September 13, 2018

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MILWAUKEE — Legal scholars David A. Strauss from the University of Chicago and Ernest A. Young from Duke University will be the featured guests in an upcoming "On the Issues with Mike Gousha," Thursday, Sept. 20, at 12:30 p.m. in the Lubar Center at Marquette University Law School's Eckstein Hall.

Later that afternoon, at 4:30 p.m., Young will present the Law School's annual Boden Lecture, "Dying Constitutionalism and the Fourteenth Amendment," to a sold-out audience in Eckstein Hall's Lubar Center. Strauss will deliver a response.

During their On the Issues discussion, Strauss and Young will discuss the current state of the U.S. Supreme Court. For more than a decade, beginning in 1994, the Court had no change in justices — a period of stability almost unprecedented in American history. Now a majority of its current members have joined the Court since 2005. Has the Court changed all that much, or have we been in an even longer period of continuity than this focus on personnel would suggest? How does the Court of the past generation compare with other post-World War II eras in its approach to important areas of constitutional law involving individual rights and federal-state relations? Gousha will explore these and other questions in a conversation with two Supreme Court experts.

The Boden Lecture will use the sesquicentennial of the Fourteenth Amendment as an opportunity to examine the concept of a "living Constitution" — a familiar, if still contested, notion in American constitutional theory. Young will assess that amendment's history as a test case for living constitutionalism. In particular, this lecture will explore how the Fourteenth Amendment got so off track in its first 75 years, how it got back on track in the late twentieth century, and whether the theory of living constitutionalism can be modified to help it hang on to the Constitution's core commitments in the face of social change. Strauss — a preeminent scholar of living constitutionalism — will offer a commentary on Young's lecture. This annual lecture remembers the late Robert F. Boden, who served as dean of Marquette University Law School from 1965 to 1984.

Strauss, the Gerald Ratner Distinguished Service Professor of Law at the University of Chicago, is an editor of the Supreme Court Review, has argued 19 cases before the Court and serves as faculty director of the University of Chicago's Jenner & Block Supreme Court and Appellate Clinic. Young, the Alston & Bird Professor of Law at Duke University, is a scholar of federalism, a former law clerk to Justice David H. Souter of the U.S. Supreme Court and the principal author of amicus curiae briefs in several recent Supreme Court cases.

Gousha, an award-winning broadcast journalist, is the Law School's distinguished fellow in law and public policy. His "On the Issues" series of conversations with newsmakers supports Marquette Law School's commitment to serve as a modern-day public square for the city of Milwaukee, the state of Wisconsin and beyond.

Through public programming such as the Marquette Law School Poll, debates featuring candidates in significant political races, Gousha's "On the Issues" conversations with newsmakers, public lectures by leading scholars and conferences on significant issues of public importance, the Law School serves as the region's leading venue for serious civil discourse about law and public policy matters.

The On the Issues event is open to members of the general public at no cost; registration is required and is available online. The Boden Lecture is at capacity for members of the general public; registration for a waiting list is available online. Members of the media who are interested in attending either event should contact Chris Jenkins in the Office of Marketing and Communication.