Themes
Faculty Scholarship
-
Retired federal judge Nancy Gertner asks whether ‘it is fair to use the criminal legal system’ to assess the actor’s responsibility.
-
‘A genuine debt ceiling crisis’?
January 23, 2023
Howell Jackson discusses what could happen if the United States defaults on its debts for the first time in history.
-
Disability in a time of climate disaster
January 19, 2023
Harvard Law’s Michael Ashley Stein is ‘calling for systemic and urgent disability inclusion’ in climate resilience planning.
-
The legal profession in 2023
January 13, 2023
Now that the champagne is long gone, the confetti has been swept up, and we are settling into 2023, Harvard Law Today wondered what changes the new year might have in store for the practice of law.
-
Andrew Mergen will lead the Emmett Environmental Law and Policy Clinic at Harvard Law
January 3, 2023
Former Department of Justice chief and appellate lawyer Andrew Mergen will join Harvard Law School as director of the Emmett Environmental Law and Policy Clinic.
-
Nicholas Stephanopoulos elected to the American Law Institute
December 16, 2022
Nicholas O. Stephanopoulos, Kirkland & Ellis Professor of Law, was elected as a member of the American Law Institute, this fall.
-
Facebook and the problem of truth
December 15, 2022
In a new podcast, Harvard Law Professors Jonathan Zittrain and Jill Lepore road-test an idea to enlist high school students across the country as “advertisement juries.”
-
‘He showed me what it meant to lead with love’
December 14, 2022
Harvard Law Clinical Professor Robert Greenwald retires after a long career securing health care access for vulnerable populations
-
On the bookshelf
December 13, 2022
This fall, Harvard Law School showcased the works of faculty, alums, and students at book events throughout the semester.
-
Laurence Tribe reflects on Larkin v. Grendel’s Den, 40 years later
December 7, 2022
In this installment of "Cases in Brief," Laurence Tribe reflects on the landmark decision involving a popular Harvard Square bar denied a liquor license by the church next door.
-
Amendments should start with states
December 6, 2022
Stephen Sachs, the Antonin Scalia Professor of Law, outlines a way to smooth the Constitutional amendment process without softening it.
-
‘In pursuit of an atmosphere in which ideas can be followed without fear that you’ll be punished’
December 6, 2022
Professors Jeannie Suk Gersen and Janet Halley lead the Academic Freedom Alliance, an organization that protects the rights of faculty to speak or publish without fear of sanction or punishment.
-
Change the Senate
November 29, 2022
Constitutional law expert Vicki Jackson argues that the disproportionate voting power of smaller states in the U.S. Senate creates a ‘significant democratic deficit.’
-
Former Canadian Supreme Court Justice Rosalie Abella on how the US approach differs — and why justice matters
November 28, 2022
Rosalie Abella, former Canadian Supreme Court justice and Harvard’s Pisar Visiting Professor of Law, believes that ‘it’s the majesty of justice’ that is ‘the law’s purpose.’
-
Enshrine an affirmative right to vote
November 21, 2022
Tomiko Brown-Nagin argues that a Constitutional amendment enshrining the right to vote would demonstrate ‘absolute commitment’ to full participation in U.S. democracy.
-
‘Falling in love with your rat’: The criminal informant system in the US
November 18, 2022
HLS Alexandra Natapoff argues in her revised book that snitching undermines justice and recommends what we should do about it.
-
‘Effectiveness in government is not something one can just assume’
November 18, 2022
In a Library book talk, Professor Vicki Jackson and panelists discuss constitutionalism, and rights to effective government
-
Why has the Supreme Court come under increased scrutiny?
November 16, 2022
In the third of a yearlong lecture series examining “The Supreme Court in a Constitutional Democracy," panelists debate reforming the Court.
-
Let’s fix how we fix the Constitution
November 14, 2022
Constitutional law expert Sanford Levinson on the ‘enduring dysfunctionality’ of Article V.
-
‘Misunderstanding how the world works’
November 9, 2022
Harvard Law Professor Mark Roe says that Wall Street short-termism has gotten a bad rap.
-
Supreme Court Preview: Brackeen v. Haaland
October 31, 2022
Harvard Law Professor Joseph Singer says the Supreme Court’s decision in Brackeen v. Haaland has the potential to upset tribal sovereignty.
-
A global beacon on climate change
October 28, 2022
This article was originally published in the Harvard Gazette. Jean Salata is a climate optimist, enough to often elicit a gentle eyeroll from his…
-
Was Antonin Scalia originally an originalist?
October 26, 2022
In remarks made as part of the biennial Vaughan Academic Program, Harvard Law Professor Adrian Vermeule argued that the late Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia began his judicial career as a champion of the administrative state.
-
Jack-o’-lanterns, haunted houses, and zombie laws
October 25, 2022
Property law expert Molly Brady tells us about the possible origin of the jack-o’-lantern, what happens if you need to sell your haunted house, and why you should add “cursed land surveyor” to your costume rotation.
