Brandeis and Holmes Seminar

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Assoc Dir Law Lib
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Joined: Tue May 29, 2018 12:15 pm

Brandeis and Holmes Seminar

Post by Assoc Dir Law Lib »

Joe Gerken, reference librarian in the law library, will be offering a new upper-level law school course this coming semester. It is a seminar entitled “Brandeis and Holmes.”

The seminar will study, in depth, the careers and judicial output of two of the most influential justices ever to sit on the United States Supreme Court, Louis Brandeis and Oliver Wendell Holmes. In addition to the historic decisions that they rendered,, the course will focus on a number of legendary dissents, which laid the groundwork for subsequent developments such as the constitutional right to privacy and the “clear and present danger” standard in free speech cases.

Any judge is a product of his or her environment: social status, education, colleagues, political beliefs, work experience and, more generally, the era in which (s)he lives. Examining the justices in this context will yield insights into their body of work, their thought processes and, to put it colloquially, what made them “tick.” Holmes’ contributions to the philosophy of law and Brandeis’ brilliant career as “the people’s lawyer” have a special relevance here. The author of The Common Law wrote the great dissent in Abrams v. United States. The inventor of the Brandies Brief wrote the majority opinion in Erie Railroad v. Tompkins. Seeing their respective careers as a whole will enable students to appreciate that law is a human enterprise, written by judges and legislators, each of whom brings his or her unique background and point of view to bear on the issues confronting them.

For more information on this course, contact Mr. Gerken at gerken@buffalo.edu or at the law library reference desk. Thanks
Brian Detweiler
Associate Director
221A O'Brian Hall
Charles B. Sears Law Library
Buffalo, NY 14260
(716) 645-2384
briandet@buffalo.edu
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