Opinion | The Challenges of Teaching Constitutional Law Today
To the Editor:
Re “How to Teach Students About a Politicized Supreme Court,” by Jesse Wegman (Opinion, March 3):
Mr. Wegman asserts that teaching constitutional law has relied on the belief that the Supreme Court is a “legitimate institution of governance” and its justices, “whatever their political backgrounds, care about getting the law right.”
Perhaps it is because I am a political scientist teaching constitutional law and politics to undergraduates rather than a legal scholar teaching it to aspiring lawyers, but this premise suffers from a rosy reading of the past.
From the very outset of the American republic, the Supreme Court has engaged in political maneuvering framed in legal language. Through the Civil War and the New Deal and the social tumult of the 1960s, the justices offered legal reasoning embodying political ideology and swollen with political ramifications.
We can decry the potentially suspect motivations behind Bush v. Gore or the shoddy treatment of historical evidence in the Bruen gun rights case, and we can lament the polarization of the confirmation process or the partisan voting patterns of the current justices. But the idea that we are shocked — shocked! — to find politics going on here is simply not credible.
Justin Crowe
Williamstown, Mass.
The writer, a professor of political science at Williams College, is the author of “Building the Judiciary: Law, Courts and the Politics of Institutional Development.”
To the Editor:
I came of age as a young law student in the mid-1980s, and of late I often think of my venerable law professor at Columbia Law School, the late Louis Henkin. He taught us to revere the Supreme Court, and we did so, reading the legions of seminal decisions based primarily on well-reasoned constitutional analysis respecting stare decisis.
I can only imagine what he would be thinking now. How unfortunate for rising lawyers.
Carole R. Bernstein
Westport, Conn.
To the Editor:
As a liberal and a constitutional law professor at Georgia State University, I can understand the visceral reaction that some law professors have had to recent Supreme Court jurisprudence.
As a citizen who lives under the court’s decisions, I share many left-leaning law academics’ concerns about the future of racial justice, reproductive choice, sexual minority rights, the administrative state and congressional power.
However, as a scholar of American political development, studying how law and politics interact over time, I have found that the court’s rulings do not affect my syllabus or pedagogy.
I convey to students that the Supreme Court has typically been an institution that reflects the majority’s will. I also emphasize that constitutional law is often in crisis — it was in the early 1800s, the 1830s, the 1860s and the 1930s. I acknowledge that precedents come and go.
Even more important, I explore how American constitutionalism develops in places beyond the Supreme Court — presidential politics, major legislative efforts, social movements, political party formation, public opinion, etc.
For all these reasons, I teach constitutional law as the history of doctrine through time, with careful attention paid to the social, political and economic influences on constitutionalism. And I sleep well at night.
Anthony Michael Kreis
Atlanta
Condemn Trump’s Mockery of Biden’s Stutter
To the Editor:
Re “Trump Blasts Biden’s Speech and Mocks Stutter” (news article, March 11):
I am a longtime stutterer. Donald Trump’s mockery of President Biden’s stutter must be quickly and strongly condemned by everyone across the political spectrum. It is unseemly and bullying, venal and unacceptable.
We can differ on the issues, even forcefully, but going after a personal disability that affects an estimated nearly three million Americans — even Republicans! — is cruel and heartless, and must be forcefully denounced.
Jerry Slaff
Rockville, Md.
Biden Enthusiasts
To the Editor:
Re “Gladly Going Against Grain to Love Biden” (front page, March 5):
I noted with interest your article about the people who feel isolated because they are still positive about President Biden and about re-electing him.
I must report that I have had the opposite experience: In my social circle of well-informed and civically engaged friends, there is widespread enthusiasm for him. We’re aware that he’s the most pro-labor president since F.D.R. and that much historic legislation has become law during his administration.
Glenna Matthews
Laguna Beach, Calif.
Medications to Combat Alcoholism
To the Editor:
Re “Alcohol-Related Deaths Surge to Nearly 500 a Day, C.D.C. Says” (news article, nytimes.com, Feb. 29):
As a physician treating many people with addiction, I appreciate the recent coverage of the increased rates of alcohol-related deaths. The reporters cite several strategies to reduce harms from alcohol. One unmentioned and highly effective approach is to educate people on medications that can reduce alcohol cravings, and the amount people drink.
Naltrexone and Acamprosate are two F.D.A.-approved medications for alcohol use disorder that can help people who binge drink or drink heavily on a regular basis. Neither drug makes someone physically ill if they consume alcohol while taking it, unlike the medication that was most commonly prescribed in previous decades:disulfiram (also known as Antabuse).
Unfortunately, many people believe that they can quit drinking using willpower alone. While this approach may work for some, the vast majority of people with an alcohol use disorder will benefit from one of these two medications.
I encourage every person who is concerned about their own drinking to talk with their doctor about receiving medical treatment to help them cut back or quit. People who are worried about their loved one should talk with them about how they may want to speak with their doctor about this type of care.
Eileen Barrett
Albuquerque
Reading the Greats
To the Editor:
Re “We Need to Read the Forgotten Geniuses, Not Rescue Them,” by Apoorva Tadepalli (Opinion guest essay, nytimes.com, Feb. 28):
When I retired from teaching English and moved to Charlottesville, Va., I missed the classroom and taught three courses at what was then the Jefferson Institute for Lifelong Learning.
The classes on poetry and James Joyce’s “Dubliners” were well attended, but the surprise came when I offered Robert Fagles’s translation of Homer’s “Iliad.” I had 32 people sign up for it, and when the six weeks of class ended, they demanded that I go on to teach the “Odyssey.”
I saw no reason for them to pay to hear the same historical background on Homer and ancient Greece, so I booked a meeting room at the central library and we began a literary odyssey of our own that has continued for 15 years, reading the world’s great literature, from classical authors to Dante, “Beowulf,” “Canterbury Tales,” the great Russians and beyond.
I don’t teach it. We teach ourselves, spending weeks on a book, each person bringing to the group the thoughts we have while reading the canon. The pleasure we get from reading “the greats” has enriched our lives and given us a strong bond. I no longer teach. I share.
Carolyn McGrath
Charlottesville, Va.
