The University of Minnesota Law School, under Dean David Wippman, is creating an annual conference to address important legal issues from conservative and libertarian perpsectives. This year’s colloquium, on the topic of “Stare Decisis in Constitutional Law,” will be held October 3 at the law school, from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. It’s open to the […]
Author Archive | Dale Carpenter
McCain’s moment:
He’s terrible at delivery. He can’t read from a teleprompter to save his life. And convention organizers badly managed the aesthetics and failed early on to control the outbursts of protesters. But with this speech, and with Palin’s last night, the McCain campaign has finally moved away from trying to consolidate the base and is […]
Palin’s big moment:
On the substance of it, I was relieved the speech was free of red-meat social issues. It was about economics, reform, cutting taxes and spending, and national security. In other words, it focused on the kinds of things that made McCain an attractive candidate beyond the social-conservative base of the party. After all the caricaturing […]
Welcome to Minneapolis, Senator Craig and friends:
One more contribution to a robust political scene in the Twin Cities this week, from a local gay bar:
Those radical gay-loving Republicans:
This morning’s New York Times has the fascinating results of a poll of the views of Republican National Convention delegates on a variety of issues. The poll reveals that 49% of the GOP delegates support either gay marriage (6%) or civil unions (43%). Only 46% of the delegates believe there should be no legal recognition […]
President Palin:
I’ve been trying for the last day to figure out how I feel about McCain’s pick for Vice President. My first instinct was to think that this is a breathtakingly bad choice. It’s bad politics because it highlights the reckless side of McCain’s admirable boldness. And, far more importantly, it’s bad for the country because […]
The lights are on, but you’re not home:
According to Joan Walsh at Salon: [Bill Clinton] left the stage to U2’s “Beautiful Day,” which then strangely segued into Robert Palmer’s “Addicted to Love” — although the band cut off the refrain but the crowd shouted out the line they dropped: “You might as well face that you’re addicted to love.” This calls for […]
Del Martin, R.I.P.:
Starting in the 1950s, she was a leader for the rights of lesbians and gay men in a time when the FBI was infiltrating the meetings of gay organizations, sodomy laws were in force in all fifty states, police were raiding gay bars and humiliating, beating, and arresting patrons, and homosexuality was officially considered a […]
Good grief:
This just means yet another person much smarter than I will be writing for this blog. Welcome Eric!
Online debate about SSM:
The Federalist Society has posted a lively but civil debate about gay marriage on its website. The exchange is available here. The participants are: Andrew Koppelman (Northwestern), Bob Nagel (Colorado), Amy Wax (Penn), and me. I’m a big fan of the work of the other three participants and it was a pleasure to be involved. […]
New study says gay couples really do want marriage:
One of the most significant developments in the debate about same-sex marriage is that it is gradually moving from abstract discussions about philosophy and civil rights to concrete debates about evidence and experience. As more countries and states recognize gay marriage, we learn more and more about its effects and the characteristics of the families […]
Banana split:
I have some of the same reactions as Eugene to the Fifth Circuit’s denial of rehearing en banc in the sexual-devices case. The fact that there is now a split between the Fifth Circuit and the Eleventh Circuit on whether a state can ban the commercial promotion of sexual devices (including, without limitation, “dildos” and […]
DADT KO’d at NRO:
On the day that a House Armed Services subcommittee will hold a hearing on the continued viability of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” National Review Online has a good column by Deroy Murdock arguing that openly gay people should be allowed to serve. Murdock summarizes some familiar developments of the past 15 years that have undermined […]
Are judicial elections bad for business?
Yes, says the Manhattan Institute’s Walter Olson in a blog post. Olson, who has been deftly criticizing our society’s litigiousness for years at overlawyered.com, argues against what he sees as a trend in the business community toward support for direct election of state court judges. The argument has been that merit-screening panels and gubernatorial appointment […]
Gay-marriage ban headed for California vote:
Today the California Supreme Court unanimously refused to hear the attempt by Equality California to challenge the appearance of the proposed state constitutional amendment on the November ballot.