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PRESENT SH CK THE LAW GRAPPLES WITH THE CHALLENGE OF NEW TECHNOL GY

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

by Nancy J. Waters

The flying car of my childhood dreams took a successful test flight earlier this summer. This happened some weeks after the New York City Police Department unleashed a robotic police dog, but a few weeks before we learned that a brain implant had enabled a paralyzed man to “speak.” Meanwhile, moguls are riding in rockets, the local bagel shop features a Bitcoin ATM, hackers are extorting millions from corporations and President Joe Biden is accusing Facebook of killing people by allowing vaccine disinformation to spread.

PRESENT SHOCK: THE LAW GRAPPLES WITH THE CHALLENGE OF NEW TECHNOLOGY

Back on the ground, cars can drive themselves, millions of us have received COVID-19 vaccinations developed with new technologies at record-breaking speeds. Reports coming out of Afghanistan indicate that the Taliban may be using U.S. biometric scanners to identify Afghans who assisted coalition forces. And, of course, your telephone—a.k.a. “the rectangle of knowledge”—knows where you have been and where you are thinking of going, what you have been doing and who you are doing it with. As Shakespeare might have said were he inclined toward mashups: Oh, brave new world that has such devices and desire in it! It’s trite but still true: We are living through a technological revolution, although not for the first time. And, like every other time that human societies have witnessed major technological advances, we struggle to adapt. Back in the 1960s, the futurist Alvin Toffler referred to the sense of disorientation that rapid technological and social change generates as “future shock.” But the disorientation is not just personal and psychological, it’s also legal. Our laws, our courts, our legislatures and our law schools: They’re not quite ready for this either. Supreme Court Justices Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas, for example, argued recently in a dissent that massive changes in media technology, as well as accompanying changes in media businesses, require a rethinking of libel laws because the law has not kept up with the technology. Who’s a public figure when millions of us have followings on Twitter? Technology has always challenged the law. After all, human beings were inventing things long before there were patent offices. But today the challenges come so quickly and from so many directions, challenges to every area of law, from those regulating monopolies to those protecting privacy, from law enforcement in American cities to the rules of engagement in battle, from the tiniest implantable chip to the largest supercomputer. About that flying car: Will it follow the rules of the road below or the airspace above? Will the operator need a driver’s license or a pilot’s license? Who knows? Who decides?

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

Amy Boss, Trustee

Dude, Where’s My Car?

Professor at Kline,

What challenges the law, of course, challenges law

Business and

schools. It falls to scholars to consider and debate the

Entrepreneurship Law

impact of new technologies and craft responses, to

Program.

directs the school’s

instructors to expand their curricula to include whole new areas of law and to students to be prepared for the often-unpredictable impact of these advances on both the substance and the practice of law. According to Amy Boss, Trustee Professor at the Kline School of Law and director of the school’s Business and Entrepreneurship Law Program, the impact of technological change on law students has

to trace their evolution. “You need to know how your

four key facets: It affects them on a personal level, as

clients are using the technology,” she explained, “to

consumers of specialized legal technology, as advis-

be able to adequately counsel your clients.”

ers to clients and as legal thinkers.

The final challenge is the biggest and most

“First of all,” she explained, “students are mem-

interesting. How will the law evolve to respond to

bers of society, and all members of society now are

technological advances? What kinds of rules and

challenged to understand how technology can best

regulations will help human societies realize the

be employed on a personal level.” We are all, she

potential benefits of these new tools and avoid the

continued, expected to possess a “certain amount of

potential harms? And how can legal scholars and

technology savvy about virtually everything today.

educators help meet this challenge?

It’s impossible to read the newspaper without under-

Think of almost any recent technology—the

standing certain technological terms. You cannot

autonomous automobile, for one—and the questions

understand why many controversies rage unless you

quickly follow. According to Kline Law Dean Daniel

understand how the Internet basically works and

M. Filler, the legal and policy implications are end-

who has access to what… For any citizen to remain

less. Automobiles have long played a huge role in

engaged, they have to pick up on these concepts.”

tort law, for example, but self-driving cars open

The second category of tech savvy that law stu-

up several new cans of legal worms with respect to

dents must have, according to Boss, is perhaps the

data privacy, cybersecurity and a host of contractual

most obvious: They need to know how to use new

issues. For example, Filler asks, if the owner fails to

tech on the job. Tools exist, she said, to “support

make a car payment, can the automobile company

virtually every activity of a lawyer, from bill pay and

digitally commandeer the vehicle? Will it be legal to

customer satisfaction to research to court filing.”

simply call the car back to the dealer in the event of

To succeed as attorneys, new graduates will need to be familiar with all these tools and ready to

a mandatory safety recall? “These,” he said, “are not things we have even begun to grapple with.”

embrace new ones as they develop. Enabling stu-

Because they will have the capacity to be phys-

dents to gain that essential fluency is one of the goals

ically moved by someone other than their owner

behind the creation of Kline’s new Buchholz Law

(or the person we have traditionally defined as the

Tech Lab, which will seek to expand students’ knowl-

owner), produce marketable and salable data about

edge of available legal technology. (See related story on

the activities and whereabouts of passengers, and

page 46.)

can be monitored more easily by third parties (think

But beyond the fairly straightforward matter of

corporations, the government and, possibly, crimi-

mastering legal office software, to effectively repre-

nals and terrorists), Filler said, “autonomous cars can

sent their clients, lawyers today must also grasp how

become a million different things and each of them

those clients are using available technologies. Boss

represents a different area of law.”

offers the following scenario: Litigators receive a doc-

And this list doesn’t even include the labor-mar-

ument request from the opposing side. They must

ket implications. Millions of people around the world

understand where those documents are, knowing

are currently employed as bus, truck, cab and delivery

many likely won’t be on paper. They need to know

drivers, and policy makers will be asked to confront

who is storing them, who has seen them and be able

the loss of so many jobs.

lawmakers to preempt these problems via regulation

PRESENT SHOCK: THE LAW GRAPPLES WITH THE CHALLENGE OF NEW TECHNOLOGY

depends to some extent on where you live and who you work for. On the question of whether the law should be out in front or follow behind, Boss, who has been involved for decades in drafting laws at both the domestic and international levels to deal with emerging issues of electronic commerce, said that the answer depends on “who you talk to.” Those who oppose early regulation worry that it will stifle innovation; they argue that the technology should lead and the law should follow. This view holds more sway in the United States, while regulators in the European Union have been quicker to identify and proactively work to address the threats that new tech poses to individuals and communities. “We see this really interesting dynamic developing internationally around the place of law within technology and innovation,” said Kline Assistant Teaching Professor Jordan L. Fischer. Fischer teaches courses on EU law, privacy law (including data privacy) and most recently she co-taught a course with Filler on law and technological change. Historically, Fischer explained, the U.S. has taken a more hands-off approach with regard to commercial regulations generally, and that remains true for new technology as well. “The law might set guard-

rails, but it very much allows for those innovative playgrounds to evolve,” she said. “And then the law may come in after the fact to enact proactive technological requirements.” These requirements, she continued, could be to safeguard privacy, security or accessibility, for example. According to Fischer, the best example of Europe’s more “hands-on and proactive approach” is the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which requires proactive privacy protections. She called it “one

of the most robust general privacy laws in the world.” “The jury,” she continued, “is out on whether or not it will allow for technological innovation.” Both Fischer and Boss agree that a legal and policy tug-of-war between consumer protection and business promotion is not new. The same arguments,

