Dunbar, Lindsay S.

Meixner, John B.

English

bepress Legal Repository

Foreword: The Legacy of Justice John Paul Stevens

Northwestern University Illinois, School of Law: Scholarly Commons

Copyright 2012 by Northwestern University School of Law Printed in U.S.A.Northwestern University Law Review Vol. 106, No. 2409SymposiumFOREWORD: THE LEGACY OF JUSTICE JOHN PAULSTEVENSLindsay S. Dunbar† & John B. Meixner††When Justice John Paul Stevens announced his retirement in April of2010, the editors of the Northwestern University Law Review had alreadybegun planning a long-overdue celebration of his life and work. Nearlysixty-five years after Justice Stevens’s graduation from NorthwesternUniversity School of Law, on May 12, 2011, the Law Review and the LawSchool had the privilege of welcoming him back to his old classroom inLincoln Hall for a day of reflection on his distinguished career.Over the course of four academic panels and a luncheon tribute panel,a distinguished group of legal scholars, journalists, and Justice Stevens’sformer clerks explored the Justice’s legacy not only on the Court, but alsoon the legal profession. Panelists commented on Justice Stevens’s executivepower jurisprudence, his interpretation of the Free Exercise andEstablishment Clauses of the First Amendment,1 his trajectory on the Court,and finally his interpretive methods. This issue contains the scholarly workthat resulted from this day of discussion and celebration. Additionally, theJustice gave the address at Northwestern University School of Law’s 2011graduation ceremony, and he has been kind enough to share those remarkswith us in the issue. The variety of the issue’s contents is a testament to theimmense impact that Justice Stevens had on many areas of the law and, ofcourse, on many lawyers, journalists, and scholars.Some of Justice Stevens’s former clerks recalled this incredible humantouch. During their panel, they shared an inside look at their time in Justice† J.D., Northwestern University School of Law, 2012; Special Sections Editor, NorthwesternUniversity Law Review, 2011–2012. We would like to extend special thanks to Professors Lee Epstein,Andrew Koppelman, and John O. McGinnis for sponsoring this symposium; Professor Robert W.Bennett for serving as faculty advisor to the Northwestern University Law Review; Professor JimMcMasters, for his constant guidance throughout the planning process; Jaci Thiede, Associate Dean forDevelopment and Alumni Relations, and the entire Development and Alumni Relations staff for theirsupport in organizing the event; and the faculty and staff of Northwestern University School of Law fortheir help in hosting the symposium. We would also like to express our appreciation to the NorthwesternUniversity Law Review editors for their extremely hard work on this issue. We are pleased to note thatvideo recordings of the symposium panels are available to view for free online athttp://colloquy.law.northwestern.edu/main/2011/06/the-legacy-of-justice-stevens.html.†† J.D., Ph.D. Candidate, Northwestern University School of Law, Northwestern UniversityDepartment of Psychology, 2013; Editor-in-Chief, Northwestern University Law Review, 2011–2012.1 U.S. CONST. amend. I.N O R T H W E S T E R N U N I V E R S I T Y L A W R E V I E W410Stevens’s chambers. Though clerks from the early years of JusticeStevens’s tenure shared the dais with clerks from his final years on theCourt, they all remembered the time and attention the Justice provided tothe young lawyers who worked for him. In their pieces, they pay tribute toJustice Stevens as a mentor.The pieces arising from the panel regarding Justice Stevens’s executivepower jurisprudence cover a wide range of some of the Justice’s mostmomentous opinions, most notably his landmark decision in ChevronU.S.A. Inc. v. NRDC.2 Professor Thomas Merrill frames the opinion interms of Justice Stevens’s orientation as a common law judge, arguing thatthe Justice did not intend to endorse the principle for which Chevron is nowthought to stand. Professor Aziz Huq ties Chevron, among other opinions,to the “institution matching” canon, showing how institution matchingpersists in a variety of executive powers decisions. Professor Dawn Johnsenexamines the Justice’s role in executive detention cases followingSeptember 11, 2001, such as Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, in which Justice Stevensjoined a dissent authored by Justice Antonin