The New York Observer notes Harvard Law School’s tentative steps towards faculty diversity with the hiring of three right-leaning professors among 20 recent hires:
[R]ecent hires have . . . added to the conservatives’ ranks. There is John Manning, 44, an expert on the separation of powers and the structure of government, who advocates for a strict reading of the U.S. Constitution, and 43-year-old Jack Goldsmith, an international-law expert known for questioning the efficacy of the International Criminal Court.
Both are highly regarded scholars and former Republican administration officials (Bush I for Manning, Bush II for Goldsmith). . .
In addition to Messrs. Manning and Goldsmith, joining next year is Adrian Vermeule, a constitutional, statutory-interpretation and administrative-law specialist who takes a social-science approach, reading empirical research and looking for counterintuitive solutions. Mr. Vermeule is currently at the University of Chicago, where he has won various teaching awards. He has written about constitutional issues in the context of national security, arguing that restricting some liberties isn’t at odds with the freedoms Americans enjoy, that people overreact in what he calls “libertarian panics.” He has also argued for the death penalty on “pro-life grounds,” citing studies that show it deters would-be killers. Yet he has also criticized some of what others see as the court’s conservative activism.
It’s a start. Link via Bashman.
Sufficient or no, Harvard Law has changed since the days when, as Mr. Berenson put it, “[Reagan Solicitor General] Charles Fried was the only game in town.”
Ain’t it the truth? Even before Berenson’s time, you had, say, Paul Bator (who supported Anderson in ’80) and Fried (who nominally supported Reagan but had nothing but contempt for the little people who put Reagan in office). Really slim pickins.
Student body was pretty monolithic, too. Bator took a pre-election open poll in his Fed Courts class. Out of over 100 students, 6 were supporting Reagan, and the rest were split between Carter and Anderson, with more supporting Anderson.