Center for Constitutional Design

2024 Model Constitutional Convention
2024-05-23 08:00 - 2024-05-26 17:00 (America/Phoenix) | Location: Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E Taylor St, Phoenix, Arizona, 85004, United States
On May 23-26, 2024, the Center for Constitutional Design at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at ASU will host the first national student-led Model Constitutional Convention in the United States.

Convening in Phoenix, Arizona, students will propose, debate, and adopt amendments to the United States Constitution in a simulated three-day Convention. Assembling in Phoenix as state convention delegates, undergraduate and law students from across the United States will benefit from a rich learning experience focused on the process of constitutional change and reform in the United States.

The Model Convention will take place on May 23-26, 2024 at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University. ASU’s law school is located in downtown Phoenix and is housed in the new and highly modern Beus Center for Law and Society, located at 111 East Taylor Street, Phoenix AZ, 85004. Student delegates will stay at the Sheraton Hotel immediately adjacent to the Beus Center.

Constitution Drafting Project: A Discussion of Five New Amendments
2024-02-01 17:00 - 19:30 | Location: Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E Taylor St, Phoenix, Arizona, 85004, United States
Please RSVP by Tue Jan 30, 2024

The Center for Constitutional Design at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law is hosting a panel discussion on the National Constitution Center’s landmark Constitution Drafting Project. Jeffrey Rosen, President and CEO of the National Constitution Center, will moderate the conversation with Caroline Fredrickson (Georgetown Law), Ilan Wurman (ASU Law) and Timothy Sandefur (Goldwater Institute). They will discuss their approaches to constitution drafting, the various amendments they agreed on, and the project’s importance in today’s constitutional environment.

5 p.m. – 6 p.m. (AZ time) – Reception and book signing of Jeffrey Rosen’s newest book: The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America. Limited quantities of the book will be made available for purchase. Refreshments will be provided.

6 p.m. – 7:30 p.m. (AZ time) – Panel discussion

Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State UniversityBeus Center for Law and Society – Room 544111 East Taylor StreetPhoenix, AZ 85004

Why Desegregation Still Matters, and What We Can Learn from the Past
2023-11-16 17:30 - 19:30 | Location: Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E Taylor St, Phoenix, Arizona, 85004, United States
Was school desegregation a stunning success or a tragic failure? Americans have been debating this question for over half a century. Part of the difficulty of answering it comes from the variety of forms “desegregation” has taken—from ending legal segregation in the South to addressing the effects of residential segregation in the north and west; from efforts to reduce the achievement gap between white and Black students to coping with the rapid influx of Hispanic and Asian students, many of whom are English learners. Equally important is the divergent meaning judges, policy advocates, and academic experts have given to the ambiguous term “desegregation.” To some, “desegregation” means ending racial discrimination by public officials. To others it means creating racially balanced schools and classrooms. To still others it means much more: providing equal educational opportunity to all students.

The purpose of this lecture is to help us understand the lessons of decades of desegregation efforts by explaining the divergent meanings so frequently given to that key term, the ways in which underlying educational problems have evolved over time, and what we know about the long-term consequences of various desegregation strategies.

This event is eligible for 1 hour of CLE credit.

Reception 5:30 p.m.Lecture 6:00 p.m.

Beus Center for Law and SocietyRoom 544

R. Shep Melnick

Thomas P. O’Neill, Jr. Professor of American Politics at Boston College and co-chair of the Harvard Program on Constitutional Government

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Annual Supreme Court Review: The 2022 Term
2023-10-26 17:30 - 19:30 | Location: Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E Taylor St, Phoenix, Arizona, 85004, United States
On October 26th, the Center for Constitutional Design will host a conversation among ASU law faculty, moderated by Patricia Lee Refo (Partner, Snell & Wilmer, and 2020-21 President, American Bar Association), with Professors Stefanie Lindquist, executive director of the CCD, Ilan Wurman, and Justin Weinstein-Tull, on the most significant decisions of the Supreme Court 2022 term, including those involving affirmative action, religious accommodation, student loans, voting rights and more.

This event is eligible for 1 hour of CLE credit.

Thursday, October 26Reception 5:30 p.m.Discussion 6:00 p.m.

Beus Center for Law and Society111 E Taylor St, Room 544, Phoenix, AZ

Patricia Lee Refo

Partner, Snell &Wilmer, and 2020-21 President, American Bar Association

Moderator

Stefanie Lindquist

Professor of law and political sciences in the School of Global Politics and the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at ASU

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Ilan Wurman

Associate professor at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at ASU

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Justin Weinstein-Tull

Associate professor at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at ASU

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From FDR to Biden: The Creation of the Modern Presidency
2023-10-11 16:00
Virtual Event

The Center for Constitutional Design at Arizona State University and the National Constitution Center present a discussion exploring how the institution of the modern presidency has evolved through the lens of studying the constitutional visions and approaches to executive power adopted by some of America’s past presidents. Join presidency experts Sidney Milkis and Barbara Perry of the University of Virginia’s Miller Center and Stephen Knott of Ashland University for this conversation moderated by National Constitution Center President and CEO Jeffrey Rosen.

This program is presented in partnership with the Center for Constitutional Design at Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law.

Participants

Sidney M. Milkis

White Burkett Miller Professor of Governance and Foreign Affairs, University of Virginia’s Miller Center

Sidney M. Milkis is the White Burkett Miller Professor of Governance and Foreign Affairs and a professor of politics. His research focuses on the American presidency, political parties and elections, social movements, and American political development. In addition to teaching undergraduate and graduate students, he regularly gives public lectures on American politics and participates in programs for international scholars and high school teachers that probe the deep historical roots of contemporary developments in the United States.

Barbara A. Perry

Gerald L. Baliles Professor and Director of Presidential Studies, University of Virginia’s Miller Center

Barbara A. Perry co-directs the University of Virginia’s Miller Center Presidential Oral History Program. She has authored or edited 16 books on presidents, First Ladies, the Kennedy family, the Supreme Court, and civil rights and civil liberties. Perry has served as a U.S. Supreme Court fellow and has worked for both Republican and Democratic members of the Senate.

Stephen Knott

Thomas & Mabel Guy Professor of American History and Government at Ashland University and Professor of National Security Affairs at the United States Naval War College

Prior to accepting his position at the Naval War College, Knott was Co-Chair of the Presidential Oral History Program at the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia. His essays have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The Christian Science Monitor, The New York Post, Time, Politico, The Hill, Foreign Policy, and The National Interest. He is the author/editor of ten books dealing with the American presidency, the early republic, and American foreign policy.

