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Law of the Land

Law of the Land 2020: The Supreme Court's Year in Review

July 16, 2020

On July 16, 2020, FOLCS virtually hosted its annual program with 92Y, Law of the Land: The Supreme Court’s Year in Review. The series has proven to be immensely popular, mostly because the Supreme Court, and the goings on there, are largely mysterious to most people. We took the audience inside the Court’s major rulings and discussed their bearing on past and future cases. The evening featured a diverse panel of charming and witty experts — the New York Times’ Adam Liptak; MSNBC’s Lisa Green; Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick; and law professor from the Touro Law Center, Tiffany Graham — to delve into the cases decided this past Term, when the Supreme Court, during a pandemic, took on issues related to abortion, ObamaCare, DACA, gun ownership, workplace protections for gay and transgender individuals, and President Trump’s tax returns.

This event was produced in partnership with 92Y.

Watch Law of the Land 2020: The Supreme Court’s Year in Review here.

See more from FOLCS here.

Adam Liptak
Supreme Court Correspondent, New York Times

Adam Liptak covers the Supreme Court for The New York Times. He joined The Times as a copyboy after graduating from Yale with a degree in English literature. He returned to Yale for a law degree and went on to practice law for 14 years, specializing in First Amendment issues, first at a large New York City law firm and then in the legal department of The New York Times Company.

Liptak rejoined the paper’s news staff in 2002 as its national legal correspondent. In 2007, he launched “Sidebar,” a column on legal affairs. In 2008, he became the paper’s Supreme Court correspondent.

Liptak was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in explanatory reporting in 2009 and received the Scripps Howard Award for Washington reporting in 2010. He was awarded Hofstra University’s Presidential Medal and an honorary doctorate from Stetson University College of Law.

He is a visiting lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School and has taught courses at Yale Law School and New York University School of Law.

Dahlia Lithwick
Senior Editor, Slate

Dahlia Lithwick is a senior editor at Slate, and in that capacity, has been writing their “Supreme Court Dispatches” and “Jurisprudence” columns since 1999. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, Harper’s, The New Yorker, The Washington Post, The New Republic, and Commentary, among other places. She is host of Amicus, Slate’s award-winning biweekly podcast about the law and the Supreme Court.

In 2018 Lithwick received the American Constitution Society’s Progressive Champion Award, and the Hillman Prize for Opinion and Analysis. Lithwick won a 2013 National Magazine Award for her columns on the Affordable Care Act. She has been twice awarded an Online Journalism Award for her legal commentary. She was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in October of 2018.

Lithwick earned her BA in English from Yale University and her JD degree from Stanford University. She is currently working on a new book, Lady Justice, for Penguin Press.

Tiffany Graham
Law Professor, Touro Law Center

Tiffany C. Graham joined the faculty at Touro Law Center in Long Island, New York in May 2020 after serving for six years on the faculty and as the Associate Dean of Academic Affairs at the University of South Dakota School of Law. Professor Graham primarily teaches in the areas of constitutional law and race and the law, but has also taught criminal procedure, law and sexuality, and torts.

She has written and spoken nationally on topics broadly related to LGBTQ+ equality, including marriage equality, LGBTQ+ youth homelessness, conversion therapy, and the integration of LGBTQ+ communities in rural spaces. Her work has appeared in multiple journals, most recently in the Creighton Law Review and the University of Missouri-Kansas City Law Review, and has been cited at various stages of appellate litigation.

In addition to her scholarly work, Professor Graham is active in the professional community, where she recently served as the Chair of the South Dakota State Advisory Committee to the United States Commission on Civil Rights, and has now been appointed to the corresponding New York State Advisory Committee. She has also served on various boards of directors and fulfilled an appointment to the Magistrate Judge Selection Panel for the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

A graduate of Harvard and Radcliffe Colleges and the University of Virginia School of Law, she previously clerked for the Honorable Richard W. Roberts on the United States District Court for the District of Columbia and did commercial litigation in the Los Angeles office of Quinn Emanuel Urquhart Oliver and Hedges, LLP. Professor Graham was named a U.S. Fulbright Scholar in 2014.

Lisa Green
Lawyer & Legal Analyst

Lisa Green is a lawyer, legal analyst and author of On Your Case, a legal guide for women (William Morrow). She is a managing director for the strategic communications firm Sard Verbinnen & Co.