Scalia,3 as well as Rasul v.Bush,4 Hamdan v. Rumsfeld,5 and Boumediene v. Bush.6 Finally, ProfessorSteven G. Calabresi discusses Justice Stevens’s role in separation of powersdecisions, examining the doctrine through a historical lens.The panel on Justice Stevens’s role in religion cases yielded piecesfocusing on the Justice’s principled approach to the Establishment and FreeExercise Clauses. Professor Andrew Koppelman argues that althoughJustice Stevens is sometimes viewed as having been hostile toward religion,he actually enthusiastically supported religion through jurisprudence thatencouraged religious neutrality. In a similar vein, Dean ErwinChemerinsky’s piece argues in support of the Justice’s “strict separationist”approach to church–state issues. Finally, Professor Alan Brownsteinreconciles Justice Stevens’s differing views of the expansiveness of theEstablishment and Free Exercise Clauses by framing both in terms of theJustice’s concerns about religious equality.A diverse collection of papers resulted from the panel that examinedJustice Stevens’s trajectory on the Court. Professor Stefanie A. Lindquist’sempirical study of Justice Stevens’s voting on the Seventh Circuit serves asa prequel to his tenure on the Supreme Court and asserts that then-JudgeStevens’s frequent dissents and independent voting patterns formed thefoundation of his later jurisprudence. In an excerpt from their forthcomingbook,7 Professor Lee Epstein, Professor William M. Landes, and Judge2 467 U.S. 837 (1984).3 542 U.S. 507, 554 (2004) (Scalia, J., joined by Stevens, J., dissenting).4 542 U.S. 466 (2004) (Stevens, J.).5 548 U.S. 557 (2006) (Stevens, J.).6 553 U.S. 723 (2008).7 LEE EPSTEIN, WILLIAM M. LANDES & RICHARD A. POSNER, THE BEHAVIOR OF FEDERAL JUDGES:106:409 (2012) Foreword411Richard A. Posner challenge the view of Justice Stevens as “the dissenter”and examine unanimous decisions on the Supreme Court. Finally, BillBarnhart, one of the Justice’s biographers, explores the impact of JusticeStevens’s early life experiences on his later relationship with the press andviews on the First Amendment.The symposium’s final panel explored Justice Stevens’s methods ofinterpretation. Professor Diane Amann’s piece takes a unique approach,examining the Justice’s methods of interpretation as an “originalist” andconcludes that Justice Stevens authored his decisions based on the view ofbeing duty-bound to the principles embedded by the Framers in theConstitution, while also synthesizing modern sources to arrive at acontemporary understanding of justice. Additionally, Simon Lazarusexamines the interpretational methods used by conservative Justices inopposition to progressive legislation, specifically the use of historicalsources in interpreting the Constitution but only the use of text ininterpreting statutes, and frames Justice Stevens’s impact in providingopposition to those methods.This symposium was only possible because of the dedication of manyindividuals, both within and outside of the Northwestern University Schoolof Law community. Each author who contributed to this issue and theconference brought a valuable perspective on the Justice’s work, and we arethankful for their contributions. The Law Review is grateful to ProfessorsLee Epstein, Andrew Koppelman, and John O. McGinnis for theirsponsorship and to the faculty and administration of NorthwesternUniversity School of Law, especially former Dean David Van Zandt andProfessor Kimberly Yuracko, for their generous support for the conference.We are also indebted to Nick Gamse, former Symposium and Essays Editorfor the Law Review, for conceiving of the conference and for his tirelesspursuit in planning it, and to Stephanie Kissel Leiter, former Editor-in-Chief of the Law Review, for her hard work in helping to organize theconference. But we are most indebted, of course, to Justice Stevens himself.The intelligence, compassion, and devotion he displaying during his fortyyears on the bench is a source of pride for everyone associated withNorthwestern University School of Law. We hope the following pages canprovide some small thanks for his remarkable career.A THEORETICAL AND EMPIRICAL STUDY OF RATIONAL CHOICE (forthcoming Nov. 2012).N O R T H W E S T E R N U N I V E R S I T Y L A W R E V I E W412

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Foreword: The Legacy of Justice John Paul Stevens

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