Tech Leads, Law Follows

Boss noted, were made during the drafting of the first Uniform Commercial Code, which began 79 years ago and took 10 years. But the UCC was a critical and

That new technology creates risk, disruptions and the

mostly successful effort to harmonize commercial

potential for conflicts that require policy responses is

law in all 50 states, Washington D.C. and American

not new nor is it unpredictable. The arrival of motor-

territories—it’s now difficult to imagine doing busi-

ized vehicles on our roads in the 1910s brought with

ness in this country without it.

it collisions and fatalities, and it took years for states

“The law,” said Fischer, “can both repress and

to enact traffic laws and ever-evolving automobile

support innovation. The law can both encourage and

safety standards. Looking back, this seems rather

discourage technology. Where we find the challenge

foreseeable. Why weren’t policy makers, we might

right now is: How can the law best be utilized to

ask, better prepared?

allow for these rapid changes in technology while also

Similarly, that the Internet would have facil-

recognizing that the average tech user has very low

itated identity theft, money laundering, cyber

bargaining power and will need the government to

stalking, conspiracy mongering, revenge pornogra-

step in—from a societal perspective—to protect us?”

phy, sex trafficking and a whole host of other horrors

As awareness grows of the profound impact that

now seems predictable. But whether you expect

new tech has had and will have on human beings, so

too does the volume of the chorus of legal scholars

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

and policy experts who argue that humans must help shape tech policy before tech changes human society for the worse. Brooklyn Law School Professor Frank Pasquale has written extensively on artificial intelligence and is the author of the book New Laws of Robotics: Defending Human Expertise in the Age of AI. (See Q & A on page 12.) With regard to artificial intelligence in particular, Pasquale worries about the presumption that “this is a runaway train, that we’ve got to catch up with and try to fix things in its wake.” This belief, he suggests, can prevent legal scholars and other thinkers from helping create appropriate policies before these powerful new tools hit the market and create problems that could have and would have been foreseen had the right people been involved earlier in the process. “Much more attention should be paid to how do we try to translate social values into rules that make for better AI,” he said. “From a scholarship perspective, we’ve got to have some awareness of how to shape the AI rather than just respond to it.”

Escape from the Silo Whether you look at what Fischer calls the “collision of law and technology” from the perspectives of practice, pedagogy or policy, the picture that emerges is of two alien species from different traditions—the lawyer and the technologist—staring at each other warily across a knowledge divide. They may not actually be from different worlds, but they can generally be found hanging out on different locations on campus. “The challenge,” said Fischer, “is that historically law has been very tech averse.” Lawyers, she said, can

Technology is so intimately intertwined in our lives that for engineers to move forward ignorant of the implications of what we design on those other fields ultimately is a disservice to us and to society.

be reluctant to draw conclusions about technology they often don’t understand. But she thinks this is changing and that the pandemic accelerated that process by making so many of us that much more reliant on technology to do our jobs, obtain goods and services, and stay connected. “Because so much of our society, especially over the last year, is being stood up on technology,” she continued, it has become more apparent that “there’s liability, there’s harm to individuals, there is a place for a legal mind in the development and growth of technology in a way that I don’t think was ever appreciated before last year.” Over on the other side of the divide, computer scientists and engineers have also suffered from their own forms of parochialism. Techies have not traditionally considered policy and the law to be their concerns. “The traditional role of the engineer was to design the product, make the widget, make it work,” said Steven Weber, who is head of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering in the Drexel College of Engineering. But just as Fischer believes that lawyers need

Professor Jordan Fischer will

more tech sophistication, so too Weber argues that

direct Kline Law’s new Center

professionals in STEM fields could do with a better

for Law and Transformational

understanding of the law. “So many aspects of our

Technology.

PRESENT SHOCK: THE LAW GRAPPLES WITH THE CHALLENGE OF NEW TECHNOLOGY

1 1 0 1 1011 10110011 00100110111

lives are now governed by technology,” he said, “and

undergraduate majors such as political science, a

technology is so intimately intertwined in our lives

trend that supports the technical sophistication of

that for engineers to move forward ignorant of the

the profession. More students with backgrounds

implications of what we design on those other fields

in engineering, computer science and business are

ultimately is a disservice to us and to society.”

going to law schools these days. “Individuals who

The inexorable pull of specialization challenges

are already tech fluent are becoming law fluent,” she

the cross-disciplinary understanding that Fischer and

said, “creating new synergies.” And a university like

Weber believe is so vital. With the goal of producing

Drexel, with its strong and well-established strengths

more well-rounded graduates, engineering schools

in STEM teaching and research, is a natural place to

such as Drexel’s, said Weber, typically require that

explore and develop those synergies.

their undergraduate students take courses in other

Another way to exploit such synergies is via the

colleges and departments, so it’s not unusual to

creation of interdisciplinary centers and institutes,

find Drexel engineers enrolled in English or biology

and several have opened at law schools across the

classes, for example.

country. One of these is the Tech Policy Lab at the

But the flip side of that engineering “outflow” is “inflow” of students from other parts of the

University of Washington School of Law in Seattle, where Alex Bolton is the program manager.

University into engineering and computer sciences

The lab is led jointly by faculty from the UW

classes, which is rare, and Weber believes Drexel and

schools of law, computer science and engineering,

American universities in general need to do more to

and information, a configuration that embodies its

promote that. Engineering and other technology-ori-

interdisciplinary aspirations. The mission, Bolton

ented schools and departments, he said, “have done

explained, is to “create more thoughtful tech policy”

a terrible job of welcoming those who wish to acquire

by convening scholars, leaders from industry, legisla-

literacy without specialization.”

tors and regulators.

