The Constitutional Legacy of Thomas Jefferson
| When |
Sep 26, 2011
from 06:00 PM to 07:00 PM |
|---|---|
| Where | Chao Auditorium, Ekstrom Library, University of Louisville |
| Contact Name | GlyptusAnn Grider Jones |
| Contact Phone | 502-852-8811 |
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Guest lecturer Richard (R.B.) Bernstein will trace Thomas Jefferson's engagement with the theory and practice of constitutional government from his early days as a Virginia lawyer in colonial America through his last public letter. The lecture is the second installment of the McConnell Center's year-long history project, "Remembering America: From Colonization to the Cold War."
Bernstein's free and public lecture is scheduled from 6-7 p.m., Sept. 26, at Chao Auditorium located at the University of Louisville's Ekstrom Library (directions).
Bernstein will consider the relationship between Jefferson's constitutional theory and practice and address Jefferson's failures to reconcile his professed commitments to principle (such as freedom of the press and human equality) with his actual practice, both personal and political. According to Bernstein, these failures raise questions about Jefferson’s sincerity and about any politician’s ability to reconcile theory and practice in dealing with the conflicts between liberty and power at the core of constitutional government.
About the Lecturer
R. B. Bernstein, Distinguished Adjunct Professor of Law at New York Law School, was born and raised in New York City, where he still lives. He was educated at Amherst College, the Harvard Law School and New York University. He has written, edited or co-edited 20 books on American constitutional and legal history, focusing on the American Revolution and the early American republic. Works include The Founding Fathers Reconsidered (Oxford, 2009), which a finalist for the 2010 George Washington Book Prize, and Thomas Jefferson (Oxford, 2003). He is now working on The Education of John Adams, a concise biography scheduled for publication by Oxford University Press in 2012.
About the McConnell Center
The McConnell Center offers this Civic Education Program to the public free of charge. The non-profit, non-partisan program was established to assist Kentucky citizens develop a better understanding of the American Constitution and American history and encourage open and free discussion of perennial concerns that inform contemporary politics.