Jurisprudence and Legal Theory

In a new book, the former Supreme Court justice and current Harvard Law School professor champions his pragmatic approach to statutory and constitutional interpretation against the forces of textualism and originalism

Harvard Law expert Timothy Edgar outlines the arguments in Murthy v. Missouri and urges the Supreme Court to be guided by famous founder Benjamin Franklin.

Harvard Law experts Martha Minow and Rosalie Abella argue that predictive algorithms and AI could amp up and amplify existing inequities.

On Nov. 1, Stephen Sachs celebrated his appointment as the inaugural Antonin Scalia Professor of Law with a lecture titled “Life After Erie.”

Benjamin Eidelson, a leading legal theorist with a body of work that spans the central areas of public law, has been named a professor of law at Harvard Law School.

Oren Tamir, a post-doctoral fellow, says that many of the critiques of the major questions doctrine tend to miss the mark — and that, with some changes, the doctrine could be fixed in ways that would make it a valuable contribution for our law and democracy.

At Harvard Law’s Scalia Lecture, William Baude argues that in some cases, textualists must consider unwritten law to arrive at the correct interpretation.

Harvard Law’s John Palfrey says that lawsuits against Google and Twitter might be among ‘the most consequential Supreme Court cases related to the internet in the technology’s history.’

On the occasion of her appointment as the Peter B. Monroe and Mary J. Monroe Professor of Law, Daphna Renan puts forth an argument for 'a more political constitutionalism.'

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.’

At Harvard Law’s Rappaport Forum, panelists debated the Supreme Court's reliance on history and tradition in recent decisions in Dobbs and Bruen.

In the third of a yearlong lecture series examining “The Supreme Court in a Constitutional Democracy," panelists debate reforming the Court.

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.

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.

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.

Ketanji Brown Jackson ’96 becomes the first Black woman to serve on the Court

In his book “The Authority of the Court and the Peril of Politics,” Justice Stephen Breyer explored how the Court can continue to maintain its vital role as a check on the rest of the government.

The Harvard Law School Library has announced the public release of the first batch of papers and other items from the Antonin Scalia Collection. His papers were donated by the Scalia family following the influential justice's death in 2016.