On September 17, 1787, the delegates to the Constitutional Convention gathered one last time in the Assembly Room of what is now Independence Hall to sign the charter that they had spent the past four months crafting. As the last of the thirty-eight signers affixed their names to the Constitution, Benjamin Franklin called attention to […]
In a follow-up to his previous conversation with Newsy Channel Manager Cliff Judy on how retirements and seeking higher office could impact 2020 elections, Professor of Political Science and Kinder Institute Affiliate Faculty Member Marvin Overby focused specifically in this second interview on the long-term and short-term factors that explain why, for decades, House Republicans have been retiring at a higher rate than their Democratic counterparts.
As part of the Kinder Institute’s ongoing participation in Newsy’s “Ask the Experts” video series, MU Professor of Political Science and KICD Affiliate Faculty Member Marvin Overby sat down with Newsy Channel Manager Cliff Judy to chat about the effect of congressional retirements and decisions to run for higher office in an age of “super incumbency.”
The first installment of a two-part conversation, Kinder Institute Director Justin Dyer sat down with Newsy Station Manager Cliff Judy to discuss how the American founders believed that civic education should be at the heart of the missions of the United States’ first public universities.
As part of the ongoing “Ask the Experts” collaboration, Kinder Institute Director and Professor of Political Science Justin Dyer sat down with Newsy Channel Manager Cliff Judy to discuss how secondary and higher education institutions might benefit from reimagining the role of civic education.
As part of the ongoing “Ask the Experts” collaboration, Kinder Institute Postdoctoral Fellow Luke Perez sat down with Newsy Channel Manager Cliff Judy for a two-part discussion of the United States’ diplomatic strategy of promoting religious liberty abroad and the “hugely important moments in humanitarian history” that have come from it.
As part of the ongoing “Ask the Experts” collaboration, Kinder Institute Postdoctoral Fellow Luke Perez sat down with Newsy Channel Manager Cliff Judy for a two-part discussion of the United States’ diplomatic strategy of promoting religious liberty abroad and the “hugely important moments in humanitarian history” that have come from it.
In a real-time update of last week’s interview on gerrymandering, MU Political Science Professor and Kinder Institute faculty member Jay Dow sat down with Newsy’s Cliff Judy to weigh in on the Supreme Court’s June 18 decision against intervening in two high-profile partisan gerrymanders—a Democratic gerrymander in Maryland and a Republican gerrymander in Wisconsin.
It’s the practice of drawing voting districts that gives one person’s vote more weight than another’s. And while that sounds blatantly unfair, gerrymandering is as old as the republic itself—it was used in the very first congressional elections for a seat in Virginia.
The Supreme Court heard two cases in the past year—Gill v. Whitford out of Wisconsin and Benisek v. Lamone out of Maryland—that could create a landmark standard for partisan gerrymandering.
But is intervening in partisan districting a move that could paint the nation’s highest court as a political actor?
In Newsy’s ongoing “Ask the Experts” series Professor of Political Science and Kinder Institute faculty member Jay Dow spoke with Newsy Channel Manager Cliff Judy about this possible side effect, which could make the cure worse than the disease.
Many legal experts believe the Supreme Court will inevitably hear a case about the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA. But historically, justices of the nation’s highest court have largely deferred to the executive branch on issues such as immigration and national security. And SCOTUS is especially hesitant to get involved in any case that could paint it as a political actor.
Meanwhile, the status of hundreds of thousands of Dreamers hangs on two administrations’ interpretations of what the White House can and can’t do.
In Newsy’s ongoing “Ask the Experts” series, Kinder Institute Assistant Professor of Constitutional Democracy Jennifer Selin sat down with Newsy Channel Manager Cliff Judy to discuss two major legal issues that could put DACA on the Supreme Court’s docket. How it gets there could give us clues about what will happen to the Dreamers.
As part of the Kinder Institute’s “Global History at Oxford” alumni and undergraduate study abroad trip, Corpus Christi College (Oxford) Senior Research Fellow Nigel Bowles gave a March 29 after-dinner talk on the “Special Relationship.”
Making a stop in Columbia on his scholarly world tour, Cambridge University Emeritus Smuts Professor of Commonwealth History A. G. Hopkins gave an April 9 talk in Jesse 410 on his most recent book, American Empire: A Global History.
For the Kinder Institute’s annual Town & Gown Dinner Lecture, Rice University William P. Hobby Professor of History John Boles gave an April 10 talk on the ideas and events that shaped the trajectory of Jefferson’s evolving ideas about constitutionalism.
On March 20, 2018, in the Smith Forum at Reynolds Journalism Institute, “Open Mind” host Alexander Heffner spoke to a capacity crowd about current incivility in public discourse, and especially in the “anti-social media complex,” and ways that we might go about “amusing our democracy back to life.” Following the talk, the Kinder Institute and Truman School convened a panel of MU faculty from across multiple disciplines to give remarks on Heffner’s talk and to offer their own insights about “civil discourse in an uncivil age.”
Drawing on research from his new book, Democracy’s Schools: The Rise of Public Education in America (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2017), Western Washington University Professor and Chair of History Johann Neem’s February 15 lecture at the Kinder Instituted explored the historic purposes for the development of public education—educating citizens, developing human capabilities, and forging a nation—in order to address questions concerning whether or not these purposes continue to guide our educational institutions and why we seem to be losing faith in them.
