Byron R. White Center for the Study of American Constitutional Law
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• Director, Byron White Center: Professor Richard B. Collins
• CU's Tribute to Byron R. White
The Byron R. White Center for the Study of American Constitutional Law was founded in 1990 through the generous bequest of one of the Law School's most outstanding graduates and patrons, Ira. C. Rothgerber, Jr. Named in honor of the retired Supreme Court Justice and University of Colorado alumnus, the Byron White Center is an important educational resource for the Law School, for the University, and for the citizens of Colorado.
The purposes of the Center are to enhance the study and teaching of constitutional law, and to stimulate public debate and understanding of our constitutional system. The Center's programs are designed to integrate the perspectives of the practicing lawyer and the legal scholar and to bring to bear on constitutional law other relevant disciplines, including history, philosophy, psychology, and political science. The Center’s Advisory Board comprises Anne N. Costain, Professor of Political Science and Associate Vice President for Human Relations and University Risk Management; Jeffrey N. Cox, Professor of Comparative Literature and Humanities and Director, Center for Humanities and the Arts; David R. Mapel, Associate Professor of Political Science and Director, Keller Center for the Study of the First Amendment; and Robert Trager, Professor, Journalism and Mass Communication.
Between 1990 and 1994 the Dean's Office's organized the annual Ira C. Rothgerber, Jr., Conference on Constitutional Law. The Byron R. White Center for the Study of American Constitutional Law was inaugurated by then-Dean Gene R. Nichol, Jr. in 1995 with the appointment of Professor Paul F. Campos as Director. In addition to assuming sponsorship of the annual conference, the Center began to organize other educational programs. Professor Robert F. Nagel became director in 1999 and served until 2002. The current director is Professor Richard B. Collins.
The Center's programs are designed to integrate the perspectives of the practicing lawyer and the legal scholar and to bring to bear on constitutional law other relevant disciplines, including history, philosophy, psychology, and political science. These programs include an annual conference on a timely topic of constitutional law, a distinguished speaker series, and White Professorships.
Previous conferences included speakers such as Ruth Bader Ginsburg, David M. Ebel, Patricia M. Wald, Jean E. Dubofsky, Michael J. Perry, Frederick F. Shauer, Stanley E. Fish, Akhil R. Amar, Ronald Dworkin, and Jesse H. Choper. Topics have ranged from the impeachment of President Clinton to the constitutionality of Colorado's Amendment 2 and from contemporary problems in free speech theory to the experience of judging in constitutional cases. Funds from the Center are also used to support a Distinguished Speaker series and White Professorships. Through the Distinguished Speaker series, the Center brings to Boulder some of the nation's most thoughtful jurists, lawyers, and scholars to enrich educational programs and to exchange ideas with the general public. Previously featured speakers included Richard A. Epstein, Jeremy J. Waldron, Steven G. Calabresi, Ronald Dworkin, William Ian Miller, Lawrence Stone, Jeffrey Rosen, and Sanford Levinson. In regard to the White Professorships, the Law School aims to make its constitutional law curriculum one of the best and most exciting in the United States. The Center seeks to assist in this effort by sponsoring exceptional faculty research. Steven D. Smith, author of Foreordained Failure: The Quest for a Constitutional Principle of Religious Freedom and The Constitution and the Pride of Reason was honored as Byron White Professor of Constitutional Law from 1995 until 1997. Pierre J. Schlag, author of Laying Down the Law: Mysticism, Fetishism, and the American Legal Mind, and The Enchantment of Reason was named Byron White Professor of Law in July 1997.
In 1998 Dean Harold H. Bruff instituted a Byron White Fellow program to reward outstanding research by faculty members. For their work on constitutional aspects of criminal procedure and comparative criminal procedure, the Center selected Professors Kevin R. Reitz and William T. Pizzi to be Byron White Fellows for 1999-2000. In 2001 the Dean and the Resources Committee determined to continue and expand the White Fellows Program by creating a program of supplementary research leaves for especially promising proposals.
The main priority of the White Center is to enhance the School's core educational programs in constitutional law. This means: improving faculty scholarship by supporting and rewarding outstanding writing; attracting to our faculty first-rate constitutional law scholars, and; bringing to the School some of the best thinkers from all relevant disciplines and from around the country, so that both students and members of the wider community can be exposed to the excitement of intense, wide-ranging exchange on constitutional issues. The Center previously supported visits by Distinguished Professors Archibald Cox and Herbert Wechsler.
A second priority of the Center is to help establish the School's reputation as a center for constitutional studies. To this end, the Center seeks to publish conference papers in the University of Colorado Law Review. It also publicizes its programs widely in the state and the nation. And these programs are designed to appeal not only to students and scholars but also to the general public. Recently the Center has attracted the attention of C-SPAN and National Public Radio. The interest of these organizations aids in the exposure of the Center's programs.
A third priority is to help integrate the Law School into the life of the University as a whole. For years now, the Center has had a cross-disciplinary emphasis and has made efforts to involve non-law students and faculty in its programs. Moreover, it has established a University-wide Advisory Board composed of distinguished scholars in other fields to advise the Director and broaden the Center's activities and perspectives.
