Yale ACS Hosts Conference, October 16–17

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The American Constitution Society at Yale Law School will host a national conference to discuss how law shapes and is shaped by extreme economic inequality on October 16 and 17, 2015, at Yale Law School.

At the ACS Law & Inequality Conference, speakers will discuss the ways that concentrated economic power imperils democracy and constitutional ideals, the trends in jurisprudence and policy that have gotten us here, and how these same tools might be used to redress the current crisis. The conference intends to address the questions: What does it mean to be equal as citizens when we are so materially unequal? How does law structure markets in ways that produce inequality, and how does economic inequality reinforce racial inequalities? How have principles of federalism been used to drive the current crisis, and how might they offer pathways to redress it? Are there constitutional approaches for addressing inequalities? Attendees will engage these questions from different perspectives, aiming to identify the jurisprudence and legal methods driving inequality across various areas of law.

Keynote speakers include Vanita Gupta, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General, U.S. Department of Justice; Zephyr Teachout, Associate Professor of Law, Fordham University School of Law; and Goodwin Liu, Associate Justice, California Supreme Court. Other speakers — including scholars, policymakers, litigators, activists, and journalists — will bring a variety of backgrounds and insights to the questions at hand.

“With this conference we hope to convene a discussion about the way that extreme concentration of economic power imperils our laws and our democracy, and the role law has played in producing the present crisis,” said the conference co-directors, Brian Highsmith, Lina Khan, Urja Mittal, and Jake Struebing, all YLS Class of 2017. 

“We are delighted to welcome so many distinguished visitors to Yale to begin an urgent conversation about extreme inequality in the United States, and the role that law must play in redressing it,” said David Singh Grewal, Associate Professor of Law at Yale Law School. 

The American Constitution Society at Yale Law School aims to foster community-wide discussion over progressive issues in American law and provide a forum for all members of the Yale Law progressive community to pursue their interests, educate the wider community, and bring scholars and practitioners together to find the best way to effect progressive change.

Read more information and register.