The Supreme Court’s new term begins on the First Monday in October. So each year the Center for Policy Studies invites a panel of our distinguished Law faculty to discuss what major issues are on the docket, how they might be decided, and why. This year there’s a bit to look back on as well… especially but not limited to a certain decision about a health care law…

Jonathan Adler is Professor of Law and Directs the CWRU Center for Business Law and Regulation. Jonathan Entin is Associate Dean and Professor of Law and Political Science. Ken Ledford is Associate Professor of History and Law. Their wide range of views and expertise ensures that the presentation every year is filled with both information and insight.

About Our Guests...

Jonathan Adler is the author or editor of four books on environmental policy and over a dozen book chapters. His articles have appeared in publications ranging from the Harvard Environmental Law Review and Supreme Court Economic Review to The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post. Professor Adler is a Senior Fellow at the Property & Environment Research Center in Bozeman, Montana, a contributing editor to National Review Online and a regular contributor to the popular legal blog, “The Volokh Conspiracy” (http://volokh.com). A 2007 study identified Professor Adler as the most cited legal academic in environmental law under age 40, and his recent article, “Money or Nothing: The Adverse Environmental Consequences of Uncompensated Law Use Controls,” published in the Boston College Law Review, was selected as one of the ten best articles in land use and environmental law in 2008.

Jonathan Entin has taught Constitutional Law, Administrative Law, Courts, Public Policy, and Social Change, and a Supreme Court Seminar. Before joining the faculty in 1984, he clerked for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg (when she was on the U.S. court of Appeals) and practiced in Washington with Steptoe & Johnson. The recipient of several teaching awards and a former co-editor of the Journal of Legal Education, he is at work on a book about equal protection. Among his recent publications are "An Ohio Dilemma: Race, Equal Protection, and the Unfulfilled Promise of a State Bill of Rights," Cleveland State Law Review (2004), and "Judicial Selection and Political Culture," Capital University Law Review (2002).

Kenneth Ledford is a social historian of modern Germany, from 1789 to the present. His research interests focus primarily upon processes of class formation, particularly the emergence and decline of the profound influence of the educated, liberal middle-class of education, the Bildungsbürgertum. The salient ideology of this social group was classical liberalism, whose vocabulary both shaped and was shaped by the primary social institution of the Bürgertum, law and the legal order. Professor Ledford has written about German lawyers in private practice, and his present work is on a book about the Prussian judiciary between 1848 and 1918; in all of his research, a clearer analysis of the complex interplay among state, civil society, and the ideology of the state ruled by law (Rechtsstaat) remains the goal. Professor Ledford's teaching interests extend beyond German history since 1789 to include the history of the European middle classes, the history of the professions, European legal history, other processes of class formation including German and European labor history, as well as the history of European international relations and diplomatic history.

Where We Meet

The Friday Public Affairs Lunch convenes each Friday when classes are in session, from 12:30 p.m. to 1:30 p.m. We usually meet in the Dampeer Room of Kelvin Smith Library. The Dampeer Room is on the second floor of the library. If you get off the elevators, turn right, pass the first bank of tables, and turn right again. Occasionally we need to use a different room; that will always be announced in the weekly e-mails.

Parking Possibilities

The most convenient parking is the lot underneath Severance Hall. We regret that it is not free. From that lot there is an elevator up to street level (labeled as for the Thwing Center); it is less than 50 yards from that exit to the library entrance. You can get from the Severance garage to the library without going outside. Near the entry gates - just to the right if you were driving out - there is a door into a corridor. Walk down the corridor and there will be another door. Beyond that door you'll find the entrance to an elevator which goes up to an entrance right inside the doors to Kelvin Smith Library.

Friday Lunch Upcoming Topics and Speakers:

September 7: Cleveland's Downtown Rebound? With Richey Piiparinen, M.A., M.U.P.D.D., Center on Urban Poverty and Community Development, MSASS *** Special Location: Baker-Nord Room, Clark Hall-Room 206***

September 14: High Cost-Sharing for Prescription Drugs: Patient Response, Physician Response, and Public Policy. With Mariana Carrera, Assistant Professor of Economics

September 21: The Future of University Libraries. With Arnold Hirshon, Associate Provost and University Librarian

September 28: The European Economy and EU Politics. With Elliot Posner, Associate Professor of Political Science *** Special Location: Mather House 100***

October 5: Presidents and the Media. With Jeffrey E. Cohen Ph.D., Professor and Chair, Department of Political Science, Fordham University

October 12: The Future of Primary Care. With George Kikano MD, Chair, Department of Family Medicine.

October 19: Biblical Rhetoric in the 2012 Elections. With Timothy K. Beal, Florence Harkness Professor of Religion.

October 26: Special Event in Memory of Alec Lamis – “Insecure Majorities: Congress and the Permanent Campaign.” With Frances E. Lee, Professor of Government and Politics, University of Maryland ***Special Location: Wolstein Medical Research Building auditorium, first floor, 2103 Cornell Road. Lunch and Mama Jo’s pies provided.***

November 2: Political Science Department Pre-Election Forecasts. With Justin Buchler, Associate Professor of Political Science, and colleagues.

November 9: What Just Happened? Open discussion about the election results, with Joe White, Chair, Department of Political Science.

November 16: Learning from Mad Cows. With Dr. Pierluigi Gambetti, Professor and Director, Division of Neuropathology and Director, National Prion Disease Pathology Surveillance Center.

November 23: No Session - Thanksgiving Break

November 30: The Medium is the Message: What Happens When Universities Digitize Course Evaluations. With Timothy J. Fogarty, Professor of Accountancy.

December 7: The “Chicago Boys” Without Pinochet: Privatization and Protest in Chile. With Diane Haughney, Ph.D.