Scott M. Matheson, Jr., professor of law at S.J. Quinney College of Law, will be discussing and reading from his new book, Presidential Constitutionalism in Perilous Times (Harvard University Press), at The King’s English Bookshop on February 25, 2009 between 6:00-8:30 p.m.
The book focuses extensively on the Bush administration’s torture, surveillance, and detention policies. It also examines President Lincoln’s suspension of the writ of habeas corpus during the Civil War, President Wilson’s enforcement of the Espionage Act of 1917 during World War I, President Roosevelt’s evacuation and internment of West Coast persons of Japanese descent during World War II, and President Truman’s seizure of the steel mills during the Korean War.
Professor Matheson “recognizes the important roles of Congress and the courts to check executive abuse and safeguard individual liberty.” He develops the idea of “executive constitutionalism” to abate “executive overreaching” because “we must rely on presidential leadership and constitutional due diligence to ensure the Constitution’s promise is redeemed in a system of separated and shared powers.”
Professor Matheson has served as a Public Policy Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C., Dean of the University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law, United States Attorney for the District of Utah, Visiting Associate Professor at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, Deputy County Attorney for Salt Lake County, associate at the Washington, D.C. law firm of Williams & Connolly, and legislative assistant in a congressional office. He teaches Constitutional Law, Evidence, First Amendment and the Press, and Scientific Forensic Evidence.
The King’s English Bookshop is located at 1511 South 1500 East, Salt Lake City. Reception with light hors d’oeuvres at 6 p.m.; reading begins at 6:30 p.m. For more information, please call Elizabeth Seeley, S.J. Quinney College of Law, (801)585-3440.