situation mildly ridiculous, that is neither here nor there. What is crude and baseless is your suggestion that he was somehow in the wrong for simply posting a justifiable (remember, even Rule 11 only requires a good faith basis) opinion on his blog… He didn’t force B&J to give away ice cream. For pete’s sake, they had already made the decision to do so. That they read his opinion and decided to change their course of action is a business decision. Nothing more. Nothing less.
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Lauryn
Nov 7, 2008 9:51 AM CST
According to the article, he’s “taking credit” for the expansion of the offer, so that infers that he believes his threats and/or accusations were influentional enough to scare or otherwise bully the company into changing their offer, which in turn seems to have been his purpose. Maybe the journal made that part up, but that seems unlikely.
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Back at ya.
Nov 7, 2008 10:10 AM CST
Unless the journal made it up, which, I agree, does seem unlikely, his exact words were “I’d tell them to shut this down.” That suggests that, though he is “taking credit” for the expansion of the offer, his intent was not, as you suggest in your original post, to bully a business to offer free products to all and sundry, thereby hurting their bottom line in these tough economic times. May I suggest that you find a sense of humor? :)
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Barac
Nov 7, 2008 11:44 AM CST
I wonder how much free ice cream they would have to give away if they used human breast milk…
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Another Ellen fan
Nov 7, 2008 1:29 PM CST
Did Ellen Barshevsky pick up a free donut with her boyfriend?
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SmallLaw
Nov 7, 2008 2:37 PM CST
First, I would like to say that I actually believe there is more than 1 “Ellen Barshevsky”. In fact, I JUST considered writing a post UNDER her name, but my BOYFRIEND, who was a RHOADES Scholar, talked me out of it because tonight is LASAGNA night.
Second—what about Ben & Jerry’s legal counsel> Think they had anything to do with BJ"s decision?
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CaliGirl
Nov 9, 2008 9:28 PM CST
B&J’s posting on Facebook said something to the effect of everyone gets a free scoop, but if you didn’t vote, don’t complain about the size or quality of the scoop you got. Pretty clever.
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JunoGuy
Nov 13, 2008 5:47 PM CST
Hey, how come I didn’t hear about this? There is no B&J in our town, the state capital of Alaska (you know, where we can see Russia from), so is there an equal protection or discrimination claim here?
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