Moderator

Jeffrey Rosen

President and CEO, National Constitution Center

Jeffrey Rosen is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the National Constitution Center, a nonpartisan nonprofit organization whose mission is to educate the public about the U.S. Constitution. Located steps from Independence Hall in Historic Philadelphia, the Center engages millions of citizens as an interactive museum, national town hall, and provider of nonpartisan resources for civic education. Jeffrey is also professor of law at The George Washington University Law School, a contributing editor of The Atlantic, and the author of six books.

Money, Politics, and the U.S. Constitution
2023-09-15 12:00 - 13:15
Who gets to decide whether and how to regulate money in our campaigns and elections? For the past 50 years, the Supreme Court has made itself the nation’s apex regulator of money-in-politics. Through its campaign finance decisions, the Court has taken many options off the table from state and federal policymakers. But is this the way things should be, as a matter of constitutional structure? There is a growing movement — which includes state lawmakers from both major political parties — that is calling for a constitutional amendment that would empower Congress and the States to choose whether and how to regulate money-in-politics. In this panel, we’ll explore the text and theory of the proposed amendment through an interactive discussion with both its advocates and skeptics. Join us for lunch!

Room 650

Participants:Brian Boyle, Executive Director & General Counsel at American PromiseScott Day Freeman, Goldwater InstituteModerated by: Kory Langhofer, Managing Attorney at Statecraft PLLC

This event is eligible for 1 hour of CLE credit.

Participants

Brian Boyle

Executive Director & General Counsel at American Promise

Brian Boyle is Executive Director & General Counsel at American Promise, a nationwide non-profit organization that is leading a movement for constitutional reform to reduce the influence of money in politics. Before joining the leadership team at American Promise, Brian was a small business owner, a litigator in a national law firm, and a clerk on the Massachusetts Appeals Court. He has also been involved in local government. Brian earned his BA from Harvard College and his JD from Cornell Law School.

Scott Day Freeman

Goldwater Institute

Scott Day Freeman is a Senior Attorney at the Goldwater Institute. He has nearly 30 years of experience litigating complex commercial and products liability defense matters. He is a former President of the Arizona Association of Defense Counsel and Pacific Regional Director of DRI, two leading organizations of civil defense attorneys. He also served as the Vice Chair of the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission during the 2011 redistricting cycle. Scott is a graduate of ASU’s Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law and earned a Bachelor of Science in Aerospace Engineering from the U of A.

Kory Langhofer

Managing Attorney at Statecraft PLLC

Kory Langhofer is the Managing Attorney at Statecraft PLLC, a law firm focusing on government and political law. His practice is concentrated in campaign finance, constitutional litigation, and political matters. He has previously worked as a federal prosecutor, as litigation counsel to multiple presidential campaigns, and as general counsel for the 2016-2017 presidential transition team. Kory received his A.B. in political science, summa cum laude, from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He received his JD from Yale Law School, where he served as an Editor of The Yale Law Journal

Amending the Constitution: Twin Jeopardies
2023-09-14 17:30 - 19:30 | Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E Taylor St, Phoenix, Arizona, 85004, United States
Join the Center for Constitutional Design for our 1st Annual Constitution Day Address. Our inaugural Constitution Day speaker will be Russ Feingold, President of the American Constitution Society. He served as a United States Senator from Wisconsin from 1993 to 2011 and a Wisconsin State Senator from 1983 to 1993. From 2013 to 2015, he served as the United States Special Envoy to the Great Lakes Region of Africa and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

In his lecture: Amending the Constitution: Twin Jeopardies, Senator Feingold will discuss an initially fringe but growing effort to call the first-ever constitutional convention under the provisions of the U.S. Constitution. He will also discuss the need for a new process that would allow more frequent, democratic constitutional change. The lecture, therefore, offers a warning and a way forward concerning Article V of the Constitution.

This event is supported by a Constitution Day Grant from the Jack Miller Center.

This event is eligible for 1 hour of CLE credit.

Reception 5:30 p.m.Lecture 6:30 p.m.Beus Center for Law and SocietyRoom 544

Russ Feingold

United States Senator from Wisconsin, President of the American Constitution Society

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The State of Free Expression in the U.S. and Abroad
2023-06-05 15:30 - 16:30 | Webinar
Join free-speech advocates Garry Kasparov, former world chess champion, political activist, and chairman of the Renew Democracy Initiative; Evan Mawarire, Zimbabwean pastor and democratic activist; and Suzanne Nossel, CEO of PEN America, as they discuss the state of free expression in the United States, Russia, Zimbabwe and around the world. Jeffrey Rosen, president and CEO of the National Constitution Center, moderates.

This program is presented as a partnership between the National Constitution Center, the Renew Democracy Initiative, and the Center for Constitutional Design at Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law.

Jeffrey Rosen – Moderator

President and CEO of National Constitution Center

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Garry Kasparov

Chairman of the Renew Democracy Network

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Evan Mawarire

Director of Education at the Renew Democracy Network

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Suzanne Nossel

Chief Executive Officer of PEN America

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The Inner-Workings of the Mexican Supreme Court: Opening the Black Box
2023-05-23 08:00 - 09:30 | Webinar
Mexico’s Supreme Court is at the center of fundamental policy debates that will impact the country’s democratic dynamics, including not only the rules for accessing and exercising political power, but also relations with Mexico’s North American neighbors, mainly the United States.

The inner workings of the Mexican Supreme Court, some of which may prove to be highly consequential in pending cases, are largely unknown to much of the Mexican public, let alone to analysts and observers abroad. To open the black box and discuss the nuts and bolts of the Court’s mechanisms and peculiarities, including the role of the Chief Justice, the supermajority requirement for certain decisions, and the assignment of cases to justices, the Mexico Institute, Mexico Evalúa, and the Arizona State University School of Law’s Center for Constitutional Design, with support from the Wilson Center, have assembled an expert panel. In addition to addressing the functioning of the Mexican Supreme Court, our panel will contrast its mechanisms with those of the Supreme Court of the United States.

For a wide-ranging discussion that will illuminate the potential impact of seemingly minor institutional features on far-reaching judicial decisions, please join us on Tuesday, May 23 from 11:00 am to 12:30 pm EST/8:00 am to 9:30 am MST.