-
Hurricane Ian exposes cracks in Florida’s flood insurance market
October 14, 2022
Harvard Law expert Hannah Perls explains why so many Florida homeowners lack flood insurance and what should be done about it.
-
Ogletree family donates the celebrated law professor and civil rights scholar’s papers to Harvard Law School
October 13, 2022
The Harvard Law School Library has been chosen as a steward of the papers of Charles J. Ogletree, Jr., the celebrated and influential Harvard Law professor and civil rights scholar.
-
Rebecca Tushnet explains the purpose of fair use in copyright law and how a Supreme Court decision could alter the arts in America.
-
A panel of experts at Harvard Law School examine the Supreme Court’s fidelity to past precedents in the wake of the precedent-busting term.
-
The myths and reality of common and civil law
October 5, 2022
What are the real differences between common and civil law systems? Probably not the ones lawyers typically think about, said Harvard Law School Professor Holger Spamann S.J.D. ’09 in a lecture commemorating his appointment as Lawrence R. Grove Professor of Law.
-
What are the limits of presidential power?
September 27, 2022
A panel of experts say that a seminal Supreme Court decision on the powers of the president may raise more questions than it answers.
-
Supreme Court preview: Merrill v. Milligan
September 23, 2022
Harvard Law Professor Nicholas Stephanopoulos explains how the Alabama redistricting case could affect the future of the Voting Rights Act.
-
‘Dominant power does not control everything’
September 8, 2022
Legal scholar, thought leader, and equal rights champion Catharine A. MacKinnon, 2022 recipient of the American Philosophical Society’s Henry M. Phillips Prize in Jurisprudence, discusses her teaching and the changes she has spent her career fighting for.
-
‘The odds are long … but not impossible’
July 20, 2022
Keith Fogg, clinical professor of law emeritus at Harvard Law School, says that IRS audits of two former FBI officials deserve an investigation, but he doubts tampering.
-
‘The Beyoncé of asylum law’
July 20, 2022
Clinical Professor Deborah Anker LL.M. ’84, ‘one of the architects of modern refugee law’ and founder of the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinical Program, moves to emerita status.
-
The Civil Rights Queen and Her Court
July 16, 2022
Tomiko Brown-Nagin’s book recounts the remarkable — and too little-known — life and achievements of civil rights lawyer and judge Constance Baker Motley
-
A Blast from the Past
July 15, 2022
Adrian Vermeule proposes an approach to constitutional interpretation rooted in classical legal tradition
-
Faculty Books in Brief: Summer 2022
July 2, 2022
From the Hughes Court to stock market short-termism to the U.S.'s "defend forward" cyber strategy
-
Articles by Harvard Law faculty and alumni among top ten corporate and securities articles of 2021
June 22, 2022
Articles by four Harvard Law faculty were selected in an annual poll of corporate and securities law professors as three of the ten best corporate and securities articles of 2021.
-
Watergate-era reforms 50 years later
June 8, 2022
Harvard Law Professor Jack Goldsmith says laws and norms established after President Nixon's resignation 'had a great run,' but the Trump presidency proved that new reforms are needed.
-
Highway to the danger zone
June 8, 2022
Harvard Law Professor Rebecca Tushnet discusses the copyright infringement lawsuit against 'Top Gun: Maverick.'
-
Professor Kristen Stilt, faculty director of the Animal Law & Policy Program, weighs in on the campaign by one animal rights organization to release Happy the elephant from the Bronx Zoo.
-
Professor Guy-Uriel E. Charles, the Charles Ogletree, Jr. Professor of Law at Harvard, has been elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences.
-
Inspiring change
April 22, 2022
On Earth Day, we highlight some of the work being done by Harvard Law students, scholars, clinics, and programs to address some our most pressing environmental issues.
-
Supreme Court preview: Kennedy v. Bremerton School District
April 20, 2022
The Supreme Court stands poised to decide whether a high school coach’s penchant for prayers with players poses First Amendment problems.
-
‘I’d love it if poetry was required reading for law school’
April 19, 2022
In celebration of National Poetry Month, HLS lecturer and poet Jessica Fjeld reads a passage from a poem by Terrance Hayes, and discusses the importance of poetry in building empathy and connection.
-
Current electric vehicles subsidies fail to reduce overall emissions, says Harvard Law study
April 7, 2022
Subsidies offered by the federal government for the purchase of new electric vehicles (EVs) may actually increase total greenhouse gas emissions without similar aid for secondhand buyers, concludes a new study led by Ashley Nunes, Ph.D., a fellow at Harvard Law School’s Labor and Worklife Program.
-
Cases in Brief: Powell v. Alabama with Dehlia Umunna
April 5, 2022
In the first of the series, “Cases in Brief,” Harvard Law Professor Dehlia Umunna discusses the infamous “Scottsboro Boys” case, Powell v. Alabama (1932), in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled for the first time that defendants in capital cases have the right to adequate legal counsel.