Event Archive: 2011-2012

Woodrow Wilson's heirs from the Cold War to the Arab Spring: American Schools of Thought in Democracy Promotion

Wednesday, February 29,
4:30 p.m.
Gasson 305

Justin Vaïsse is a Senior Fellow and Director of Research for the Center on the United States and Europe at the Brookings Institution and an adjunct professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. Vaïsse is an expert on American foreign policy and European affairs. He has published numerous articles and reviews in leading newspapers and magazines, such as Foreign Policy, Le Monde, The International Herald Tribune, and Le Figaro. He is the author of numerous books in both French and English, including (with Jonathan Laurence) Integrating Islam: Political and Religious Challenges in Contemporary France (Brookings Institution, 2006) and, most recently, Neoconservatism: The Biography of a Movement(Harvard, 2010).

Book panel on Gary Jacobsohn's book Constitutional Identity (Harvard 2010)

Thursday, March 15
4:30 p.m.
Devlin 101

Featuring Gary Jacobsohn, Author, H. Malcolm MacDonald Professor in Constitutional & Comparative Law, Department of Government, The University of Texas at Austin; Miguel Schor, Professor of Law, Suffolk University Law School; Mark Tushnet, William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Law, Harvard Law School; and moderator Vlad Perju, Associate Professor, Boston College Law School.

Three Years On: The Works and Progress of the Obama Administration

Wednesday, March 21
4:30 p.m.
McGuinn 121

Morton Keller is Spector Professor of History Emeritus at Brandeis University. His scholarly work focuses on American political and legal history, especially of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and a Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy. While he has spent most of his career at Brandeis, he has also taught at the University of Pennsylvania, Yale, Sussex, and Oxford. Keller has written for numerous magazines and newspapers such as The Boston Globe and The National Review. He is the author of numerous articles and books, including The Life Insurance Enterprise, 1885-1910: A Study in the Limits of Corporate Power (Harvard, 1963); Regulating a New Economy: Public Policy and Economic Change in America, 1900-1933(Harvard, 1990); (with his wife, Phyllis) Making Harvard Modern: The Rise of America's University (Oxford, 2001); and, most recently, America's Three Regimes: A New Political History (Oxford, 2007).

The Prospects for Constitution Making: Two Ancient Perspectives

Wednesday, April 25
4:30 p.m.
McGuinn 121

John J. Mulhern is a Senior Fellow at the Fels Institute of Government and Adjunct Associate Professor of Classical Studies and Government Administration at the University of Pennsylvania. He has published and taught extensively on government and politics from classical antiquity to the present, the interpretation of the Platonic dialogues, the history of logic, and the classical tradition. Mulhern also worked at the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, where he served as research editor and administrator of the Research Department; and as a consultant on issues involving government, business and economic growth. Mulhern’s many publications have appeared in Phoenix, Polis, Phronesis, and elsewhere. He has served as a special-issue editor for Defense and Security Analysis and for Arethusa and currently serves on the editorial board of the Bryn Mawr Classical Review.

Constitution Day Lecture: Beyond Belief: The Radical Significance of the Free Excercise of Religion

Thursday, September 15
4:30 p.m.
McGuinn 121

Jack Rakove is William Robertson Coe Professor of History and American Studies, professor of Political Science, and professor of Law at Stanford University.  He is one of the nation’s most respected scholars of the American Constitution. Rakove has written extensively on the origins of the American Revolution, the creation of a national polity and government between the early 1770s and 1800, the origins of the Constitution and the early history of its interpretation, and the political ideas and career of James Madison. His publications include James Madison and the Creation of the American Republic (Scott Forsman, 1990, 3rd ed. Longman, 2006), Original Meanings: Politics and Ideas in the Making of the Constitution (Alfred A. Knopf, 1996), which won the 1997 Pulitzer Prize in History, and, most recently, Revolutionaries: Inventing an American Nation (Houghton Mifflin, 2010). 

