Bush Presidency, Constitution, and Supreme Court Discussed

By Communications staff, Washington State University

The Thomas S. Foley Institute for Public Policy and Public Service will present a policy forum Friday (Dec. 3) from 3-5 p.m. in the Samuel H. Smith Center for Undergraduate Education, Room 518. 

The WSU Department of Political Science professor Cornell Clayton will moderate the event, which will focus its discussion on the Bush presidency, the Constitution and the Supreme Court.

The event will feature four distinguished panelists from various universities across the country. They include David A. Yalof, associate professor of political science at the University of Connecticut; Nancy Kassop, professor and chair for the Department of Political Science and International Relations at the State University of New York, New Paltz; David M. O’Brien, the Leone Reaves and George W. Spicer Professor at the University of Virginia; and H. W. Perry Jr., who has a joint appointment on the faculties of both the Department of Government and the School of Law at the University of Texas, Austin. 

Yalof received a doctorate from Johns Hopkins University and a law degree from the University of Virginia. His first book, “Pursuit of Justices: Presidential Politics and the Selection of Supreme Court Nominees” (University of Chicago Press, 1999), was awarded the American Political Science Association’s Richard E. Neustadt Award as the best book published on presidential studies in 1999. Yalof has written extensively on issues in constitutional law and Supreme Court appointment politics. His work has been published in a number of publications, including “Political Research Quarterly,” “Judicature,” “Constitutional Commentary” and various law reviews.

Kassop writes on issues that are at the intersection of the presidency and law. Her most recent articles include “Expansion and Contraction: Clinton’s Impact on the Scope of Presidential Powers,” published in the book by David G. Adler and Michael A. Genovese “The President and the Law: The Clinton Legacy” (University Press of Kansas, 2002); “The War Power and Its Limits” in Presidential Studies Quarterly” (September 2003); “Not Going Public: George W. Bush and the Presidential Records Act” in the book by Lori Cox Han and Diane J. Heith “In the Public Domain: Presidents and the Challenge of Public Leadership” (SUNY Press, forthcoming, 2005); and “When Law and Politics Collide: Presidents and the Use of the Twenty-Fifth Amendment” published in “Presidential Studies Quarterly” (March 2005, forthcoming).

O’Brien has been a Judicial Fellow and Research Associate at the U.S. Supreme Court and has held Fulbright Teaching and Research Awards at Oxford University, England, the University of Bologna, Italy, and in Japan. He has also been a Visiting Fellow at the Russell Sage Foundation in New York. His most recent book is “Animal Sacrifice & Religious Freedom: The Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City of Hialeah.” O’Brien has co-authored a number of books, including “Government by the People” (20th ed.).

Perry is chair of the public law subfield in the Department of Government and is the director of the combined juris doctor and doctoral program in law and government. He was named the Astor Visiting Lecture at Oxford University in summer 2000 and gave the Sixth Annual Law and Social Science Lecture at Oxford in May 2000. Perry’s research interests center around topics at the intersection of law and politics with a particular focus on legal institutions. He also does research on topics of constitutional law, with a particular interest in federalism, separation of powers and freedom of expression. 

Clayton received a doctorate in politics from Oxford University. He has been a Senior Fulbright Scholar, a Mellon Scholar, and a Truman Scholar and has held fellowships at the European Union Institute, the Salzburg Seminar Institute and the Miller Center for Public Affairs at the University of Virginia. His research focuses on American political institutions and judicial politics. 

For more information on the forum, contact the Foley Institute at (509) 335-3477.

Next Story

Recent News

Students design outdoor story walk for Keller schools

A group of WSU landscape architecture students is gaining hands‑on experience by designing an outdoor classroom with members of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Indian Reservation.
By Communications staff, Washington State University