Influential legal commentator and law professor Jeffrey
Rosen will examine the John Roberts'
led Supreme Court at Johns Hopkins' 2007 Constitutional
Forum, a discussion of important legal issues
held in conjunction with the annual observance of
Constitution Day.
In addition, the university will host a colloquium at
which Joel Grossman, professor of political
science, will be the speaker and moderator for a discussion
titled "How Supreme Court Justices Are
Selected — and How Should They Be?"
Rosen's talk — "Is the Roberts Court on a
Collision Course With America?" — will take place at 8
p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 18, in 110 Hodson Hall on the
Homewood campus. The colloquium will be held the
previous day, at 3 p.m. on Monday, in 210 Hodson Hall.
Rosen has been legal affairs editor of The New Republic
since 1992. A professor at the George
Washington University Law School, he specializes in
constitutional law, criminal procedure, privacy
issues and privacy in cyberspace. His latest book is The
Supreme Court: The Personalities and Rivalries
That Defined America, the companion book to the PBS
series on the Supreme Court.
In addition to his other books, The Most Democratic
Branch, The Naked Crowd and The
Unwanted Gaze, Rosen has written numerous essays and
commentaries for The New York Times
Magazine, The Atlantic Monthly, National Public Radio
and The New Yorker, where he has been a staff
writer. The Chicago Tribune named him one of the 10
best magazine journalists in America, and The
Los Angeles Times called him "the nation's most widely read
and influential legal commentator."
Rosen is often sought for his expertise by shows like
The PBS NewsHour with Jim Lehrer and
Charlie Rose, among others. He is a graduate of Harvard
College, Oxford University, where he was a
Marshall Scholar, and Yale Law School.
At the colloquium on Monday, students, faculty, staff
and the general public are invited to listen
and participate in the discussion about various proposals
for altering the way Supreme Court justices
are selected, including the imposition of term limits and
qualifications for holding that office.
The 2007 Constitutional Forum is supported by the
George Huntington Williams Memorial
Lectureship, established to honor Williams, a pioneer in the
microscopic study of rocks and minerals.
He was the university's first professor of petrology and in
the late 1880s founded what was then
called the Department of Geology (now
Earth and Planetary
Sciences). In 1917, Williams' family
created an endowment in his memory for lectures by
distinguished public figures on topics of
widespread contemporary interest. Past speakers include
Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Russian
President Boris Yeltsin.
Sponsors of the 2007 Constitutional Forum at Johns
Hopkins are the Department of Political
Science, the Institute for Policy
Studies and the Office of Government, Community and
Public
Affairs.
The events will celebrate Constitution Day, officially
Sept. 17, the date in 1787 when delegates
convened for the final time to sign the U.S. Constitution.
Additional information about Constitution
Day can be found on the Web site of the National Archives,
www.archives.gov.
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