Faculty Scholarship

Harvard Law School Professor Elizabeth Warren continues to gain support for serving as director of the newly created Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection. In a letter to the Oval Office, HLS students from the classes of 2011 and 2012 are urging the president to nominate Warren for the top spot at the bureau.            

Harvard Law School professor Charles Fried appeared on the August 19, 2010 edition of the WBUR program “Radio Boston” with his son and co-author, Gregory Fried, to discuss their new book, “Because it is Wrong: Torture, Privacy, and Presidential Power in the age of Terror.”

Benjamin Kaplan, the Royall Professor of Law Emeritus at Harvard Law School and a former justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, died August 18, 2010.

Shifts in public opinion on gay marriage could influence Justice Kennedy and the fate of same-sex marriage in the Supreme Court, writes HLS Professor Michael Klarman in an op-ed in August 15, 2010 edition of The Los Angeles Times.

Harvard Law School Dean Martha Minow wrote the post “Charter schools and integration” for the law blog 'Balkinization'.

Harvard Law School Professor Lawrence Lessig recently co-wrote an op-ed in the San Jose Mercury News on how new legislative templates by Google and Verizon threaten true net neutrality.

Harvard Law School Professor Jonathan Zittrain recently appeared on NPR’s “All Things Considered” to discuss the website Wikileaks.org, and the Pentagon’s recent attempt to stop WikiLeaks from publishing classified documents, many pertaining to the war in Afghanistan.

Harvard Law School Professor Lawrence Lessig recently spoke on NPR’s “Talk of the Nation” about a new ruling that allows Apple iPhone users to “hack” into their phones so they can choose a different carrier. Lessig, the director of the Edmond J. Safra Foundation Center for Ethics at Harvard, also discussed recent changes to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

Harvard Law School Professor Randall Kennedy recently appeared on Public Radio International’s show “The Takeaway” to discuss the 14th amendment in light of the current immigration debate.

Harvard Law School Dean Martha Minow’s op-ed, entitled “Also confirmed: Marshall’s legacy,” appeared in the August 8, 2010, edition of The Boston Globe. According to Minow, the appointment of Elena Kagan’86 to the Supreme Court serves as a reminder of Marshall’s enduring legacy and most significant contribution to American law: his successful argument of Brown v. Board of Education.

Harvard Law School Professor Jack Goldsmith recently published an op-ed in the Washington Post on the effects the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) could have on the Senate’s role in foreign policy.

President Barack Obama '91 hosted a White House reception in honor of Elena Kagan '86, who was confirmed to be the next Justice on the United States Supreme Court on August 5, 2010. The Senate confirmed the former Harvard Law School Dean and Solicitor General by a vote of 63-37. With her confirmation, Kagan becomes the 20th Harvard Law School alumnus to serve on the Court. 

Harvard Law School Professor Jonathan Zittrain recently appeared on NPR’s “On The Media” to discuss the recent decision by the Librarian of Congress that “jailbreaking” a smart phone is not in violation the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which was enacted in 1998 to prevent the unauthorized distribution of copyrighted material via new media.

Harvard Law School Lecturer on Law Bonnie Docherty '01 recently wrote a post for Reuters' "The Great Debate UK" blog, as the first international cluster bomb treaty entered into force. Docherty is also a clinical instructor in the International Human Rights Clinic at Harvard Law School and a senior researcher in the Arms Division at Human Rights Watch.

Lucian Bebchuk, Harvard Law School Professor of Law, Economics, and Finance, and Director of the Corporate Governance Program at Harvard Law School, wrote the op-ed "How to pay a banker," which appeared in the July 27 edition of Project Syndicate. It is part of his "Rules of the game" series written for the website.

In the Aug. 2 issue of New Republic online, HLS Professor Adrian Vermeule ’93 reviews two new books: “Keeping Faith with the Constitution” by Goodwin Liu, Pamela S. Karlan, and Christopher H. Schroeder and “The Living Constitution” by David Strauss. Vermeule’s latest book is Law and the Limits of Reason (Oxford University Press 2009).

In a Boston Globe op-ed, “Obama should give Warren a recess appointment,” HLS Professor Charles Fried supports an interim appointment for Elizabeth Warren to head the new Consumer Financial Protection Agency. Warren is the Leo Gottlieb Professor of Law and chair of the Congressional Oversight Panel on the Troubled Asset Relief Program. Fried served as solicitor general in the second Reagan administration and as a justice on the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts. His op-ed appeared in the July 29, 2010, edition of the Boston Globe.

One hundred sixty-two former students of Harvard Law School Professor Elizabeth Warren sent a letter to the White House on July 28, urging President Barack Obama ’91 to appoint her as director of the newly created Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection.

Harvard Law School Dean Martha Minow’s new book, “In Brown’s Wake,” which examines the legacies of Brown v. the Board of Education, was released last week by Oxford University Press. In an interview on ScotusBlog, Minow discusses the book and the reverberations of Brown in American schools.

Alex Whiting, an assistant clinical professor of law at Harvard Law School, will join the International Criminal Court (ICC) as the investigation coordinator this December. On Monday, July 26, he spoke with WBUR radio about his new post.