Liberty Law Talk

This next conversation is with Richard Samuelson on the constitutional principles that have guided our nation's approach to immigration, that is, until recently. In an essay in the Summer 2013 Claremont Review of Books, (link no longer available) adapted from an academic version published in Citizens and Statesman, Samuelson argues that Our political institutions strive to treat individuals as individuals, who relate to the government on that basis, rather than as parts of groups, castes, or classes. A regime dedicated to protecting the rule of law and the rights of men–including the right of each individual to make his way in…Read More

This next conversation is with Richard Samuelson on the constitutional principles that have guided our nation's approach to immigration, that is, until recently. In an essay in the Summer 2013 Claremont Review of Books, adapted from an academic version published in Citizens and Statesman, Samuelson argues that Our political institutions strive to treat individuals as individuals, who relate to the government on that basis, rather than as parts of groups, castes, or classes. A regime dedicated to protecting the rule of law and the rights of men–including the right of each individual to make his way in the world, and to…Read More

Mark Helprin, award-winning novelist, former member of the Israeli Army and Air Force, foreign and military policy strategist, comes to Liberty Law Talk to discuss his latest novel, In Sunlight and In Shadow. Strange, you say, for a site devoted to law and political thought to devote time to a novel, a love story at that. However, Helprin's book is a story of many things that all seem to connect and hold together. The tapestry created is of love, honor, dignity, and the freedom to act heroically within a democratic political and social order that trims, calculates, and forgets the…Read More

Mark Helprin, award-winning novelist, former member of the Israeli Army and Air Force, foreign and military policy strategist, comes to Liberty Law Talk to discuss his latest novel, In Sunlight and In Shadow. Strange, you say, for a site devoted to law and political thought to devote time to a novel, a love story at that. However, Helprin's book is a story of many things that all seem to connect and hold together. The tapestry created is of love, honor, dignity, and the freedom to act heroically within a democratic political and social order that trims, calculates, and forgets the…Read More

Mark Helprin, award-winning novelist, former member of the Israeli Army and Air Force, foreign and military policy strategist, comes to Liberty Law Talk to discuss his latest novel, In Sunlight and In Shadow. Strange, you say, for a site devoted to law and political thought to devote time to a novel, a love story at that. However, Helprin's book is a story of many things that all seem to connect and hold together. The tapestry created is of love, honor, dignity, and the freedom to act heroically within a democratic political and social order that trims, calculates, and forgets the…Read More

This next Liberty Law Talk is a conversation with Justin Litke on his new book, Twilight of the Republic. Our conversation focuses on the book's attempt to situate twentieth century claims of American Exceptionalism within the context of the political symbols and public meanings that are revealed in significant political documents stretching back to the Mayflower Compact and forward to Albert Beveridge's 1900 Senate speech "In Support of American Empire." Along the way, we discuss the Declaration of Independence, Federalist Papers, the Constitution, and the presidency of Abraham Lincoln in order to better understand Litke's powerfully argued claim that the…Read More

This next Liberty Law Talk is a conversation with Justin Litke on his new book, Twilight of the Republic. Our conversation focuses on the book's attempt to situate twentieth century claims of American Exceptionalism within the context of the political symbols and public meanings that are revealed in significant political documents stretching back to the Mayflower Compact and forward to Albert Beveridge's 1900 Senate speech "In Support of American Empire." Along the way, we discuss the Declaration of Independence, Federalist Papers, the Constitution, and the presidency of Abraham Lincoln in order to better understand Litke's powerfully argued claim that the…Read More

This next Liberty Law Talk is a conversation with Justin Litke on his new book, Twilight of the Republic. Our conversation focuses on the book's attempt to situate twentieth century claims of American Exceptionalism within the context of the political symbols and public meanings that are revealed in significant political documents stretching back to the Mayflower Compact and forward to Albert Beveridge's 1900 Senate speech "In Support of American Empire." Along the way, we discuss the Declaration of Independence, Federalist Papers, the Constitution, and the presidency of Abraham Lincoln in order to better understand Litke's powerfully argued claim that the…Read More

This next Liberty Law Talk is with Marc DeGirolami on his new book, The Tragedy of Religious Freedom (Harvard University Press, 2013). Central to DeGirolami's argument is the failure of monistic accounts that seek to resolve religious liberty disputes by cosmic appeals to neutrality, equality, or other universal rationales. These fail because they do not consider the range of conflicts, practices, traditions, and meanings that are at stake in these highly controverted cases. Similarly, DeGirolami takes issue with those who deny even the possibility of the concept of religious freedom. Instead, he looks in a Burkean manner to how the practices…Read More

This next Liberty Law Talk is with Marc DeGirolami on his new book, The Tragedy of Religious Freedom (Harvard University Press, 2013). Central to DeGirolami's argument is the failure of monistic accounts that seek to resolve religious liberty disputes by cosmic appeals to neutrality, equality, or other universal rationales. These fail because they do not consider the range of conflicts, practices, traditions, and meanings that are at stake in these highly controverted cases. Similarly, DeGirolami takes issue with those who deny even the possibility of the concept of religious freedom. Instead, he looks in a Burkean manner to how the practices…Read More

This next Liberty Law Talk is with Marc DeGirolami on his new book, The Tragedy of Religious Freedom (Harvard University Press, 2013). Central to DeGirolami's argument is the failure of monistic accounts that seek to resolve religious liberty disputes by cosmic appeals to neutrality, equality, or other universal rationales. These fail because they do not consider the range of conflicts, practices, traditions, and meanings that are at stake in these highly controverted cases. Similarly, DeGirolami takes issue with those who deny even the possibility of the concept of religious freedom. Instead, he looks in a Burkean manner to how the practices…Read More

This Liberty Law Talk is with philosopher Eric Mack on Friedrich Hayek's 1973 magnum opus, Law, Legislation and Liberty. Hayek's significant trilogy distinguishes between law and legislation, considers the appropriate rule of judges within a spontaneous order, observes the difficulties of even defining social justice, and attempts to set forth the principles of a new constitutional order for a free people. This conversation considers at length the major ideas that Hayek advances in his incredible work on the principles of law and just order.

Friedrich HayekThis Liberty Law Talk is with philosopher Eric Mack on Friedrich Hayek's 1973 magnum opus, Law, Legislation and Liberty. Hayek's significant trilogy distinguishes between law and legislation, considers the appropriate rule of judges within a spontaneous order, observes the difficulties of even defining social justice, and attempts to set forth the principles of a new constitutional order for a free people. This conversation considers at length the major ideas that Hayek advances in his incredible work on the principles of law and just order.

This Liberty Law Talk is with philosopher Eric Mack on Friedrich Hayek's 1973 magnum opus, Law, Legislation and Liberty. Hayek's significant trilogy distinguishes between law and legislation, considers the appropriate rule of judges within a spontaneous order, observes the difficulties of even defining social justice, and attempts to set forth the principles of a new constitutional order for a free people. This conversation considers at length the major ideas that Hayek advances in his incredible work on the principles of law and just order.

This Liberty Law Talk is with Ted Frank on reforming class action litigation and, in particular, the settlements plaintiffs receive under the current system. Frank, the founder of the Center for Class Action Fairness, argues that class-action suits contribute little to plaintiffs and substantially benefit only their lawyers. Monitoring and agency problems reign because most plaintiffs lack the incentives to ensure that the class's lawyers are actually representing their interests and not the lawyer's monetary desires. We also discuss the turn to arbitration by companies as an exit from class actions and Frank's work that contests egregious attorney fee awards…Read More