Julio Rios-Figueroa

Associate Professor at the Department of Law at ITAM in Mexico City

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Laurence Pantin

Program Coordinator for Transparency in Justice and Special Projects at México Evalúa

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Stefanie Lindquist

Foundation Professor of Law and Political Science, ASU College of Law

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Andrew I. Rudman

Director of the Wilson Center’s Mexico Institute

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Five New Amendments: Next Steps for Constitutional Change
2023-03-27 15:00 - 16:15 | Online
Join the Center for Constitutional Design and the National Constitution Center for a discussion of the amendments to the Constitution proposed by the National Constitution Center’s Constitution Drafting Project. This pathbreaking initiative asked three teams of progressive, libertarian, and conservative scholars to convene online for a constitutional convention. After a week of dialogue, deliberation and compromise, the ideologically diverse delegates agreed on proposals for five constitutional amendments, ranging from term limits for Supreme Court justices to resurrecting the legislative veto and making it easier for national majorities to amend the Constitution. In a conversation moderated by NCC President and CEO Jeffrey Rosen, leaders of the three teams—Caroline Fredrickson, of the Georgetown Law School and senior fellow at the Brennan Center; Ilan Wurman, of the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University, and Ilya Shapiro, of the Manhattan Institute—are joined by Stefanie Lindquist, executive director of the Center for Constitutional Design at Arizona State University to discuss the amendments and the next steps for constitutional reform.

Jeffrey Rosen- Moderator

President and CEO of National Constitution Center

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Caroline Fredrickson

Professor at Georgetown Law

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Ilan Wurman

Associate Professor of Law, Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law

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Ilya Shapiro

Senior Fellow and Director of constitutional studies at the Manhattan Institute

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Stefanie Lindquist

Executive Director | Center for Constitutional Design
Foundation Professor of Law and Political Science | Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law

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Can the Legislative Power Be Delegated to the Administrative State?
2023-03-23 12:15 - 13:15 | Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E Taylor St, Phoenix, Arizona, 85004, United States
Can the legislative power be delegated? Is the “major questions” doctrine” a suitable alternative to the non-delegation doctrine – the doctrine that states that a delegated power (and Congress’ powers are delegated from the people) cannot be re-delegated. What are the implications of the dispute over the delegation of legislative power for constitutional good governance and the future of the administrative state?”

Join us for a debate about whether the legislative power can be delegated between Professor James Stoner, Hermann Moyse, Jr., Professor and Director of the Eric Voegelin Institute in the Department of Political Science at Louisiana State University, and Michael Rappaport, the Hugh & Hazel Darling Professor of Law at the University of San Diego School of Law, where he is also the Director of the Center for the Study of Constitutional Originalism.

This debate is co-sponsored by the Center for Constitutional Design and the Federalist Society, Arizona State Student Chapter.

CLE credit provided.

Room 250 at Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E. Taylor St. Phoenix, AZ 85004

Clint Bolick – Moderator

Justice | Arizona Supreme Court

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James Stoner

Professor and Director of the Eric Voegelin Institute in the Department of Political Science at Louisiana State University

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Michael Rappaport

Hugh & Hazel Darling Professor of Law at the University of San Diego School of Law, and Director of the Center for the Study of Constitutional Originalism

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Amendment Reform in America and Abroad
2023-03-16 14:30 - 16:00
ARIZONA TIME 2:30 PM – 4:00 PM

EASTERN TIME 5:30 PM – 7:00 PM

The National Constitution Center and the Center for Constitutional Design at Arizona State University present a comparative discussion focused on the various systems of amending constitutions at home and around the world. Join a panel of distinguished scholars, including Wilfred Codrington of Brooklyn Law School, Chief Judge Jeffrey Sutton of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, and Rosalind Dixon of the University of New South Wales, Faculty of Law, for a webinar conversation, as they survey the world’s various constitutional democracies to explore the similarities and differences in constitutional amendment processes across the globe, and explore questions surrounding federal amendment reform in the United States. Jeffrey Rosen, president and CEO of the National Constitution Center, moderates.

This webinar program is presented in partnership with the National Constitution Center.

Jeffrey Rosen – Moderator

CEO of the National Constitution Center

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Hon. Jeffrey S. Sutton

Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit

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Wilfred Codrington III

Person Title, Company or Organization

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Rosalind Dixon

Professor of law at the University of New South Wales, Faculty of Law

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The Irrelevant First Amendment
2023-03-01 12:15 - 13:15 | Location: Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E Taylor St, Phoenix, Arizona, 85004, United States
A Presentation by Ashutosh Bhagwat

with Commentary by James Weinstein

Room 150, Beus Center for Law and Society

The Center for Constitutional Design will host a conversation about whether the First Amendment continues to protect free expression in contemporary American society.

Despite its cultural prominence and the Roberts’ Court’s broad interpretations andvigorous enforcement of it, in today’s world the First Amendment provides little or noprotection for free expression in the most contested areas for a number of reasons. Firstand foremost, the vast majority of public discourse today occurs on privately-ownedinternet platforms, yet the state action doctrine means that the First Amendment does notconstrain content moderation and/or censorship by these platforms. In addition, in recentyears the Supreme Court has greatly expanded the government’s power to exercise controlover speech internal to the government itself, free of First Amendment constraints. Thesedevelopments have effectively immunized from First Amendment scrutiny such things asFlorida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law aggressively restricting speech by classroom teachers, or thecurrent wave of bans on books discussing race discrimination and sexual orientation inpublic school (and sometimes public) libraries. Finally, under current law the FirstAmendment also does not touch upon ideological conformity imposed by privateemployers, including private universities supposedly committed to academic freedom, asillustrated by the recent fiascos at Hamline University and Harvard’s Kennedy School. So,what is to be done? Should First Amendment doctrine be altered to extend FirstAmendment protection to platform users, government employees, and private universitystudents and employees? Or are we to acknowledge that the Golden Age of the FirstAmendment is over?

Bring your questions and join us for lunch and a provocative conversation about the continued relevance of the First Amendment.

Ashutosh Bhagwat

Boochever and Bird Endowed Chair for the Study and Teaching of Freedom and Equality and Martin Luther King Jr. Professor of Law

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James Weinstein

Dan Cracchiolo Chair in Constitutional Law in the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law, a faculty fellow in the Center for Law, Science and Innovation at Arizona State University and an associate fellow with the Centre for Public Law at the University of Cambridge.

