Professor of Law

(434) 592-5300

Education

  • J.D., Thomas M. Cooley Law School, cum laude
  • B.A., Communications and Pre-law Studies, Michigan State University

Areas of Interest/Teaching

Bankruptcy, Business Associations, Contracts, Lawyering Skills, Law Office Management, and Mergers & Acquisitions

Experience

  • Professor of Law, Liberty University School of Law
  • Partner, President, and later, Of Counsel, for the Michigan-based commercial litigation law firm of Silverman, Smith & Chalmers, P.C. in Kalamazoo, Michigan
  • Admitted to practice before all courts of the State of Michigan, United States District and Bankruptcy Courts for the Western District of Michigan, and the Sixth Circuit United States Court of Appeals

Publication Experience

  • A Design-Focused Approach to Legal Argument and the Logical Fallacy of Equivocation, 54 U. Memphis L. Rev. 375 (2024)
  • Logic, Fallacy, and the Art of Framing a Legal Issue: The Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy, 62 U. Louisville L. Rev. 133 (2023)
  • Argument’s Design: The Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc Fallacy in Legal Argument and Analysis, 89 UMKC L. Rev 279 (2020).
  • The Force of Logic: Using Formal Logic as a Tool in the Craft of Legal Argument, National Institute for Trial Advocacy (2017).
  • Leveraging Logical Form in Legal Argument: The Inherent Ambiguity in Logical Disjunction and Its Implication in Legal Argument, 40 Okla. City U. L. Rev. 551 (2015)
  • False Persuasion, Superficial Heuristics, and the Power of Logical Form to Test the Integrity of Legal Argument, 34 Pace L. Rev. 76 (2014)
  • Conventional Logic: Using the Logical Fallacy of Denying the Antecedent as a Litigation Tool, 79 Miss. L. J. 669 (2010)
  • Indispensable Logic: Using the Logical Fallacy of the Undistributed Middle as a Litigation Tool, 43 Akron L. Rev. 79 (2010)
  • Indiscernible Logic: Using the Logical Fallacies of the Illicit Major Term and the Illicit Minor Term as Litigation Tools, 47 Willamette L. Rev. 101 (2010)
  • Conspicuous Logic: Using the Logical Fallacy of Affirming the Consequent as a Litigation Tool, 14 Barry L. Rev. 1 (2010)

Biography

Rice began his private practice career with a Michigan-based commercial litigation firm. He actively litigated a wide range of disputes appearing in hundreds of legal proceedings at the trial and appellate levels including disputes involving: commercial contracts, secured and other financing transactions, franchisee-franchisor relationships, adversary proceedings in bankruptcy, intellectual property, securities fraud, breaches of professional (legal, accountancy, estate trustee, and ERISA fiduciary) standards of care, asset valuation, asset and equity purchase transactions, products liability, insurance coverage, commercial real property transfers and leasehold interests, property rights and land use regulation, wrongful employment termination, employment discrimination, employer violations of public policy, stock option disputes, workers’ compensation and disability, and various other business disputes.

While attending Cooley Law School, Rice received the Bureau of National Affairs Law Student Award recognizing him as the top-performing member of the school’s American Bar Association National Trial Competition Team. Additionally, Rice was a member of the Thomas M. Cooley Law Review and served as research assistant to Professor and Associate Dean William P. Weiner.

Rice currently teaches Contracts, Business Associations, and Mergers and Acquisitions.  His scholarly focus is on the design of legal argument and on how philosophies of logic help lawyers design and evaluate legal arguments.  He is the author of the book The Force of Logic: Using Formal Logic as a Tool in the Craft of Legal Argument, published by the National Institute for Trial Advocacy, as well as several law review journal articles on the topic of legal argument design.