Undergraduate liberal arts students seeking more

“We believe in the importance of interdiscipli-

tech literacy, for example, may find themselves sty-

narity,” Bolton said. Technical specialization is, of

mied by the extensive pre-requisites of engineering

course, generally necessary and unavoidable. But “a

and computer sciences programs. Weber sees the pol-

pitfall of specialization is that you can get gaps. We are

icy of Drexel’s undergraduate Pennoni Honors College

trying to help fill them,” he continued. The lab spon-

that all honors courses must be open to students from

sors faculty and student research, hosts symposia and

all departments with no pre-requisites as an antidote.

publishes white papers, and one of its co-directors

Special classes team taught by faculty from different

has testified before Congress on technology issues. A

departments is another way to promote interdisciplin-

recent initiative has focused on the role of narratives

ary knowledge. Through the Pennoni College, Weber

(fiction, films, etc.) in understanding and envision-

teamed up last year with Fischer and faculty from

ing the cultural and social impacts of technology.

other areas including history, environmental science

The scholarly and pedagogical potential that an

and public health to teach a symposium titled “Legal

interdisciplinary center offers prompted Kline Law to

and Technological Aspects of Privacy and Security in

launch its own Center for Law and Transformational

a Pandemic.” That course, he said, represents a neces-

Technology this fall. Fischer will be the center’s

sary kind of interdisciplinary collaboration.

director. Filler wants the new center to attract the

Fischer also thinks law schools are drawing on a

participation of thinkers who will not only address

broader range of students from beyond the traditional

today’s most pressing tech issues but anticipate

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LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

0000 O00OO00000000000 0000000000000000 000000000 00000000000000 KKKK0KK0 Brooklyn Law School Professor Frank Pasquale is an internationally recognized KKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK expert in technology regulation. In his latest book, New Laws of Robotics: Defending KKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK KKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK Human Expertise in the Age of AI (Harvard University Press 2020), he simultaneously KKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK KKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK challenges both the breathless optimism of the technophiles who expect technology to KKKKKKKKKKKKK always make our lives better as well as the helpless certainty of the skeptics who are KKKKKKKKK KKKKKK convinced that a dystopic robotic future is around the corner—and that there is nothing KKKK KKKKK we can do to prevent its dehumanizing effects. Riffing off of a classic Isaac Asimov KKKKKKKKK short story published in 1942 that set forth three “laws” that robots would follow in KKKKKKKKK KKKKKKK

a future world, Pasquale argues not just that intelligent machines should never be

allowed to hurt human beings, but that we should set our expectations much higher.

Our laws and policies must, he argues, ensure that these amazing new technologies OOO OOOOOOOO not only don’t harm us, but that they instead help us all lead fuller, fairer, healthier OOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOO and more humane lives. 000OOOOOOO Lex sat down last spring with Pasquale for a Zoom interview to discuss the 00

0 0OOO k

current and future impacts of artificial intelligence on our society and what policy makers, scholars and anyone interested in the interaction of machines and humans needs to know about artificial intelligence. The transcript below has been edited for brevity and clarity. —Nancy J. Waters

How did you become interested in this area of law and policy? As a legal scholar, what do you find most compelling about artificial intelligence? It goes back to my time in law school. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, there was a lot of debate about the role of technology in the music industry and in biotechnology. I wrote an article called “Beyond Napster” that looked at how the Internet was changing intellectual property… People worried that it would either lead to total anarchy with no copyright rules or any rules at all, or to perfect control, and the Internet, the government and others could just surveil you all the time.

OUR ROBOTIC FUTURE: A Q & A WITH AUTHOR FRANK PASQUALE

I saw the challenge as: How do you move between cyber anarchy and perfect control? On the bio-

What are the biggest challenges that the rise of AI presents to the legal profession?

tech side, the people who said that we can just use mechanical organs to replace any part of your body

Many people have suggested that AI can replace law.

that fails were also saying that the ultimate goal

My worry is that you have an AI attempting to take on

would be to download your brain to a computer. So

legal roles or replace law entirely. For example: the

I wrote an article in 2002 called “Two Concepts of

suggestion that you don’t need traffic cops anymore,

Immortality” to say that I thought that would be a

that we will just have robot stop signs and robot traffic

bad idea.

lights or that we don’t need to have lawyers in finance anymore, that all the contracts will turn into code that will govern everything. For almost every specific area of law, there are these claims that AI can replace

How do you create a future of meaningful work for everyone that is solving the economy’s real problems, and not simply exacerbating zero-sum competition for resources?

lawyers. Sometimes AI can help lawyers and help make things more efficient, but it can’t and shouldn’t replace lawyers in many contexts. Why should AI not replace lawyers and police? I think AI should be framed more as a complement or as an assistant to lawyers as opposed to a replacement. There are so many forms of judgment, communication and empathy that are elements of a proper legal representation. You can’t get that through a purely automated approach. There are some narrow areas where AI is doing very well. For example, tax preparation like Turbo Tax, which does have a legal component to it, is great, but

Did you have a technical background?

even that has problems. For example, it allows the legislators to make the taxes so complex because with

No, I have no technical background. I think experi-

TurboTax people don’t actually need to understand

encing some family members with health troubles

the tax code. So consequently Intuit, the company

made me interested in health and technology

behind TurboTax, lobbies to keep the taxes complex

in general. It was striking to see someone whose

or, at least, to prevent simple reforms that could make

cancer would have been a death sentence 10 years

tax filing really easy for 100 million people. The 100

earlier but with current technology it could be cured.

million simplest returns should simply be a postcard…

And watching how the Internet changed governance

It should be easy, but it’s made complex because the

even among people in a university was fascinating—

people behind automated tax-prep software lobby

for example, the difference in who would win

against the simple solutions, which run contrary to

a public election versus an online election for a

their business model.

university position. One of my biggest worries is that the price of

Your book describes both our worst fears and best

admission to talking about these issues becomes

dreams for robotics. Which of the worst fears is most

having a technical background, like knowing how

likely to be realized? Which of the best dreams?

to code. Artificial intelligence raises so many policy, ethical and philosophical concerns where a person

The worst fear likely to be realized is ongoing robot-

with a technical background has no special expertise,

icization of law enforcement. I think we are going to

but others have really appropriate expertise in policy

see more things like the New York police robot dog

and law and should be at the table not just to regu-

that was introduced in April. Even though the New

late what happens but to shape what is developed.

York Police Department is pulling back on that, there’s

That, to me, is really important: getting the voice of

going to be a lot of pressure to develop drones and

humanities and law in at the very beginning of the

other forms of automated surveillance. I think security

technical process so that we don’t create horrific AI

robots are going to be very popular particularly if there

or other technology.

are any upticks in crime, then they will be framed as

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

just a temporary response to crime increases, but they will, in fact, become permanent. With respect to positive outcomes, we could be on

Bullshit Jobs, David Graeber argued that a lot of people feel alienated from what they are doing. But it’s often not that the job itself is B.S. but that there are prob-

the verge of a real medical renaissance with an incred-

lematic parts that could be done better by automation,

ible array of new drugs and devices developed because

freeing the worker to take on more fulfilling or inter-

the data from existing devices is going to keep improv-

esting tasks.

ing and that’s going to feed into more innovation and

For example, where I used to work there was an

better services and drugs for everybody.

eight-step approval process for getting travel reim-

You have identified several priorities for managing

receipts and decide whether they are legit or likely

the rise of robotics that you call the “New Laws of

to have been faked. I would bet every person in that

bursed. It would have been easy for AI to look at travel

Robotics.” With these general principles in mind,

eight-step approval process didn’t like looking over

what do you see as the most urgent priority for

travel receipts and probably had something more

policy makers?

important they could have been doing for the community, for the law school or for the university.

