Civil Rights Litigation Since 1978: A Practitioner’s Perspective
CSPL 217 Times: Th 6:00-9PM, Location: ONLINE
This course will examine major themes in modern civil rights litigation in the United States between 1978 and 2020. The course will review major cases challenging police misconduct, school and housing segregation, including exclusionary land use policies, sexual harassment and bullying as well as cases supporting voting and gay rights. Students will be asked to present argument before their peers regarding the issues raised in and by these cases and will also be presented with imaginary fact patterns and asked to discern the critical legal issues raised and apply both the settled law and aspirational law as we develop it through Socratic method. In addition, students will select an area of civil rights litigation and writing about its evolution.
Understanding the 2020 Presidential Election
CSPL399 Times: M.W. 1:20-2:40PM, Location: ONLINE
In understanding the 2020 Presidential Election, students will learn how to read skeptically the political press and how to write critically about presidential campaign politics. Along the way, the course will touch on electoral history, political and social thought, public policy, media criticism, and much more. Students will read past examples of thought-provoking and influential commentary. They will read current coverage in the legacy press of the 2020 presidential election and come to class prepared to discuss the most important stories and issues of the week. Students will have the opportunity to learn about electoral politics and political writing alongside a veteran journalist. Students who have experience working for political campaigns will have a chance to share their knowledge and help the class incorporate their experience in a larger historical framework. They will have a chance to see their work published in the Editorial Board, the lecturer’s daily politics newsletter. Students will attempt to do what political writers do in real-time: explain what’s happening from a unique, particular, and informed point of view for the benefit of like-minded citizens seeking to achieve the ideal of self-government. In the end, the hope is that students see that campaign politics is simpler and more complex than it appears, but that neither is obvious without study, focus, and understanding.