Princeton President Shirley Tilghman announced this morning that her glorious university will relinquish one-half of one percent of its endowment ($100 million) to settle a six-year-old lawsuit with a clan of grocery store magnates. In 1961, the Robertson family gave $35 million to found the Woodrow Wilson School for Public and International Affairs; as of June 2008, the Robertsons' endowment had expanded to $900 million (score one for the i-bankers!) and the students at the prestigious Woody Woo were using their fancy educations to get jobs in lucrative areas like finance (score two for the i-bankers!) instead of piddling work in the public sector (sad pandas for the Robertsons). So the Robertsons sued Princeton for blowing their wad on a bunch of greedy little prigs, and Princeton was all, "Not our fault if President Bush sucks and government jobs are thankless and painful," and both sides spent tens of millions repeating those two messages for 76 months.

Tilghman outlined the specifics of the settlement in an extraordinarily long email (which we provide in full after the jump) but all that really matters is this part:

It is tragic that this lawsuit required the expenditure of tens of millions of dollars in legal fees that could have and should have been spent on educational and charitable purposes.

Lady, "tragic" is when someone dies. Spending a few million dollars to safeguard your hoard of billions is by definition the passionless pursuit of institutional self-interest. Note that "charitable purposes" refers to a charity the Robertsons fund, which is where the contested money will now go; as in, if Princeton had its way, none of the money would be going to charity, but to the upwardly mobile neophytes of the Woodrow Wilson School. Basically, this entire story is about i-banking, which is also why June's $900 million is only worth $600 million now, and why future WWS students may actually end up in public sector jobs. Not because the Robertsons sued, not because Shirley is feeling charitable, but because all the awesome money-filled jobs have disappeared into thin air. Also, this.

Moral of the story: Losing money makes people more charitable.

After the jump: Shirley Tilghman's email bidding adieu to some money, but keeping a lot more, and some gently menacing words from the Robertsons.

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Columbia has moved to dismiss hometown favorite anti-feminist Roy Den Hollander's class action lawsuit against the school. The University brings the snark in its filing, stating from that start that Hollander's claim "reads like a parody" and culminating in a section entitled "All of Hollander's Claims Fail Because He Does Not Allege Actionable Discrimination." Not only is Hollander more or less nuts, it seems that there's really no legal basis for his lawsuit.

For readers in need of a quick briefer, Hollander asserts that the women's studies department both "discriminates against male students and male alumni" and "violates the First Amendment establishment clause concerning religion." How? Unclear! But the motion is a nice rundown.

Firstly, Hollander insists that if Columbia is allowed to keep its feminist indoctrination program, it must create an equivalent men's studies curriculum, "a field he does not define and does not even claim exists as a coherent scholarly discipline." Furthermore, although Hollander did graduate from the Business School, he is no longer at the University, so it's tough to prove that he has any direct claim to damages:

To begin with, he is not a Columbia student and he has never taken, or attempted to take, a women’s studies course, let alone been the victim of any discriminatory conduct in such a class. Read the rest of this entry »

And by "chastity oath," we mean "becoming a co-defendant in his Title IX lawsuit against Columbia's Women Studies department and never get invited to another pillow fight at Barnard. Ever." Caught circulating CU's "Noble Freedom Warrior" Libertarian email list:

From: Roy Den Hollander

Date: Oct 24, 2008 11:58 AM

Subject: [CCL] Columbia Lawsuit

To: [redacted]@columbia.edu

Dear Libertarians,

I'm a graduate of the Columbia Business School and a lawyer who is currently suing Columbia University because its Women's Studies program discriminates against male students and male alumni and violates the First Amendment establishment clause concerning religion.

The case is a class action lawsuit, and I am currently looking for Columbia students or organizations to join as plaintiffs. All expenses are being picked up by the MR Legal Fund.

I can be contacted at [redacted]@yahoo.com or (917) [redacted].

Thanks

Roy

Over on the Philolexian Society's list, they're replying to Roy with chicks-with-dicks porn. But to discuss the impressive girth of Philo's collective silicone phallus is to beg the question: MR (that's misogynspeak for "Men's Rights") Legal Fund exists? And... has money?

Roy Den Hollander -- Columbia B-school grad and self-described "anti-feminist" -- took aim this week at his alma mater's Institute for Research on Women and Gender. In a lawsuit charging sexual discrimination, Hollander calls the institute "a bastion of bigotry against men." Using Title IX as an "analogy," Hollander adds the Columbia suit to a growing stable of "Men's Rights" crusades, including a lawsuit protesting Ladies' Nights at bars, and another against VAWA, the Violence Against Women Act.

In an hour-long phone interview, Hollander waxes poetic on physical desire, his background as a draft-dodger, and the best places in New York for middle-aged dudes seeking jail-bait booty (dance class). As for Women's Studies at CU:

The whole program is about benefiting females and teaching that guys are evil and that guys are responsible for all the world's evils.

He also told me about his "Russian mafia prostitute stripper" "mistress to a Chechen warlord" ex-wife, and how she used VAWA to persecute him and/or attain US citizenship.

Roy is surprisingly interesting for a guy who spends 90% of his waking life plotting the destruction of feminism, and the other 10% trying to get laid. Our epic conversation, after the jump.

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When child art prodigy Annabel Osberg told the television last week that she was going to take Yale to court for kicking her out of its MFA program, few believed her. Hopefully, this will be the last time anyone underestimates the young painting whiz, who has found a lawyer and politely informed everyone that she is quite serious about this whole suing thing.

In the recently filed lawsuit, a copy of which has been provided by her lawyer here, Osberg reveals a few details of how she got the boot, but nothing yet that offers an explanation to this mystery.

On or about July 7, 2008, the defendant locked the plaintiff out of the studio she was renting from the defendant and thereafter locked her out of the residence she was renting from the defendant ... As a result, the plaintiff has suffered ascertainable economic losses and emotional distress.

Rough, but last I heard, schools don't usually make a habit of locking students out of their rooms just to be a bitch. Osberg wants $15,000 (about 0.00006% of Yale's endowment) and to be re-admitted into the program, but that looks doubtful. Any Yale MFAs still reading IvyGate these days? Send us the full version of this story.