The most urgent priority now is to develop a vision

We need to reimagine what work could be. It’s not

for the future of jobs in an increasingly automated

like my entire job will be automated, or my assistant’s

society. There’s not enough attention paid to the

or the financial controller’s. But parts of the job can be,

most important problems facing us, which I think

and then we can probably do other tasks that are more

are climate change and ongoing care crises—crises

useful and more meaningful.

for people caring for young children, for elderly family members, for loved ones in long-term facilities.

This is your first “new law of robotics,” that

Those things are not being prioritized sufficiently,

robotic systems should complement not replace

while simultaneously innovators are channeling

professionals.

more and more money into the finance and force sectors. The overarching question is: How do you create a

Yes, AI can complement people in many roles. The usual automation talk expresses the worry that “Oh

future of meaningful work for everyone that is solv-

no, the robots are going to take all the jobs.” I think

ing the economy’s real problems, and not simply

it is more likely there will be infinite work for people,

exacerbating zero-sum competition for resources?

especially as data collection improves.

The book describes several ways we could guar-

But how are we going to do it all? Once you have

antee a job to almost everyone, grounded in an

the robots collecting all the data, they could offer so

awareness of the type of work that is unlikely to

many great new services for people if we have enough

be automated and that shouldn’t be automated. We

people to coordinate the data collection, the testing,

should invest in that, while making sure that the

the quality control. If we play our cards right, there will

general tech and finance sectors are kept in their

not just be infinite work, but infinite productive work.

place and not able to become so expansive that they displace the more important roles in the economy.

Which entities and institutions are most effective at confronting the challenges that AI poses? What are

So you are advocating guaranteed jobs rather than

some examples of effective policy making that you

guaranteed incomes? That’s interesting to me

have seen recently?

because my concern about a universal guaranteed income scheme is that it might make inequality

Real regulatory action is happening right now with

even worse by dividing society into an elite creative

regard to bias and discriminatory AI that’s very

workforce with a lot of autonomy and mobility, and

inspiring. There’s serious concern that artificial intel-

a vast unemployed underclass whose income can

ligence is being based on data that does not accurately

meet their basic needs, but they have no power, no

represent society as a whole. Caroline Criado-Perez

mobility and no sense of accomplishment.

has written a book called Invisible Women, stating

Yes, that’s really important. How do you create a gen-

in medical studies. There are works like Ruha

eral economy in society where everybody has a feeling

Benjamin’s Race After Technology that talk about the

that women’s data is not adequately represented

of involvement, purpose and importance—where

failure to acknowledge and to adequately include a

the job being done is actually important? In his book

lot of minority perspectives in AI technology. Safiya

OUR ROBOTIC FUTURE: A Q & A WITH AUTHOR FRANK PASQUALE

Noble and Virginia Eubanks are also doing great work in this area. How do we make sure that AI is not discriminatory?

you see and impose augmented reality over someone so, for example, the moment that you meet someone you would be able to know their name, where they

In the U.S. we are groping toward an answer. In the con-

live, the top five Google results about them and so on.

text of commercial law, the Federal Trade Commission

And I think we are very fortunate that most people just

just announced that discriminatory AI would be

rose up and said, “This is a bad idea.” Sure, it might be

deemed an “unfair practice.” That’s going to be very

great for surgeons to record their surgeries, or in other

hard to enforce, but I think it’s a great step forward.

high stakes contexts, but it’s just a terrible idea to have

A much more ambitious approach is that of the European Union, which has put forth a draft regu-

everyone walking around recording each other automatically, obliterating every last bit of privacy.

lation on AI that’s extremely well thought out and

I bring it up because I think it was just last week

very rigorous. First of all, it’s banning several forms

Mark Zuckerberg was pushing for a similar invention,

of AI that have really negative impacts on individu-

saying “Wouldn’t it be great?” But people need to be

als. Some manipulative advertising will be banned,

able to say, “No, actually, being constantly watched

as will police use of indiscriminate facial recognition.

by a pair of glasses hooked up to some of the most

That list is not enough—for example, many forms of

powerful companies in history is a bad idea.”

emotion recognition, mental health diagnoses, eth-

There are a hundred other technologies like this

nicity attribution and lie detection should also be

that are being developed and implemented now, like

banned. But the broader principle—that some uses of

the hiring based on secret AI-driven analysis of videos,

technology are simply too harmful to be permitted—

or weaponry where a drone could become more and

should improve global debates on AI regulation.

more autonomous, or police robots and prison guards.

The EU also regulates high-risk AI, which includes

We are making decisions now, and if we let them

credit scoring, employment scoring and things like

go forward it’s very risky because once something

that. To give you a sense of how scary this stuff can

becomes common in society, it’s very hard to ban it.

be, there are now firms that claim they can watch a

And it’s even hard to regulate because the peo-

video of you talking, and that from just your face or

ple behind it are concentrated interests. For example,

your voice tone they can recommend to an employer

imagine if there were, in the next 10 years, 100,000

whether to hire you or not. And they say, “Oh, it’s

police robots. We may find in the year 2031 that we

AI. We have a big database of the best employees, and

really want to regulate these things, and the experts

we’re going to match how you talk and how often

say they need to be regulated, but every time it comes

you blink, for example, and a thousand other vari-

up in the U.S. Senate, the police robot company basi-

ables, and then we’re going to recommend whether

cally owns one senator who filibusters.

you look more like the successful employees or not.” That’s something I would like to see banned.

That sort of thing is dangerous, so having people be deeply aware of the stakes of technological

Barring that, at the very least it should be deemed

advance is critical. If you allow any of these menacing

high risk, and both providers of it and users of it would

and creepy things that I’ve discussed to come forward

have to demonstrate that it doesn’t have biases, that

and they become popular—that’s worrisome.

the data is secure, that a person is responsible for it, that it can be explained—all of those things I think are

You are also suggesting that for every one of these

really critical to the future of AI regulation, and I hope

advances an entrenched interest arises.

the U.S. follows in the EU’s footsteps soon on that. Absolutely. How should the general public best understand the potential risks and rewards of the Age of AI? What

What is the most important thing for lawyers to

is the thing you most want the ordinary person to

understand about new technologies and AI in

understand about this moment?

particular?