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Mexico: Constitutional Democracy in Crisis?
2023-02-23 12:15 - 13:15 | Location: Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E Taylor St, Phoenix, Arizona, 85004, United States
Featuring Julio Rios-Figueroa, Andrea Pozas-Loyo and Manuel Gonzalez

Join CCD visiting scholars from Mexico—Julio Antonio Rios Figueroa (Professor of Law, Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México), Andrea Pozas-Loyo (Professor, Institute of Legal Research, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)), and Manuel González Oropeza (Professor of Law, UNAM, and former Judge on the Mexican Federal Electoral Tribunal)—for lunch and discussion of the current challenges facing Mexico’s constitutional democracy, and on the process of constitutional change and reform in Mexico. The discussion will be moderated by Stefanie Lindquist, Executive Director of the Center for Constitutional Design.

Room 150, Beus Center for Law and Society

Julio Rios-Figueroa

Associate Professor at the Department of Law at ITAM in Mexico City

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Andrea Pozas-Loyo

Fulltime professor at the IIJ-UNAM Institute of Legal Research

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Manuel González

UNAM academic staff at the the Legal Research Institute. Career Professor at the Faculty of Law in the Graduate Studies Division

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Constitutional Change in Mexico
2023-02-22 17:30 - 19:30 | Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E Taylor St, Phoenix, Arizona, 85004, United States
Mexican democracy is at a crossroads. In the center stage of the current dynamic and challenging times lies the Mexican Constitution, one of the oldest and most amended in the world. Enacted in 1917, it was the product of a social revolution. During its long life, the Mexican Constitution was functional for the long period of authoritarian hegemonic-party regime, but it was also key in the protracted transition to democracy. The constitution is now the locus of acute tensions between legitimate demands for inclusion, social and economic, and the stability of the rules for accessing and exercising political power. The destination of Mexican democracy is uncertain, but the patterns and ways of more than a hundred years of constitutional change reveal surprising clues. CLE credit will be offered for the event.

Speakers

Stefanie Lindquist- Moderator

Executive Director | Center for Constitutional Design
Foundation Professor of Law and Political Science | Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law

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Julio Antonio Rios Figueroa

Associate Professor at the Department of Law at ITAM in Mexico City. Fellow at the Wilson Center, in Washington.

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Andrea Pozas-Loyo

Full-time Professor at the IIJ-UNAM (Institute of Legal Research)

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Manuel González

Member of the UNAM academic staff since 1982 as a researcher at the Legal Research Institute (1982-2012). Currently a Career Professor at the Faculty of Law in the Graduate Studies Division

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The Unfortunate Consequences of a Misguided Free Speech Principle with Robert Post
2023-02-16 17:00 - 18:30 | Location: Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E Taylor St, Phoenix, Arizona, 85004, United States
Are Americans “losing their appetite for candid and constructive dialogue?” Robert Post, Yale Law professor, argues that we have misdiagnosed America’s social malady as a free speech problem, when the challenges to free speech in America are more a symptom than a cause of the problems we are experiencing in the public sphere. The decline in the nature and quality of our public discourse is not a problem that more free speech will necessarily resolve. Instead, Post claims that “our public discourse has become rancid because our politics has become diseased.” In order to heal and ameliorate our public discourse, we must restore our politics to a healthy condition. Join us for a discussion about the relationship between politics and free speech.

CLE credit will be offered for this event.

Robert Post

Sterling Professor of Law at Yale Law School. He served as the School’s 16th dean from 2009 until 2017. Before coming to Yale, he taught at the University of California at Berkeley School of Law.

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Originalism and the Rights of Women
2023-02-02 17:30 - 19:15
Proponents of originalism argue that judges must adhere faithfully to the meaning of constitutional texts as those texts would have been understood at the time of their adoption. In the case of the 14thAmendment, such an approach would limit clauses like “equal protection of the laws” to nineteenth century understandings of equality. Since women were not equal to men under the law in 1868, and since the framers of the 14th Amendment did not advance gender equality as one of its purposes, originalism poses a quandary for women’s rights in the 21stcentury. Can originalism be squared with constitutional protections for women under the 14th Amendment? This distinguished panel of scholars and judges addresses this important topic as the conservative majority on U.S. Supreme Court adopts originalism as its dominant method of constitutional interpretation.

CLE credit will be offered for this event.

Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E. Taylor, Phoenix, AZ 85014

Room 544

James Weinstein- Moderator

Dan Cracchiolo Chair in Constitutional Law in the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law, a faculty fellow in the Center for Law, Science and Innovation at Arizona State University and an associate fellow with the Centre for Public Law at the University of Cambridge.

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Mary Anne Case

Arnold I. Shure Professor of Law at the University of Chicago.

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Tessa Dysart

Assistant Director of Legal Writing and Clinical Professor of Law at the University of Arizona, James E. Rogers College of Law, Editor-in-chief of the Journal of Appellate Practice & Process.

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Stefanie Lindquist

Executive Director | Center for Constitutional Design
Foundation Professor of Law and Political Science | Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law

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Christina Sandefur

Executive Vice President at the Goldwater Institute.

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Can Courts Save Democracy?
2022-11-01 17:00 - 19:00 | Location: Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E Taylor St, Phoenix, Arizona, 85004, United States
In partnership with the Phoenix Committee on Foreign Relations, the Center for Constitutional Design will host a discussion on the ability of courts to halt democratic decay and support the institutions of democracy. Join Associate Professor and Deputy Director Tom Daly (Melbourne School of Government), Professor and Senior Fellow in Global Democracy Larry Diamond (Stanford University), and Professor Jeffrey K. Staton (Emory University) who co-authored the recently published Can Courts be Bulwarks of Democracy? Judges and the Politics of Prudence.

Speakers

Tom Daly

Associate Professor | University of Melbourne
Deputy Director | Melbourne School of Government

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Larry Diamond

Professor | Stanford University
Senior Fellow | Hoover Institution
Mosbacher Senior Fellow in Global Democracy | Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies

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Jeffrey K. Staton

Professor | Emory University
Director | Center for the Study of Law and Politics

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Conference on Elections and Federalism
2022-10-07 12:00 - 2022-10-08 13:15 | Location: Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E Taylor St, Phoenix, Arizona, 85004, United States
In partnership with the University of Wisconsin’s State Democracy Research Initiative, the Center for Constitutional Design will host an interdisciplinary conference on electoral federalism. Participants in the event will discuss how federalism affects electoral institutions in the United States, how U.S. electoral institutions may be evaluated under international standards of electoral efficacy, and how varying institutional structures and conflicts within the states shape electoral administration and procedures.

