Harvard Law School Dean Martha Minow joined 68 other law school deans from around the country in a letter endorsing the nomination of Elena Kagan ’86 to a seat on the United States Supreme Court. The letter, which was addressed to the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, was distributed widely on Tuesday, June 15.
“Elena Kagan excels along all relevant dimensions desired in a Supreme Court Justice,” the letter states (PDF). “Her knowledge of law and skills in legal analysis are first-rate. Her writings in constitutional and administrative law are highly respected and widely cited. She is an incisive and astute analyst of law, with a deep understanding of both doctrine and policy. In terms of intelligence and intellectual ability, she is superbly qualified to sit on the United States Supreme Court.”
Signed by Stanford Law School Dean Larry Kramer, the letter also includes the signatures of the deans of more than one-third of the nation’s law schools. Some of those deans are, the letter says, personal friends of Kagan’s. A number of conservative deans also signed onto the letter, including Dean Joseph Kearney of the Marquette University Law School.
Minow and two other deans – Kearney and Evan H. Caminker of the University of Michigan Law School – joined in a conference call with reporters organized by the White House on Tuesday afternoon to speak about their support of Kagan.