Benjamin N. Lawrance— March 9 marks the 174th anniversary of the Supreme Court decision U.S. v Amistad, one of the most celebrated U.S. “freedom suits.” Since the case’s conclusion in 1841, the charismatic leadership of Cinqué (Sengbe Pieh) and the rhetorical prowess of former President John Quincy Adams and others
Philip N. Howard— Since the great tragedy of Charlie Hebdo, politicians and pundits around the world have succumbed to the notion that social media, such as Facebook and Twitter, are to blame for violent online extremism. They argue that social media is not only a conduit for terrorists it is
John D. Inazu— In the early days of the Ferguson protests this past August following the death of Michael Brown, President Obama insisted that “our constitutional rights to speak freely, to assemble, and to report in the press must be vigilantly safeguarded: especially in moments like these.” He was right.
Anna Harvey— On October 19, 1789, John Jay took the oath of office to begin serving as our nation’s first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. The canonical story about Jay’s service as Chief is that he resigned from the bench in 1795 to serve as New York’s second governor (after
On this day in 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. gave what is widely hailed as the best political speech of the twentieth century. King famously departed from his prepared text to expound upon his dream, a vision of a nation living in racial harmony. Folk history has it that Mahalia
Read the profile of Cass Sunstein in the May 2014 issue of The Atlantic! Follow @CassSunstein From last minute impulse buying at the grocery store to the way we treat the environment, it goes without saying that we are sometimes prone to making decisions that are not in our own best
Listen to the podcast interview for The Terror Courts on iTunesU! Follow @JessBravin On the Yale Press Podcast, in conversation with Yale University Press Director John Donatich, author Jess Bravin revealed: “It was one of the commission’s big advocates, Senator Lindsey Graham, who told me, in effect, that you needed to put
Follow @yaleSCIbooks Today is the 40th anniversary of the Endangered Species Act (ESA) of 1973. The ESA attempts to protect species from extinction as a “consequence of economic growth and development untempered by adequate concern and conservation.” The ESA uses quite broad language, protecting “any species”. There was some question
Stein Ringen, author of the recently published Nation of Devils: Democratic Leadership and the Problem of Obedience, writes here on the current state of American democracy in light of the recent shutdown, financial concerns driving policy, and the possible erosion of the government into “soft despotism.” His book addresses one of the primary
“Who owns your email? What about work place creation? Who owns what you come up with at work? Does it matter whether you used company technology to create and learn?” These questions, asked by Deven Desai of Concurring Opinions, and related discussions on the economics of human capital form the