Join us in-person or online.

Breakfast, lunch and refreshments provided for in-person attendees.

Keynote Speakers

Is Federalism a Bulwark Against, or a Path Toward, Election Subversion?

Richard L. Hasen

Professor of Law | UCLA School of Law
Director | Safeguarding Democracy Project

Richard L. Hasen is an internationally recognized expert in election law and campaign finance regulation, writing as well in the areas of legislation and statutory interpretation, remedies, and torts. He is co-author of leading casebooks in election law and remedies. Hasen served in 2020 as a CNN Election Law Analyst. He directs UCLA Law’s Safeguarding Democracy Project.

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The Fight For Democracy in 2024 Starts in 2022

Sarah Longwell

President and CEO | Longwell Partners
Publisher | The Bulwark

Sarah Longwell is a Co-Founder of Defending Democracy Together and executive director of the Republican Accountability Project. She is also the Publisher of The Bulwark. She lives in Washington, D.C. with her family and is a graduate of Kenyon College.

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Conference Agenda

Friday, October 7, 2022

12:00 – 1:00 pm: Check-in and Welcome

Stefanie Lindquist

Executive Director | Center for Constitutional Design
Foundation Professor of Law and Political Science | Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law

Stefanie Lindquist is a professor of law and political sciences in the School of Global Politics and the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at ASU. She is recognized as an expert on the U.S. Supreme Court, Constitutional Law, and Administrative Law. Her book, Measuring Judicial Activism, is the first publication to define the oft-used term quantitatively. Her prior service at ASU includes heading ASU’s Global Academic Initiatives as senior vice president in the Office of the Provost (2019 to 2021). In that role, she facilitated ASU’s global academic portfolio. She also served as deputy provost and vice president for academic affairs and was Foundation Professor of Law and Political Science at ASU from 2016 to 2019. Before coming to ASU, she was dean and Arch Professor at UGA’s School of Public and International Affairs from 2013 to 2016, after serving as interim dean, associate dean for outreach, and associate dean for academic affairs at the University of Texas School of Law.

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Miriam Seifter (moderator)

Associate Professor and Co-Director, State Democracy Research Initiative | University of Wisconsin Law School

Miriam Seifter is an Associate Professor of Law, Co-Director of the State Democracy Research Initiative, and Rowe Faculty Fellow in Regulatory Law at the University of Wisconsin Law School. Her research interests include federalism, administrative and constitutional law, and state and local government law, with a focus on challenges affecting democracy at the state level. She also teaches courses in Administrative Law, Property Law, and State and Local Government Law. Professor Seifter’s recent publications appear in the Harvard Law Review, the Columbia Law Review, the Michigan Law Review, and the NYU Law Review, among others.

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1:00 – 2:15 pm: Keynote: Is Federalism a Bulwark Against, or a Path Toward, Election Subversion?

Richard L. Hasen

Professor of Law | UCLA School of Law
Director | Safeguarding Democracy Project

Richard L. Hasen is an internationally recognized expert in election law and campaign finance regulation, writing as well in the areas of legislation and statutory interpretation, remedies, and torts. He is co-author of leading casebooks in election law and remedies. Hasen served in 2020 as a CNN Election Law Analyst. He directs UCLA Law’s Safeguarding Democracy Project.

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2:30 – 3:45 pm: Double-Edged Federalism

This panel will focus on how federalism operates as a double-edged sword in the U.S. constitutional democracy. While state election officials acted to preserve and protect the integrity of elections in 2020, some state legislatures are now adopting laws that many believe serve to undermine the franchise. Unlike many other nations, the U.S. electoral system is decentralized and subject to state and local control. How can these dynamics be conceptualized theoretically and constitutionally, and how should we accommodate them in future elections? How does the concept of the states as laboratories-of-democracy play out in this space?

Panelists

Justin Weinstein-Tull (moderator)

Associate Professor | Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law

Professor Weinstein-Tull studies structural constitutional law, state and local governments, and election law. His scholarship reconstructs theories of public law to better account for the on-the-ground complexities of governmental institutions and day-to-day human experiences of the law. In the context of federalism, Weinstein-Tull has written about the ways that state and local governments can both frustrate and strengthen federal power, including federal civil rights laws and the right to vote.

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Jessica Bulman-Pozen

Professor | Columbia Law School

Jessica Bulman-Pozen is the Betts Professor of Law and a director of the Center for Constitutional Governance at Columbia Law School. An expert on administrative law and constitutional law, she has written extensively about federalism. Before joining the Columbia faculty, she served as an attorney-adviser in the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel and as a law clerk to Justice John Paul Stevens of the U.S. Supreme Court and Judge Merrick B. Garland of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.

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Jake M. Grumbach

Assistant Professor of Political Science | University of Washington

Jacob M. Grumbach is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Washington and a Faculty Associate with the Harry Bridges Center for Labor Studies. Grumbach’s research focuses on the political economy of U.S. democracy, with an emphasis on public policy, racial and economic inequality, American federalism, and statistical methods. His book, Laboratories Against Democracy reveals how the pursuit of national partisan agendas at the state level has intensified the challenges facing American democracy.

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Kevin R. Kosar

Senior Fellow | American Enterprise Institute

Kevin R. Kosar is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where he studies the US Congress, the administrative state, American politics, election reform, and the US Postal Service. Before joining AEI, Dr. Kosar was at the R Street Institute, where he served as vice president of policy, vice president of research partnerships, and senior fellow and director of the Governance Project. He writes the Election Reform Q&A blog series, which aims to foster a nonpartisan conversation around elections policies. His most recent book is Congress Overwhelmed: The Decline in Congressional Capacity and Prospects for Reform.

