Robert P. George

Theorists of public morality—from the ancient Greek philosophers and Roman jurists on—have noticed that apparently private acts of vice, when they multiply and become widespread, can imperil important public interests. This fact embarrasses philosophical efforts to draw a sharp line . . . . Continue Reading »

( The following was delivered upon the occasion of Prof. George’s acceptance of the Philip Merrill Award bestowed by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni. ) So tonight we celebrate ACTA and the great cause of higher education reform for which it fights. Buy why does it fight? Why do we . . . . Continue Reading »

“Each nation that has ‘liberal’ abortion laws has rapidly become, if it was not already, a nation of murderers.” The person who spoke those words was not Operation Rescue’s Randall Terry, or the Reverend Jerry Falwell, or some fundamentalist preacher from the Ozarks. She . . . . Continue Reading »

The question is: How do immigrants become Americans? Now, I cannot claim any expertise on questions of immigration policy. I have not explored the vast bodies of literature in sociology, political science, history, and economics devoted to questions of immigration in the United States. Nor have I . . . . Continue Reading »

Disputes about metaphysical issues rarely make the newspapers. The ancient argument about the nature and identity of the human person, however, turns out to be highly relevant to issues that contemporary Americans read about, and argue about, every day. As Yale psychology professor Paul Bloom . . . . Continue Reading »

After the Supreme Court’s landmark 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education ordering the desegregation of public schools in Topeka, Kansas, lawsuits promptly were brought to dismantle legally sanctioned segregation in other states. One of these was Arkansas. There, Governor Orville . . . . Continue Reading »

There is a sense in which twentieth-century legal philosophy began on January 8, 1897. On that day, Oliver Wendell Holmes, then a justice of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, spoke at a ceremony dedicating the new hall of the Boston University School of Law. In his remarks, which were . . . . Continue Reading »

In 1993, Colorado enacted a law prohibiting any person within one hundred feet of a “health care facility” to approach”indeed, to come within eight feet of”another person in order to hand that person “a leaflet or handbill,” “display a sign,” or . . . . Continue Reading »

On the morning of his Commonwealth’s 1992 presidential primary, I got a telephone call from Pennsylvania Governor Robert P. Casey, a man whose pro“life record I knew and admired, but whom I had never met. A mutual friend had given him a copy of a talk I had presented to the Catholic bishops . . . . Continue Reading »

Participants Josh Dever Robert P. George Josh Dever As an atheist, a liberal, and a philosopher, I suppose I’m as likely as anyone to qualify as a proponent of Robert P. George’s “secular orthodoxy” (“A Clash of Orthodoxies,” August/September 1999). As such, I’d like to say a few . . . . Continue Reading »