Thinking about Madison Thinking 

Friday, September 16
12 Noon
Stuart 414, Newton Campus

Jack Rakove is William Robertson Coe Professor of History and American Studies, professor of Political Science, and professor of Law at Stanford University.  He is one of the nation’s most respected scholars of the American Constitution. Rakove has written extensively on the origins of the American Revolution, the creation of a national polity and government between the early 1770s and 1800, the origins of the Constitution and the early history of its interpretation, and the political ideas and career of James Madison. His publications include James Madison and the Creation of the American Republic (Scott Forsman, 1990, 3rd ed. Longman, 2006), Original Meanings: Politics and Ideas in the Making of the Constitution (Alfred A. Knopf, 1996), which won the 1997 Pulitzer Prize in History, and, most recently, Revolutionaries: Inventing an American Nation (Houghton Mifflin, 2010). 

Kenya: Passing the Baton (Movie Screening and Discussion Panel)

Thursday, October 20, 2011
7:00 p.m.
Cushing Auditorium

Subsequent to the tragic post-election violence of 2007–2008, Kenya rebuilds its democracy with a new constitution. The panel discussion, following the film, will feature Professor John Michalczyk; Rev. Raymond Helmick, SJ; Rev. Joseph Kiarie, SJ; and Professor Ken Kersch.

Visit of the Kazakh Judges

Wednesday, October 26
Boston College

The Islamic Civilization & Societies Program and the Clough Center for the Study of Constitutional Democracy, in conjunction with Boston College Law School, the Federal Judicial Center, and the Library of Congress Open World Leadership Center, will serve as local hosts for a delegation of judges (five in number) from the Republic of Kazakhstan.

After a full schedule of events on Main Campus and at the Law School, the judges will be welcomed at a cocktail reception on Wednesday, October 26 in the newly renovated Gasson Commons. In addition to the judges from Kazakhstan, several U.S. federal judges, members of the Boston Bar Association's International Division, BC law faculty, and Clough Junior Fellows will be in attendance.

Kazakhstan is in a unique position among former Soviet republics. It has a Muslim majority population and is rich in both gas and oil. In recent years it has positioned itself strategically between Russia and China. Politically, the Kazakh judiciary has struggled to achieve independence in this dynamic economic environment, and is making serious attempts to reform its judicial system. The Kazakhstan delegation is here to study the US judicial system, and we hope the Boston bench, bar and academic communities can do much to serve as an example for the judiciary there.

Book Panel on Gerard Magliocca’s book "The Tragedy of William Jennings Bryan:  Constitutional Law and the Politics of Backlash" (Yale 2011)

Thursday, October 27
4:30 p.m.
Gasson 100

Featuring Gerard N. Magliocca, Professor of Law, Indiana University School of Law—Indianapolis; Michael Kazin, Professor of History, Georgetown University; Ken Kersch, Associate Professor of Political Science and Director of the Clough Center for Constitutional Democracy, Boston College; M. Elizabeth Sanders, Professor of Government, Cornell University.

Co-sponsored by the Political Science Department

"To no one deny or delay right or justice" - Magna Carta 1215, Imperfect constitutions, imperfect courts and the ideal of justice

Tuesday, November 15
4:30 p.m.
Gasson 100

The Honorable Margaret Marshall is the former Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, and the first woman to serve in that position. Born in South Africa, Marshall spent her college years as a student leader in that nation’s anti-apartheid movement. She moved to Boston in 1964, attended undergraduate and graduate school at Harvard University, and received her law degree from Yale University. From 1976 to 1992, Marshall practiced law in private practice in Boston. She served as the president of the Boston Bar Association from 1991-1992, and as General Counsel to Harvard University from 1992-1996. In 1996, Governor William F. Weld appointed Marshall to the Supreme Judicial Court as an Associate Justice. In 1999, she became Chief Justice, serving in that position  until her retirement  in 2010. Marshall is currently a member of the Yale Corporation, the governing board of Yale University.

Co-sponsored with the McMullen Museum, the BC Legal History Roundtable, and the Departments of History and Political Science