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Carolyn Shapiro

Professor and Associate Dean | Chicago-Kent College of Law

Carolyn Shapiro is a Professor of Law and Associate Dean for Academic Administration and Strategic Initiatives at Chicago-Kent College of Law, where she is also the founder and co-director of Chicago-Kent’s Institute on the Supreme Court of the United States (ISCOTUS), and the faculty director of the Constitutional Democracy Project, a civic education initiative. Professor Shapiro’s scholarship is largely focused on the Supreme Court, its relationship to other courts and institutions, and its role in our constitutional democracy, as well as on other structural constitutional matters and issues related to democracy.

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4:00 – 5:15 pm: Electoral Adequacy

Global institutions such as the Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance advance criteria to measure and assess the adequacy of elections worldwide. Yet the U.S. is rarely subject to such assessments because it does not deploy a national electoral management body responsible for governing elections, among other reasons. Instead, the individual states manage the electoral process pursuant to the U.S. Constitution, Article I. How does the U.S. fare under these international standards, including ensuring that historically marginalized groups have access to the franchise? How can international, national, or other criteria be developed and applied to the United States plural election systems?

Panelists

Chad Vickery (moderator)

VP, Global Strategy and Technical Leadership | The International Foundation for Electoral Systems

Chad Vickery, vice president of global strategy and technical leadership at the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES), has extensive legal and international election administration experience with an emphasis on strengthening democracy and governance in transitioning societies. He manages IFES’ global applied research, technical leadership and strategic innovations initiatives. Vickery’s specific programmatic experience includes leading electoral integrity assessments and projects designed to ensure the development of impartial legal frameworks for elections, increasing professionalism of election management bodies, establishing effective election dispute programs, and increasing political participation of historically disenfranchised groups into the electoral process.

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Larry Garber

Adjunct Professor | Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law

Larry Garber is an independent consultant with more than 35 years of experience working in the fields of national security policy, international development, human rights and democracy promotion. He has managed complex governmental and nongovernmental organizations, served in senior national security policy positions, taught high-ranking military and civilian officials, and trained counterparts in more than 30 countries on five continents. Larry currently serves as the Chief of Party for The Carter Center’s Zimbabwe International Election Mission. In 2020 and 2021, he taught a course on “Election Law: US and International Perspectives” at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law, Arizona State University. He is a member of the National Task Force on Election Crises and on the Board of Election Reformers Network.

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James A. Gardner

SUNY Distinguished Professor | University at Buffalo School of Law

James A. Gardner is Bridget and Thomas Black SUNY Distinguished Professor at the State University of New York, University at Buffalo School of Law, where he teaches in the areas of constitutional, government, and election law. He is the author or editor of seven books and more than seventy articles and book chapters. His work, which deals largely with issues of constitutional structure and design, focuses on two areas: the law and legal structure of democratic institutions, and the structure and operation in practice of federal forms of governance. His books include Comparative Election Law (Edward Elgar 2022); Election Law in the American Political System (with Guy-Uriel Charles, Aspen, 3d ed. forthcoming 2022); and What Are Campaigns For? The Role of Persuasion in Electoral Law and Politics (Oxford 2009). Each year since 2015, he has been named one of the ten most-cited U.S. legal authorities on election law by the Election Law Blog.

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Pippa Norris

Lecturer in Comparative Politics | Harvard Kennedy School

Pippa Norris is a comparative political scientist who has taught at Harvard for a quarter century. She is the McGuire Lecturer in Comparative Politics at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, and Director of the Electoral Integrity project. Her research compares public opinion and elections, political institutions and cultures, gender politics, and political communications in many countries worldwide.

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Erica Shein

Managing Director, Center for Applied Research and Learning | The International Foundation for Electoral Systems

Erica Shein is the Managing Director of the Center for Applied Research and Learning at the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) and an expert in electoral integrity. She leads the development and execution of IFES’ research agenda and Knowledge Management Initiative. Erica was the Lead Editor for the IFES COVID-19 Briefing Series, co-author of the recent Foreign Policy piece The Dark Side of Democracy, and co-creator of the IFES Electoral Integrity Assessment Methodology and the Abuse of State Resources Research and Assessment Framework.

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5:15 pm: Wrap Up

Stefanie Lindquist

Executive Director | Center for Constitutional Design
Foundation Professor of Law and Political Science | Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law

Stefanie Lindquist is a professor of law and political sciences in the School of Global Politics and the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at ASU. She is recognized as an expert on the U.S. Supreme Court, Constitutional Law, and Administrative Law. Her book, Measuring Judicial Activism, is the first publication to define the oft-used term quantitatively. Her prior service at ASU includes heading ASU’s Global Academic Initiatives as senior vice president in the Office of the Provost (2019 to 2021). In that role, she facilitated ASU’s global academic portfolio. She also served as deputy provost and vice president for academic affairs and was Foundation Professor of Law and Political Science at ASU from 2016 to 2019. Before coming to ASU, she was dean and Arch Professor at UGA’s School of Public and International Affairs from 2013 to 2016, after serving as interim dean, associate dean for outreach, and associate dean for academic affairs at the University of Texas School of Law.

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Miriam Seifter (moderator)

Associate Professor and Co-Director, State Democracy Research Initiative | University of Wisconsin Law School

Miriam Seifter is an Associate Professor of Law, Co-Director of the State Democracy Research Initiative, and Rowe Faculty Fellow in Regulatory Law at the University of Wisconsin Law School. Her research interests include federalism, administrative and constitutional law, and state and local government law, with a focus on challenges affecting democracy at the state level. She also teaches courses in Administrative Law, Property Law, and State and Local Government Law. Professor Seifter’s recent publications appear in the Harvard Law Review, the Columbia Law Review, the Michigan Law Review, and the NYU Law Review, among others.

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Saturday, October 8, 2022

8:00 – 9:00 am: Check-in and Welcome

Stefanie Lindquist

Executive Director | Center for Constitutional Design
Foundation Professor of Law and Political Science | Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law

Stefanie Lindquist is a professor of law and political sciences in the School of Global Politics and the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at ASU. She is recognized as an expert on the U.S. Supreme Court, Constitutional Law, and Administrative Law. Her book, Measuring Judicial Activism, is the first publication to define the oft-used term quantitatively. Her prior service at ASU includes heading ASU’s Global Academic Initiatives as senior vice president in the Office of the Provost (2019 to 2021). In that role, she facilitated ASU’s global academic portfolio. She also served as deputy provost and vice president for academic affairs and was Foundation Professor of Law and Political Science at ASU from 2016 to 2019. Before coming to ASU, she was dean and Arch Professor at UGA’s School of Public and International Affairs from 2013 to 2016, after serving as interim dean, associate dean for outreach, and associate dean for academic affairs at the University of Texas School of Law.