We are now deciding the rules and practices for AI that

That they could be a huge help. Although AI could be

are going to deeply affect your life and your children’s

dangerous if it were to take over the jobs of judges and

lives for decades to come. To give a really practical

police, it’s also a useful tool. Lawyers are going to need

example, think back to Google Glass. It was being

to understand these technologies very deeply. They

marketed to the public as a little camera in eyeglasses

need to be aware of different forms of natural lan-

that you would wear that could record everything

guage processing, of automated text generation and of

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

analysis of legal opinions and regulations that could

What idea about artificial intelligence do you most

help them serve their clients better and make more of

want to leave readers with?

a positive impact on society as a whole. For example, say you are a health privacy lawyer

How is this affecting us as persons, in the way that we

who is interested in what the Department of Health and

think of ourselves as actors in the world? The biggest

Human Services is doing about the interoperability of

danger is not necessarily that the machines will replace

data on different electronic health records platforms. A

human beings, but that human beings are being forced

lot of what comes out of the department is extremely

to act more and more like machines, that we are being

complicated, extremely hard to parse. So having an AI

incentivized or coerced to be more standardized, easier

to do some level of summarization, that can try to find

to understand and less spontaneous. I do some work

patterns and analyze it in various ways could be quite

on affective computing, where the computer suppos-

helpful. I think we will see an increasing number of

edly can read your emotions. It’s supposed to help

firms creating that type of software. Some programs

computers serve people. But if it becomes widespread,

already analyze how different judges react to different

then the challenge may well become being able to

filings and then suggest, “Here’s the best place to file

enact the type of emotion that the machine can rec-

a patent case and here’s the place that’s not so good”

ognize, for example, when the automated voice on the

and things like that. All those tools are going to become increasingly

phone tree says, “I didn’t understand that” and you learn to talk like the phone tree wants you to talk…

important to be aware of, but judges should force law-

That times one thousand is what potentially happens

yers to disclose if they’ve used those tools. I proposed

when things like affective computing get rolled into

that as a rule in a co-authored article in 2018—I think

cars, workplaces, bathrooms and many other places.

we really need to get the bar to pay attention to this. I

Or imagine interactive displays at airport customs

worry that you’re going to see natural language pro-

when you come back from a foreign country. That’s

cessing that will look at all the filings that go before

very high stakes and you really need to be understood

a judge and will give lawyers ideas about how you

by the machine very well. This aspect is a big worry—

should write to impress this judge. If you use that,

people should have it on their agenda and try to resist it

you need to disclose that to the judge to avoid unfair

and be aware of it to the extent that one is in a position

advantages for those who can afford the tech. Judges

to stop it. Retaining and reclaiming our humanity is

need to see “How are they picking up on my habits in

the biggest challenge in an age of AI.

my decision?” And they can adjust their own actions accordingly. Wouldn’t that also make judges more enlightened about their own reasoning? Yes, that’s exactly right.

The biggest danger is not necessarily that the machines will replace human beings, but that human beings are being forced to act more and more like machines.

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

A Tale of Two Drexels: St. Katharine, Her Uncle Anthony and the Universities hey Built

A TALE OF TWO DREXELS

Anthony founds

Catherine founds

the Drexel

a new order and

Institute (now

takes the name

Anthony Joseph

Catherine Mary

Drexel Sr. is born in

Drexel is born,

Catherine enters

Drexel University)

Sister Mary

Philadelphia.

also in Philadelphia.

the convent.

in Philadelphia.

Katharine Drexel.

1826

1858

1889

1891

On May 21, 1883, a young Catherine Mary Drexel, niece

Would she serve God best as a bride of Christ—or as a

of Drexel University’s founder, Anthony J. Drexel, scrib-

wife and mother?

bled out the following phrases across the top of a blank

When Catherine’s father died just two years after

piece of paper: “My Reasons for Entering Religion,” “My

her stepmother, the fortune that she and her sisters

Objections to Entering Religion,” “For the Married State”

inherited placed them among the ranks of the Gilded

and “Opposed to the Married State.” She then listed

Age’s richest Americans. But her dizzying wealth and

reasons why she should and should not get married or

the social clout that came with it diminished neither her

become a Catholic nun and sent the lists to Father James

commitment to sharing God’s love nor her uncertainty

O’Connor, her long-time friend and spiritual advisor.

about her true vocation. Her health began to decline.

She signed the letter “Your unworthy child in Christ.”

She lost her appetite, suffered from stomach ailments

Catherine, who was 24 years old at the time, would

and fasted beyond what Father O’Connor recommended.

later become St. Katharine Drexel, the second American

In 1886, in an effort to restore her health, Catherine

to be canonized as a saint. On the path toward saint-

toured Europe with her sisters. In Rome, she met privately

hood, she founded a university, Xavier University in

with Pope Leo XIII and asked him to send missionary

New Orleans, the country’s only historically Black

priests to the Native Americans. His response—“Why

Catholic university. Although they lived quite differ-

not my child, yourself become a missionary?”—left her

ent lives, these Drexels—uncle and niece, banker and

in tears of confusion.

nun—shared a passionate belief in the power of educa-

Catherine Drexel resolved her indecision on

tion to remedy injustice and inequality, improve lives

November 26, 1888, her 30th birthday, sending a letter

and advance society. Their legacies live on, not only

to Father O’Connor declaring her intention to become

in the two schools they founded, but in the two cities,

a nun. She entered the novitiate of the Sisters of Mercy

Philadelphia and New Orleans, where those schools

of St. Mary’s Convent in Pittsburgh soon after.

have grown into important local institutions. When Catherine wrote to her priest, she was st r ug gl i ng to resolve her i ndeci sion about her future. Her stepmother had passed away just months earlier, in January 1883, and she, her two sisters and her father were plagued with grief. She had grown

A Black Catholic College Grows in New Orleans In 1891, Catherine founded a new order, became its

up in a wealthy and devout Philadelphia family

first professed sister and took a new name, Sister Mary

and had heard from a young age the call to share

Katharine Drexel. (She continued to go by Katharine,

God’s love by uplifting those less fortunate than her-

but with the different spelling. This article uses the new

self. One of her first independent acts of charity had

spelling going forward.) Her concerns about the welfare

been to purchase a $100 statue for a Catholic church

of Black Americans and Native Americans in particu-

serving Native Americans in Tacoma, Washington.

lar sparked the creation of the new order, the Sisters

Her commitment to service reflected both her

of Blessed Sacrament for Indians and Colored People.

upbringing and her disposition. But on the day that

According to her biographer and distant relative Cordelia

Catherine wrote to Father O’Connor, she was uncertain:

Biddle, as quoted in the documentary Urban Trinity: The

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

Katharine founds Xavier University in New Orleans, Anthony Drexel

the country’s only

Katharine dies

Katharine is

dies at age 66.

Catholic HBCU.

at age 96.

canonized.

1893

1915

1955

Katharine undermined segregationist norms throughout her work at Xavier. During the dedication of the new campus, she circumvented the expectation that Black attendees would be unable to sit until all white attendees were seated by removing all the chairs—everyone, Black and white, stood during the ceremony.

2000

who were self-assured in their Blackness, and so, that’s what she did.” Creating Xavier was, unsurprisingly, no easy task. In fact, the university’s original location at 5116 Magazine Street in New Orleans had previously been occupied by Southern University, a public land-grant institution for Black students that had thrived in that location. But as New Orleans began to expand around 1910, white residents moved into the school’s majority Black neighborhoods and began complaining about living near Black people. In 1913, despite the efforts of Black New Orleaneans, the Louisiana legislature passed a bill to

Story of Catholic Philadelphia, Katharine “believed that

move Southern University to Baton Rouge, leaving the

everyone was equal as God’s beloved children.”

property vacant.

