Panel to discuss legacy of the Robert Bork Supreme Court nomination
April 17, 2008
The University of Richmond Student Chapter of The Federalist Society will host a panel discussion April 24 to mark the 20th anniversary of Robert Bork's nomination to the U. S. Supreme Court. It will begin at 3 p.m. in the Moot Court Room of the University of Richmond School of Law and is free and open to the public.
The panelists will include Reagan administration officials John Bolton, the former U.N. ambassador who was assistant attorney general for legislative affairs during Bork's nomination, Terry Eastland, now the publisher of the Weekly Standard who directed the Department of Justice's Office of Public Affairs, and Eugene Hickok, who was special assistant in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Justice Department. John Douglass, dean of the law school, will moderate. There will be a question and answer session following the presentation.
Panelists will discuss Bork's nomination from an insider's perspective, including his qualifications, his jurisprudential philosophy, political considerations regarding his confirmation and the effect the nomination has had on subsequent Supreme Court nominations.
Bork's career has included terms as solicitor general, acting attorney general and judge of the U. S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. He is the author of several books, including "The Antitrust Paradox," "Slouching towards Gomorrah: Modern Liberalism and American Decline" and "Coercing Virtue: The Worldwide Rule of Judges."
The Federalist Society is a nonprofit organization of conservatives and libertarians interested in the current state of the legal order. It is founded on the principles that the state exists to preserve individual freedom, the separation of powers is central to our constitution, and it is the province and duty of the judiciary to say what the law is, not what it should be. Through chapters across the country, the society seeks to promote an awareness of those principles and to further their application.