Online Civil Liberties Course with Robert P. George

Civil Liberties: An Online Course with Robert P. George

 

For the first time, Princeton’s McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence, James Madison Program Director, and JMC fellow Robert P. George’s signature course on Civil Liberties will be available online on edX.org. The free, seven-week course is open to the public and will begin on September 13, 2018.

To enroll, visit https://www.edx.org/course/civil-liberties >>

About the Course


“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.”

These stirring words from the Declaration of Independence are at the very foundation of the American tradition of civil liberties. In this course, we explore this tradition from its beginning with the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Federalist Papers, through a number of notable historical and contemporary cases in which claims to rights and liberties have been at stake.

We will examine issues of slavery, segregation, abortion, campaign finance, free speech, religion, affirmative action, and marriage.  Our discussion will be guided by thinkers like John Locke, John Stuart Mill, Friedrich Hayek, and Martin Luther King Jr., as well as important Supreme Court opinions, such as the majority and dissenting opinions in Dred Scott v. Sandford (on slavery), Brown v. Board of Education (on segregation), Roe v. Wade (on abortion), Citizens United v. FEC (on campaign finance and free speech), and Obergefell v. Hodges (on marriage).

We do not seek unanimity of opinion, but rather a deepening of understanding. Whatever your views happen to be—liberal, conservative, whatever—they will be sympathetically explored but also challenged. The goal of the course is not to persuade you to think as anyone else does; rather, it is to encourage and empower you to think about disputed questions of civil rights and liberties more deeply, more critically, and for yourself.

What you’ll learn

 

·         The historical foundations of civil rights and liberties in the United States
·         How influential philosophers have thought about important civil rights issues
·         The arguments presented in groundbreaking Supreme Court opinions
·         How to critically analyze controversial claims to civil rights and liberties
·         An understanding and respect for those who have differing opinions

Enroll for the course here >>


 

Robert P. George is the McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence and Director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University. George has served as chairman of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom and as a presidential appointee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. He has also served on the President’s Council on Bioethics and as the U.S. member of UNESCO’s World Commission on the Ethics of Science and Technology. George is also a visiting professor at Harvard Law School. His most recent book is Conscience and Its Enemies (ISI Books). George recently received a Leadership Award from the Heterodox Academy.

Learn more about Robert George >>

 

 


 

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