Under her leadership, the order founded 145 mis-

Even before Southern University’s relocation, James

sions, 12 schools for Native American children and

Hubert Herbert Blenk, the Archbishop of New Orleans,

50 schools for African American children throughout

had invited Katharine to send her sisters to establish

the United States. But it was the founding of Xavier

Catholic schools for the Black community. But Katharine

University in New Orleans in 1915, the first and only

refrained, likely because she didn’t believe she could

historically Black and Catholic higher education insti-

offer anything beyond what the Sisters of the Holy

tution in the United States, that many consider to be

Family, an order of Black nuns in New Orleans, were

her greatest accomplishment. In a 2019 convocation

already providing. With Southern University’s eviction,

speech at Xavier, historian Sharlene Sinegal-DeCuir

however, Katharine saw an opportunity for her order to

pronounced the founding of that school to be the future

provide something unique, a teacher training school for

saint’s “crowning achievement.”

Black Catholics.

As Sinegal-DeCuir describes her, St. Katharine

Given the hostile environment, Katharine knew she

showed an understanding of the toll that racial injustice

would have to be strategic about how she acquired the

took on its victims that seems ahead of her time. “Even

property. According to Biddle in her 2014 biography,

though she’s working in the 1900s in Louisiana with the

Saint Katharine: The Life of Katharine Drexel, she visited

rigid Jim Crow system, she wants to make sure that the

the property covertly, hiding her identity and intentions.

people that she’s educating feel that they are worthy,

Once she approved the purchase of the property, she used

that they’re not second class,” explained Sinegal-DeCuir,

a straw man to acquire it at a public auction in April 1915.

the chair of Xavier’s history department, in a recent interview. “When you came to Xavier this was your environ-

Her creative circumvention of segregationist norms persisted throughout her work at Xavier. In 1932, when the university opened a new campus at its current

ment, this was your Black space,” she continued. “She

location, Katharine knew that the dedication cere-

wanted to create people who were independent, people

mony for the building would be dictated by social and

Xavier University of

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

Louisiana, located in New Orleans, is the nation’s only

Catholic HBCU.

Xavier produces more Black medical students than any other undergraduate institution in the United States.

mater “a true lifeline for the community, especially given where Xavier is situated.” When Greene attended the school, she explained, the neighborhoods immediately surrounding the university were home to mostly low-income people of color. “Xavier was very much a applied knowledge, enabling them to improve their earn-

centerpiece of the community and provided countless

ing potential and enhance their lives,” wrote Biddle in

resources, not just academic ones,” she said.

Building Drexel. So, in 1891, the same year that Katharine

According to Greene, Xavier instills in students a

took her vows, Anthony established what became Drexel

commitment to not only be of service to their commu-

University in Philadelphia.

nity but also to be invested in community beyond the university gates. Upon stepping on campus as a new

A Saint’s Legacy Katharine died in 1955. Because she had no heirs, her

student, “these expectations were clearly communicated to us,” she continued. “Cultivating students who use their educational access and enrichment for the betterment of our communities, for the betterment of

father’s will determined how her inheritance was dis-

society is a part of Xavier’s institutional DNA. Xavier

tributed. According to Sinegal-DeCuir, if Katharine had

alumni continue to adhere to these principles as they

put 10 percent of her annual income in an endowment

venture out in the world pursuing their respective pro-

throughout her life, the endowment would have quickly

fessional paths.”

surpassed her father’s fortune, and Xavier would have

Katharine’s strategy of undermining White suprem-

had firm financial backing. But she never did this because

acist practices became a Xavier tradition. In 1934, Sister

she believed that God would provide for the university.

Mary Elise Sisson established a music department.

“She was right. God has provided, and God continues

According to Biddle’s Saint Katharine, when Sister Elise,

to provide for Xavier,” said Sinegal-DeCuir in her 2019 convocation speech.

a former opera singer who grew up in the North and was “ignorant of the effects” of segregation, learned that her

Indeed, the school, which is now known as Xavier

students couldn’t attend musical performances in local

University of Louisiana, has thrived both financially

halls and auditoriums, she created an opera program at

and academically. With a total enrollment (including

Xavier. From 1934 until her retirement in 1969, she and

undergraduate and graduate students) of approximately

her students produced full operas that featured interracial

3,400 students, Xavier is considerably smaller than its

casts and were performed for mixed audiences. By the

New Orleans peer schools, such as the University of New

1950s, Xavier had become the first stage for several Black

Orleans and Tulane University. But since its founding it

opera students such as Annabelle Bernard, Débria Brown

has had an important and even outsized impact on its

and Gail Varina Gilmore, who went on to break barriers in

city and beyond.

the opera world by becoming professional opera singers.

Its endowment sits at $178 million as of March 2021,

Universities serve many masters. Urban univer-

which makes it one of the most well-endowed of the

sities typically seek to responsibly balance their core

historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs). Its

mission to educate students and advance society

college produces more Black medical students than any

through research with their inevitable responsibilities

other undergraduate institution in the United States. And

as employers, property owners and neighbors. Beyond

in 2021 US News ranked it as the nation’s third best HBCU,

her commitment to Xavier’s students, Katharine also

just behind Spelman College and Howard University.

hoped to benefit the people of New Orleans.

Wendy Greene, a Kline Law professor, received her

In 2011, Xavier University established the Xavier

undergraduate degree from Xavier. She called her alma

University Community Outreach Center, which

speech in 2010, Drexel University President John Fry

A TALE OF TWO DREXELS

acknowledged that, if Anthony Drexel had walked from the school’s first building, across the current campus, and into the surrounding neighborhoods, he might have been less than satisfied that Drexel was, as he put it, “fulfilling serves Gert Town, the neighborhood surrounding the campus. In a short documentary film, Cirecie A. West-

our mission as an urban university.” Consequently, the university launched several ambi-

Olatunji, the center’s director, explained its approach

tious community-oriented initiatives. These include the

to community service. Community members, she said,

Lindy Center for Civic Engagement and the Dornsife

“need to say what they want here. And then what we

Center for Neighborhood Partnerships. Housed within

do will be sustainable because it’s their community.

the Dornsife Center, Thomas R. Kline School of Law’s

It’ll be recognizable because it’s what they thought

Andy and Gwen Stern Community Lawyering Clinic pro-

should happen, and they’ll be involved and engaged.”

vides both short-term and long-term services to Drexel’s neighbors. The clinic offers legal education to community

Anthony J. Drexel Sr. (1826—1893) Banker, philanthropist and founder of Drexel University.