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Miriam Seifter (moderator)

Associate Professor and Co-Director, State Democracy Research Initiative | University of Wisconsin Law School

Miriam Seifter is an Associate Professor of Law, Co-Director of the State Democracy Research Initiative, and Rowe Faculty Fellow in Regulatory Law at the University of Wisconsin Law School. Her research interests include federalism, administrative and constitutional law, and state and local government law, with a focus on challenges affecting democracy at the state level. She also teaches courses in Administrative Law, Property Law, and State and Local Government Law. Professor Seifter’s recent publications appear in the Harvard Law Review, the Columbia Law Review, the Michigan Law Review, and the NYU Law Review, among others.

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9:00 – 10:15 am: Keynote: The Fight For Democracy in 2024 Starts in 2022

Sarah Longwell

President and CEO | Longwell Partners
Publisher | The Bulwark

Sarah Longwell is a Co-Founder of Defending Democracy Together and executive director of the Republican Accountability Project. She is also the Publisher of The Bulwark. She lives in Washington, D.C. with her family and is a graduate of Kenyon College.

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10:30 – 11:45 am: Local Electoral Administration

Public administration scholars focus on the manner in which principles of effective administration apply in the election law context. Because U.S. election administration is conducted by local and state governments, the manner in which election officials are selected, trained, funded, and supervised in the plural federal framework deserves attention. What can be learned from public administration about the complexities of election processing at the state and local levels? How do these officials conceptualize their roles and internalize principles of integrity and regularity in the exercise of their official duties? How does funding (adequate or inadequate) shape these systems, and who should be responsible for funding recounts and audits? How does election administration differ between urban and rural areas? In what ways might local administration hamper efforts to ensure racial equality in access to the ballot, address language access issues, and provide accommodations for voters with disabilities?

Panelists

Erin Scharff (moderator)

Professor | Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law

Erin Adele Scharff joined the ASU College of Law faculty in 2014. Previously, she was a visiting assistant professor of tax law at New York University School of Law, where she served as an editor of the Tax Law Review.
Scharff’s scholarship focuses on fiscal federalism, including the allocation of revenue authority between state and local governments, local government law, and state tax law. Her publications have appeared in Stanford Law Review, Georgetown Law Journal, New York University Law Review, and the Tax Law Review, among other journals. As an expert on local fiscal authority, Scharff has written several amicus briefs on the legal authority of local governments to raise revenue under state constitutions.

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Richard Briffault

Professor of Legislation | Columbia Law School

Richard Briffault is the Joseph P. Chamberlain Professor of Legislation at Columbia Law School. His work focuses on state and local government law, the law of the political process, and government ethics. He served as Chair of the New York City Conflicts of Interest Board (2014-2020); was a member of New York’s Moreland Act Commission to Investigate Public Corruption; is the Reporter for the American Law Institute’s project on Principles of Government Ethics; and is the Reporter of the Drafting Committee on Public Meetings During Emergencies of the Uniform Laws Commission. He was a member of or consultant to several New York City and State commissions, including the State Commission on Local Government Efficiency & Competitiveness, the Temporary Commission on Constitutional Revision, the Real Property Tax Reform Commission, and the New York City Charter Revision Commission.

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Mitchell Brown

Professor of Political Science | Auburn University

Mitchell Brown, Ph.D., is the Curtis O. Liles III Professor of Political Science at Auburn University and is a founding editor of the Journal of Election Administration Research & Practice. Her work as a researcher, evaluator, trainer and consultant focuses on applied projects around the country centering on election administration and community-based problem solving. She serves on the board of directors of the National Association of Election Officials (the Election Center) and has also held board and leadership positions at the university, in state government, and in non-profit organizations.

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Joshua Douglas

Professor | University of Kentucky Rosenberg College of Law

Professor Joshua A. Douglas of the University of Kentucky J. David Rosenberg College of Law is the Ashland-Spears, Inc. Distinguished Research Professor of Law. He teaches and researches election law and voting rights, civil procedure, constitutional law, and judicial decision making. He is the author of Vote for US: How to Take Back our Elections and Change the Future of Voting, a popular press book that provides hope and inspiration for a positive path forward on voting rights.

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Rebecca Green

Associate Professor and Co-Director, Election Law Program | William & Mary Law School

Rebecca Green is an Associate Professor of Law at William & Mary Law School where she teaches Election Law, Privacy Law, and Alternative Dispute Resolution. Professor Green co-directs the Election Law Program, a joint project of the Law School and the National Center for State Courts that provides resources for judges on election law topics.

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12:00 – 1:30 pm: State-Level Conflicts

Some state attorneys general played a major role in litigation over the results of the 2020 election, signing on to amicus briefs in the U.S. Supreme Court alleging election fraud—even in their own states. At the same time, secretaries of state defended the results of their elections and often found themselves in conflict with attorneys general (or state solicitors) over the integrity of their states’ election results. This issue has come to a head in Arizona, for example, where the secretary of state has filed a bar complaint against lawyers in the state’s attorney general’s office for taking positions adverse to the secretary of state’s office in litigation, even though the secretary of state is a client of the attorney general. How should such conflicts of interest be addressed in the context of a plural executive? Which official properly represents the state’s relative to election results and procedures? How does this tension between constitutional officers shape election outcomes and processing, and what are the consequences for democratic values?

Panelists

Miriam Seifter (moderator)

Associate Professor and Co-Director, State Democracy Research Initiative | University of Wisconsin Law School

Miriam Seifter is an Associate Professor of Law, Co-Director of the State Democracy Research Initiative, and Rowe Faculty Fellow in Regulatory Law at the University of Wisconsin Law School. Her research interests include federalism, administrative and constitutional law, and state and local government law, with a focus on challenges affecting democracy at the state level. She also teaches courses in Administrative Law, Property Law, and State and Local Government Law. Professor Seifter’s recent publications appear in the Harvard Law Review, the Columbia Law Review, the Michigan Law Review, and the NYU Law Review, among others.

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Isabel Longoria

Fmr. Elections Administrator | Harris County, Texas

Isabel Longoria is a native Houstonian and born of Mexican and French immigrant parents. She is a progressive policy wonk who has dedicated her life to public service in Texas. In November 2020 Longoria was appointed as Harris County’s first ever Elections Administrator, where she served for two years, ushering in new voting machines and innovative voting practices that increased access for Harris County’s 2.5 million registered voters.

