Success follows US internship
	Stepping up: Andrew Faulk outside the Supreme Court in Tennessee
Andrew Faulk, a final-year student in ANU's Law School last year successfully completed a legal internship in the United States, with the support of Mr Hugh Selby, coordinator of Legal internships in the Legal Workshop, Faculty of Law. Mr Faulk, a former Development Officer for ANU Rugby, spent a snowy Christmas 1996, working in the Memphis, Tennessee, offices of Baker Donelson Bearman & Caldwell, Attorneys-at-Law. Baker Donelson is one of the largest Southern legal firms with offices throughout the South and in Washington DC, and was active in support of civil rights during the 1960s and still maintains a strong tradition of pro bono work on behalf of the poor and disadvantaged. ANU's system of Legal internships requires that interns work under supervision of a senior officer within a private or public sector company and on completion of the out-posting, write a 10,000 word sub-thesis on some aspect of their work. At Baker Donelson, Mr Faulk was assigned to the supervision of African-American senior partner Alan Wade, who is running for political office this year. Mr Faulk chose to base his sub-thesis on a case of cross-border transactions, which focused on the sale of cotton by the Tennessee Cotton Corporation, a syndicate of local growers, to an Indian State authority. The transaction developed problems when the two sides disagreed on terms of the sale, and the legal systems of the two countries and different cultural practices and negotiating forms caused it to break down irretrievably, despite arbitration and the intervention by the US State Department and the Indian Foreign Ministry. The sub-thesis, after revision and editing and recommendations for similar cases which might occur in the future, was examined by the US supervisor and awarded a Distinction. "The world is growing a lot smaller and cross-border legal transactions are going to become much more common, and unfortunately, so will litigation in such negotiations, unless we understand how the other side plays the game," Mr Wade said. "It was good to have a young man of Andrew's calibre as an intern with us. We're happy that he chose Baker Donelson for his internship and I'm sure that with his knowledge of US and Australian law, he will be an asset to any international corporation." Mr Faulk is now working in the Securities section of Coopers & Lybrand, Sydney.