Kline Law faculty collaborate with the Dornsife Center

Like his niece, Anthony Drexel had an expansive vision

munity members in conflict resolution techniques.

for the school that he founded: that it would bring educa-

in a restorative justice project, which seeks to train comDrexel has also made a series of significant investments in local education. The

tional opportunities to working class and other less education-

university raised almost $42

ally advantaged students and

million for a new building to

be an engine for progress in his home city. For Drexel University, living up to its founders’ vision—especially with regard to its neighbors—has sometimes proven challenging, and residents of neighborhoods

Through its Liberty Scholars Program, Drexel has provided nearly $90 million in full-tuition scholarships to low-income Philadelphia residents.

surrounding the campus have complained that the university

Representatives of Drexel University and the School District of Philadelphia breaking ground in December 2019 for a new building in West Philadelphia to house two public schools.

members and represents them in legal proceedings. And

Fulfilling Anthony Drexel’s Vision

house both a local elementary school and middle school operated by the Philadelphia School District, and, through its Liberty Scholars Program, the university has provided nearly $90 million in full-tuition scholarships to low-income Philadelphia residents. Fry is proud of the univer-

wasn’t doing enough to make its amenities available to

sity’s progress. “The spirit of civic engagement is evident

its neighbors or to engage the local community in its

in all corners of Drexel’s community,” he wrote in an

development processes. In his inaugural convocation

email. “Our faculty have deepened their commitment to

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

The St. Elizabeth Motherhouse in Cornwell Heights, Pennsylvania. The sisters of the Order of the Blessed Sacrament moved into the unfinished convent building in December 1892.

social impact and problem-solving through their teach-

founded more than 100 years ago. “St. Katharine

ing and research, and there is faculty leadership in civic

Drexel and her Sisters showed tremendous ingenuity

engagement in every college and school. We have seen

in overcoming challenges and barriers to bring oppor-

an incredible rise in student engagement, with mento-

tunities to marginalized people. Her story exemplifies

ring from the Lindy Center for Civic Engagement and

the positive impact individuals and institutions can

Student Life. And importantly, our business practices

have on communities,” said Daniel M. Filler, dean

now routinely extend opportunities for employment,

of the Kline School of Law. “At Kline Law, we are

purchasing and contracting to local residents and busi-

inspired by their commitment as we seek to do our

nesses, creating wealth for our neighbors.”

part to empower our neighbors.”

Charity Begins at Home

Analisa Goodmann is a copywriter at the Thomas R. Kline School of Law and assistant editor of Lex.

Katharine Drexel witnessed generosity toward neighbors from an early age. Her stepmother, Emma Drexel, one of her most important role models, invited the Philadelphia community into the family home three days each week, distributing everything from new shoes to rent money. Katharine wrote later: “I didn’t think of becoming a religious until years after I’d become interested in missionary work on the Indian reservations. It was long after I’d helped build schools for Indians and Negroes, and endeavored to get priests and nuns to do the work of religious training in those schools. It suddenly seemed one night that something inside of me was saying, ‘Why do you keep sending other people to do this great work for you? Why don’t you do it yourself?’” The generous, inquisitive, innovative and activist spirits of St. Katharine Drexel, the patron saint of philanthropy and of racial justice, and of her uncle, Anthony Drexel, live on today in the universities they

Emma Bouvier Drexel (1833-1882) Beloved stepmother to Katharine and her sisters.

THE OLD TO LEAD, THE YOUNG TO FALL? MAKING THE CASE FO R Y U T H RIGHTS by Adam Benforado

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

In 1968, th e Youth In ternational president o Party nomin f the United ated a pig States. Acco for members w r ding to the Y e r e k n ow n ippies (as pa ), the Dem rty was ignorin o c r a ti c National g the young Committee people of A would send m e rica. Puttin a message, in g up a swin th e e w o rds of the fo that the upc lk singer Ph oming Dem il Ochs, ocratic Nati be taken ser o n a l C o n vention “w iously beca as not to use it wasn’t h on e s t , a n d fa ir , a nd wasn’t g wasn’t goin oing to be g to be a de bought the m o cratic conv 145-pound ention.” He p ig fr o m a local farm his transpor e r a n d a r ra n t, via statio n ged for w a g o n , to the Chic Pigasus’s ac ago Civic Ce c e p ta n c e s p nter. As e e c h wa s re seizing Och a d o u t , the police s , s e ve r a l o closed in, ther Yippie nominee. O o r g a nizers and chs, release their swine d o n b a il—but now later that w eek to perfo pigless—retu rm to the gr rned the Chicago o w ing crowd o Colosseum. f protesters at

MAKING THE CASE FOR YOUTH RIGHTS

When, after the violence, after the tear gas and the bloodied batons, after hundreds had been injured, and Hubert Humphrey, who had promoted the Vietnam War as vice president, was crowned the Democratic nominee, Ochs was called as a witness in the trial of his fellow

Many of Ochs’s songs were like the Yippie movement

Yippies for conspiracy and incitement to riot charges.

itself: a laugh and a punch at the same time. He’d have

The defense counsel asked him to play the song so the

his audience chuckling, as he socked them in the ribs. In

court could hear the lyrics. They aren’t funny at all:

“Love Me, I’m a Liberal” he skewered the very lefties who bought his albums—men and women who, in his words,

It’s always the old

were “ten degrees to the left of center in good times, ten

to lead us to the wars,

degrees to the right of center if it affects them person-

Always the young to fall,

ally.” His words stung with truth: “The people of old

Now look at all we’ve won

Mississippi, should all hang their heads in shame… But

with a saber and a gun

if you ask me to bus my children, I hope the cops take

Tell me, is it worth it all?

down your name.” And perhaps that’s why he was the only folk singer there protesting before the convention. He had invited Paul Simon, Pete Seeger and Judy Collins,

The Young and the Powerless

but none of them came. So, Ochs stood there alone and sang into the night, and when he got to “I Ain’t Marching Anymore” the

The song is about combat—who gives the orders and who bleeds—but the broader message is about the trag-

crowd’s cheers stopped him. In the footage of that

edy of subjugating, silencing and exploiting young

moment—which Ochs would later call the highlight of

people generally. More than a half-century later, Ochs’s

his career—the camera pans to pockets of light, catching

lines echo unsettling truths. It is still the young—from

young faces and hands for an instant. You can make out

infancy to the cusp of adulthood—who are forced to

two-fingered peace signs, and then you notice the draft

sacrifice for the old. The United States left Vietnam

cards, raised and suddenly aflame. Hundreds of them

but never stopped coercing teens into fighting its bat-

burned that night.

tles. Today, military recruiters understand that high

Singer songwriter Phil Ochs in January 1966. Ochs’s songs expressed the frustrations of American youth who opposed the Vietnam War.

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

schoolers are their primary targets, so they coach teams and chaperone events. They set up mobile simulators in the school parking lot so that students, released early from math and English, can try out the latest weapons. They give kids the hard sell as they play Call of Duty and Valorant on the U.S. Army’s very own Twitch channel. They dangle signing bonuses and college scholarships in front of 17-year-olds living below the poverty line. America lowered the federal voting age in 1971—a victory for the young people in Ochs’s audience that night—but today’s 17-year-old enlistees still can’t vote, and, because of the election cycle, roughly a quarter still won’t be able to cast a ballot for president until they are 21.