On January 31, the Kinder Institute hosted University of Oklahoma Professor of Political Science Keith Gaddie on campus for a talk that uses recent litigation in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina to raise questions concerning the constitutionality of gerrymandering and to explore the potential for different empirical and constitutional tests that might tame egregious abuses in the redistricting process.
Working against the narrative of the American Revolution as a high-minded, orderly event, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and University of Virginia Jefferson Foundation Chair in History Alan Taylor’s October 4 talk at the Kinder Institute wove a new national creation story, tracing the history of the conflict with Great Britain from the turbulent conditions that boiled over into war through the political divisions that shaped the course of ratification and westward expansion in the Revolution’s aftermath.
For the second installment of the Kinder Institute’s Constitution Week Lecture Series, Boston College Founders Professor of Law Mary Sarah Bilder gave a talk on her recent research into Madison’s Notes on the 1787 Constitutional Convention, which uses digital technologies and rigorous textual analysis to reveal invisible, and previously unsuspected, layers of revision in Madison’s account of the Convention’s charismatic figures, crushing disappointments, and miraculous triumphs.
As part of the World War I Museum and Memorials November 2017 “America Joins the Fight” Symposium Kinder Institute Chair Jay Sexton and Chapman University Professor and Chair of History Jennifer Keene contributed to an opening night panel discussion of President Woodrow Willson’s vision for peace, the U.S. military’s preparedness in 1917, and domestic reactions to U.S. entry into war.
On the October 1 episode of PBS’ “The Open Mind,” Kinder Institute Director Justin Dyer spoke with host Alexander Heffner about the polarization of legal interpretation and civic discourse in contemporary American political society.
Courtesy of expert Mizzou Creative videographer Mike Boles and a wonderful cast of students, we’re thrilled to provide you a brief glimpse into a day in the life of a Kinder Institute undergrad
As part of the Pulitzer Prize’s Centennial Campfires Initiative, University of California-Davis Professor of History Eric Rauchway delivered a September 7, 2016, lecture at the University of Missouri examining the causes and consequences of the Great Depression through the lens of Charlie Ross’ 1931 Pulitzer-winning St. Louis Post-Dispatch article, “The Country’s Plight.”
For the Kinder Institute’s third annual Constitution Day Lecture, University of Michigan Associate Professor of Political Science Mariah Zeisberg gave a September 20 talk entitled, “Our Global Constitution: U.S. Imperialism and the Separation of Powers.”
Professor Jay Sexton delivered the Kinder Institute’s inaugural chair lecture on November 10, 2016, examining the external factors that shaped the American founding in a talk entitled “U.S. Constitutional Democracy and the World.” A full recap of the lecture can be found here.
Filmed during Fall 2015 as part of our video series with Newsy, Political Science Professor and Kinder Institute Director Justin Dyer gave a brief interview on the protection of, as well as the limits placed on, hate speech under the 1st Amendment.
As part of our ongoing relationship with Newsy, Prof. Marvin Overby sat down with Eugene Daniels to discuss the history underlying African American voters’ loyalty to the Democratic Party.
Professor Jeffrey L. Pasley, Associate Director of the Kinder Institute, discusses his most recent book, The First Presidential Contest: 1796 and the Founding of American Democracy, a finalist for the 2014 George Washington Book Prize.
On April 4, 2016, Professors Annette Gordon-Reed (Harvard University) and Peter S. Onuf (UVA, emeritus) launched the national book tour for their co-authored ‘Most Blessed of the Patriarchs’: Thomas Jefferson and the Empire of the Imagination in Columbia with a dinner lecture sponsored by the Kinder Institute. A full recap of their talk, along with news about a public forum on Jefferson’s legacy in contemporary society held earlier in the day, can be found here.
In one of the first installments of the Kinder Institute’s ongoing collaboration with Newsy, Political Science Professor and Institute core faculty member Marvin Overby sat down with journalists at the video news service to discuss a pair of questions regarding the current vacancy in the U.S. Supreme Court. The first video segment, “Could a Senate Recess Give Obama an Opening to Appoint a New Supreme Court Judge,” can be found here, and the second, “Does the Senate Have to Vote on a Supreme Court Nominee? Nope,” can be seen above.
In one of the first installments of the Kinder Institute’s ongoing collaboration with Newsy, Political Science Professor and Institute core faculty member Marvin Overby sat down with journalists at the video news service, to discuss a pair of questions regarding the current vacancy in the U.S. Supreme Court. The first video segment, “Could a Senate Recess Give Obama an Opening to Appoint a New Supreme Court Judge,” can be seen above, and the second, “Does the Senate Have to Vote on a Supreme Court Nominee? Nope,” can be found here.
It’s with great pleasure, and greater gratitude, that we get to share the news that the Kinder Foundation, a family philanthropic foundation started by Rich and Nancy Kinder, has pledged $25 million to the University of Missouri to support programming at the Kinder Institute on Constitutional Democracy for years (and generations) to come. An MU News Bureau account of the press conference announcing the Kinder Foundation’s gift, written by Nathan Hurst, can be found here.
As Kinder Institute Director Justin Dyer noted in addressing the crowd at the press conference, the gift will provide the Institute with the resources necessary to truly reinvigorate the study of the nation’s constitutional and democratic traditions on the MU campus, in Columbia, and throughout the state. From continuing to promote undergraduate, graduate, and faculty scholarship on American political thought and history, to building and supporting new programs in the community, the Kinder Institute remains dedicated to its core goals of making the University of Missouri a national and international leader in civic education and to fostering active, informed, interdisciplinary dialogue about matters of great national importance.
