Legal Commentary

I'm back from a weekend jaunt to South Bend -- the "gateway to Mishawaka," as Rick Garnett once described it to me -- and I'm happy to say that the Dome is doing as well as ever and that the Law School is flourishing. 

The occasion was a roundtable discussion on Kent Greenawalt's Religion and the Constitution: Establishment and Fairness, the second in his comprehensive and magisterial two-volume "treatise" on law and religion.  The discussants included Larry Alexander and Steve Smith of San Diego, Steve Smith of Virginia, Robert Audi, Kathleen Brady, John Finnis, Frederick Mark Gedicks, Cathleen Kaveny, Andrew Koppelman, Mark Noll, Robert Rodes, Winnifred Fallers Sullivan, Nelson Tebbe, Rick Garnett (the host), and the author himself. 

The discussion itself was a treat.  At the risk of boiling down a day's discussion, everyone agreed about the magnitude of Kent's accomplishment in dealing in a characteristically sensitive and careful manner with a vast and complicated subject.  The broader question was whether Kent's promise to build the Religion Clauses "from the bottom up" can be accomplished in the absence of a stronger overarching and organizing theory that allows one to reconcile the many competing values that contend for inclusion in thinking about the Religion Clauses.   

I can think of better things for my confidence than being the junior member of a very distinguished conference, but I can't think of much that would have been more enjoyable and educational.  Thanks, Rick and everyone else, for a wonderful conference and a great education.