Hugo L. Black Lecture on Freedom of Expression
Freedom of Thought and the Struggle to End Slavery
Professor Keith Whittington, Princeton University
Thursday, March 31, 2022, 7:00 pm
Daniel Family Commons, Usdan Hall and a Zoom Webinar.
Please register for the webinar event here.
Please register for the in-person event here.
This annual lecture is designed to bring to the Wesleyan Campus, public figures and scholars with experience and expertise in matters related to the First Amendment and freedom of expression. This lecture is endowed by Leonard S. Halpert ’44 (1922–2017), who believed that the First Amendment to the US Constitution is the basis upon which we enjoy all other Civil Rights. This lecture is named in honor of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Hugo L. Black.
About the Lecture
The abolitionists saw the success of their movement as a victory for free speech, as well as for human liberty generally. To them, free speech was a necessary adjunct to their goal of converting a small movement on the fringes of mainstream politics into a powerful political force that could shape public opinion and win democratic elections. Their opponents thought the same, and engaged in aggressive efforts to suppress and silence antislavery speakers and writers in the antebellum period. The struggle to end slavery was also a struggle to extend and protect the freedom of speech.
Keith Whittington Bio
Keith E. Whittington is the William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Politics at Princeton University and is currently the chair of Academic Freedom Alliance and a visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution. He works on American constitutional history, politics and law, and on American political thought. He is the author of Repugnant Laws: Judicial Review of Acts of Congress from the Founding to the Present and Speak Freely: Why Universities Must Defend Free Speech, among other works. He has been a visiting professor at Harvard Law School, Georgetown University Law Center, and the University of Texas School of Law, and he is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He did his undergraduate work at the University of Texas at Austin and completed his Ph.D. in political science at Yale University.
Hugo L. Black Lecturers 1991 - 2021
Keith Whittington William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Politics at Princeton University |
|
Bertrall Ross |
Jelani Cobb |
A. Leon Higginbotham Jr. |
Rodney Smolla |
Harry A. Blackmun |
Margaret Marshall |
Anthony Lewis |
Cass Sunstein |
Nadine Strossen |
Patricia Williams |
Abner Mikva |
Laurence H. Tribe |
Norman Dorsen |
Director, Edmond J. Safra Foundation Center for Ethic Professor, Harvard Law School |
Patricia Wald |
Jack M. Balkin |
Floyd Abrahms |
Antonin Scalia |
Kathleen Sullivan |
Geoffrey R. Stone |
Nat Hentoff |
Aharon Barak |
Lee C. Bollinger |
Sol and Lillian Goldman Professor of Law Dean, Yale Law School |
Anthony D. Romero
|
The Davidson-Kahn Distinguished University Professor and Professor of Law Florida International University |
Linda Greenhouse
|
John Finn |