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Tammy Patrick

Senior Advisor, Elections | Democracy Fund

Tammy Patrick is a Senior Advisor to the Elections program at the Democracy Fund. Focusing on modern elections, Tammy helps lead the Democracy Fund’s efforts to foster a voter-centric elections system and work to support election officials across the country. In 2013 she was selected by President Obama to serve as a Commissioner on the Presidential Commission on Election Administration which led to a position at the Bipartisan Policy Center to further the work of the PCEA. Prior to that, she was the Federal Compliance Officer for Maricopa County Elections Department for eleven years. She has testified on election administration policies multiple times in the United States Senate and House of Representatives, and numerous state legislatures on behalf of members of both parties. She has been an active member of the National Association of Election Officials (Election Center) Legislative and Postal committees, representing the organization to the United States Postal Service’s Mailers Technical Advisory Committee for over a decade. She serves as an adjunct professor at the University of Minnesota’s Humphrey School of Public Policy and is CERA certified by Auburn University and the Election Center and was inducted into their Hall of Fame in 2022.

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Gowri Ramachandran

Senior Counsel, Democracy | Brennan Center for Justice

Gowri Ramachandran serves as senior counsel in the Brennan Center’s Elections & Government program. Her work focuses on election security, election administration, and combatting election disinformation. She has co-authored numerous reports on these matters, including Election Officials Under Attack: How To Protect Administrators and Safeguard Democracy; Partisan Election Reviews in Five States; and Preparing for Cyberattacks and Technical Problems During the Pandemic: A Guide for Election Officials. She has testified about these matters before multiple congressional and state legislative committees and has worked across the country to support State and local election officials, as well as nonpartisan election protection programs, committed to fulfilling voters’ rights to free, fair, and accurate elections. Before joining the Brennan Center, she was professor of law at Southwestern Law School, in Los Angeles, California, where she taught courses in constitutional law, employment discrimination, critical race theory, and the Ninth Circuit Appellate Litigation Clinic. Her work was published in Election Law Journal, North Carolina Law Review, and Yale Law Journal online, among others.

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Quinn Yeargain

Assistant Professor | Widener University Commonwealth Law School

Quinn Yeargain is an Assistant Professor of Law at the Widener University Commonwealth Law School, and focuses on state institutional development, teaching courses and writing in state constitutional law. Quinn’s recent work has involved legal histories of the development of state-level democracy, the use of the initiative and referendum process by the electorate to build state administrative capacity, and a series of fifty-state surveys of election administration and canvassing processes. Prior to joining the faculty at Widener, Quinn was the Associate Director of the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy and clerked for Judge Lanier Anderson on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.

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1:30 pm: Wrap Up

Miriam Seifter (moderator)

Associate Professor and Co-Director, State Democracy Research Initiative | University of Wisconsin Law School

Miriam Seifter is an Associate Professor of Law, Co-Director of the State Democracy Research Initiative, and Rowe Faculty Fellow in Regulatory Law at the University of Wisconsin Law School. Her research interests include federalism, administrative and constitutional law, and state and local government law, with a focus on challenges affecting democracy at the state level. She also teaches courses in Administrative Law, Property Law, and State and Local Government Law. Professor Seifter’s recent publications appear in the Harvard Law Review, the Columbia Law Review, the Michigan Law Review, and the NYU Law Review, among others.

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Originalism and its Discontents
2022-09-28 17:30 - 19:30 | Location: Beus Center for Law and Society, 111 E Taylor St, Phoenix, Arizona, 85004, United States
The Center for Constitutional Design is excited to host four constitutional law experts who will critique originalism as a theory of constitutional interpretation, and discuss the past present and future of constitutional analysis in U.S. Courts.

Earn up to 1 hour of CLE Credit.

Register Now

Speakers

Stefanie Lindquist – Moderator

Executive Director | Center for Constitutional Design
Foundation Professor of Law and Political Science | Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law

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Hon. Clint Bolick

Justice | Arizona Supreme Court

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Peter de Marneffe

Professor of Philosophy | ASU School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies

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James Weinstein

Dan Cracchiolo Chair in Constitutional Law | Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law

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Ilan Wurman

Associate Professor | Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law

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1776 and Us: Finding the Founding in a Foundering Democracy
2022-09-19 17:00 - 19:30 | Memorial Union – Ventana BC, 301 E Orange St., Tempe, Arizona, 85281, United States
The Center for Constitutional Design joins the School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership for its annual Constitutional Day Lecture. This year features a discussion of the founding of the United States and its national identity. In recent years, the competing imperatives of activists and journalists at both edges of our ideological spectrum have produced warring narratives of the American founding: slavery versus liberty, original sin versus germinal gift, conclave of villains versus garden of heroes. Both of these approaches owe more to politics than to history. As we approach the quarter-millennium mark, how can we equip ourselves and our students with an understanding of the revolutionary era that is rigorous, complex, and above all, true to the evidence?

This event will also be live streamed on SCETL’s YouTube page.

Distinguished Lecturer

Dr. Jane Kamensky

Jonathan Trumbull Professor of American History | Harvard University
Pforzheimer Foundation Director | Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America

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Abortion Law in the U.S. and Abroad After Roe
2022-07-14 00:00 - 23:59
We are delighted to partner with the National Constitution Center for a comparative look at abortion law in the U.S. and abroad. Hear from Teresa Stanton Collett of the University of St. Thomas School of Law, David French of The Dispatch, Katherine Mayall of the Center for Reproductive Rights, and Mary Ziegler of the University of California, Davis and author of Dollars for Life: The Anti-Abortion Movement and the Fall of the Republican Establishment.

Watch the conversation now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_MuH3ATfoQ

2022 Democracy and Climate Change Conference
2022-04-19 09:00 - 12:15
Watch now

Panel 1, Panel 2

Climate Change poses a threat to democracy and constitutional order. But how might the structure of the U.S. Constitution help or hinder efforts to address and mitigate climate change? How can specific reforms or alternative approaches make a difference? How do other constitutional democracies approach these issues? We’ll tackle these questions and more across two expert panels: Is the Constitution the Problem? and Constitutional and Practical Reforms to Enable Effective Responses to Climate Change.