Is it any wonder that the major political parties continue to ignore the interests of young people? Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein summed it up best, in 2019, when 16-year-old Isha Clarke pressed her to support the Green New Deal and to hear the pleas of the students in her office. “You didn’t vote for me,” she told them, because, of course, they couldn’t. That elected officials have not acted to forestall climate change or pass meaningful gun control legislation to protect children seems less surprising when one considers how little power children have in our system. Their disqualification and exclusion from the political realm help explain why less than 10 percent of the federal budget is spent on children, why one in six kids lives in poverty, why more than a million children under the age of six experience homelessness each year, why it’s entirely legal for a 12-year-old to work unlimited hours on a farm, and why more than 10 percent of kids in Texas don’t have health insurance.

3 1 — Chicago Police “arrest” Youth International Party (“Yippie”) presidential nominee Pigasus at a protest before the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in 1968. Singer Phil Ochs bought the pig from a local farmer and arranged for his transport to the Chicago Civic Center. 2 — During protests at the 1968 DNC in Chicago, a young man supporting the Yippies stands near a line of helmeted police officers. 3 — A poster advertises “The Calling,” a series of animated recruiting videos released in spring 2021 by the U.S. Army telling the personal stories of five young soldiers. According to the army, the videos were tested to assess their resonance with today’s youth.

MAKING THE CASE FOR YOUTH RIGHTS

Less than 10 percent of the U.S. federal budget is spent on children.

One in six American children live below the poverty line.

HELP More than one million children in the United States experience homelessness each year.

It is legal for children as young as 12 to work unlimited hours on a farm of any size.

More than 10 percent of the children in Texas lack health insurance.

That elected officials have not acted to forestall climate change or pass meaningful gun control legislation to protect children seems less surprising when one considers how little power children have in our system.

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

Consider public policy during the COVID-19 pandemic: In Philadelphia, where I live, casinos, movie

We are so accustomed to young people’s second-class citizenship that any claim of full and equal person-

theaters, restaurants, stores, churches and senior centers

hood produces strong resistance. Indeed, as

were all open on March 1, 2021, but public schools still

with the burning of the draft cards, the

were not—nearly a year after they shut their doors. As

act of protesting the mistreatment and

Susan B. Anthony explained back in 1873, “The moment

oppression of young people is often

you deprive a person of his right to a voice in the govern-

viewed as the outrage, not the mis-

ment, you degrade him from the status of a citizen of the

treatment and oppression itself.

republic to that of a subject…[a person] helpless, power-

Rather than heed the call of young

less, bound to obey laws made by superiors.”

people to confront the harms of

Over and over, we—the adults, the self-appointed

climate change, gun violence and

superiors—pass on our debts and our responsibilities to

racism, too many focus on the dis-

our children. We did not pay for the wars we chose to

ruption and danger these young

wage in Afghanistan and Iraq; we gave ourselves huge

people pose to us.

tax cuts in the present and financed our quagmires by

When we all might celebrate the brav-

borrowing money. The tab—trillions in direct costs and

ery and initiative of young environmental

trillions in interest payments—is left for posterity. Rather

activists, the Parkland School shooting survivors

than remove the lead paint and service lines from our old

and the Black Lives Matter youth organizers, instead, note

Greta Thunberg

houses and schools, we hand out disclosure pamphlets. To

how many adults scoff at them for their disrespect, their

Greta Thunberg of Sweden,

remove the risks to children discovered on our watch has

naiveté, their foolishness, their radicalism. In The New

the world’s most famous

been deemed too expensive, so our children carry heavy

York Times, columnist Christopher Caldwell described

climate activist, recently

metals in their veins. We could make higher education free

Greta Thunberg, who, at the age of 16, was drawing

turned 18.

so young people do not start adulthood with six-figure

international attention to the threat of climate change,

handcuffs. We could end the restrictive zoning practices in

as an “unqualified,” “complicated adolescent,” with an

cities like San Francisco, New York and Boston that drive

“unrealistic” world view and “out of balance” priorities,

up rents and prevent those on the cusp of adulthood from

prone to “crude language,” “simplification” and “sow-

moving to these hubs of opportunity. We could ban pes-

ing panic.” In his view, if only she were older and wiser,

ticides that damage children’s brains and cause pediatric

she’d realize that what was called for was not action,

cancer. But we like our cheap, blemish-free apples, soar-

but “patience”—“waiting and seeing” whether

ing home equity and swelling retirement accounts.

the Earth becomes uninhabitable, or not.

When there is a whisper, a question, a murmur of protest from the young, too many of us put our finger

According to radio host Erick Ericson, then 17-year-old gun-safety

to our lips. Over and over, we deny them a voice, tell-

advocate David Hogg, a survivor

ing them that they are unprepared, naïve, incapable

of the massacre at the Stoneman

of understanding, that, as partial persons only, they

Douglas High School, was “a bully”

should follow silently and wait. As Senator Feinstein told

using “what happened to him as

Isha, “I’ve been doing this for 30 years. I know what I’m

a shield to avoid criticism.” As

doing”; you—children—“should listen a little bit.” With

Ericson explained, “High school

proper patience, in 60 or 70 years, perhaps Isha might get

kids are not people we should take

her chance to address global warming: “I think one day

seriously on any subjects.” As thou-

you should run for the United States Senate and then you

sands of young people across the country

do it your way.”

marched against police brutality, Fox News

But it is no answer that youth is a temporary condi-

warned us not of the dangers posed to Black

tion, that everyone gets their chance in time, because

children—the 6-year-olds arrested for getting upset at

many young people in fact do not: They are struck and

school, the 12-year-olds mistaken as dangerous men and

don’t recover, they carry wounds that do not heal, and

shot without warning, all the teens stopped and frisked

today, because of growing inequality, decreased geo-

for nothing more than a look over their shoulder—but

graphic mobility and the threat of global warming in

of the danger posed by Black children: rioters, looters,

particular, they face an adulthood far more precari-

cop killers, anarchists. Try to begin a conversation about

ous and fraught than the one their parents have had. If

ensuring children’s rights and see how quickly you are

our best response is “don’t worry, one day you’ll get to

drowned out by those eager to defend the existing rights

ignore children, too,” we should stop and reflect. “The

of adults: Second Amendment rights, small business

old to lead us and the young to fall” is not the natural

rights, police rights, defendants’ rights, teachers’ rights,

order of things; it’s not rational or inevitable; it was

parents’ rights.

wrong in 1968 and it is wrong today.

David Hogg David Hogg became a prominent gun-safety advocate after surviving the mass shooting at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla. in 2018.

MAKING THE CASE FOR YOUTH RIGHTS

When we begin to listen to young people—and give them real power—we will make better societal decisions for current and future generations.

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

False Choices These other interests do matter, of course, but it’s not a zero-sum game. We don’t have to choose. Ensuring the rights of young people would lead to better outcomes for all of us. To return to Phil Ochs, what have we won in subjugating the young? The truth is that when young people have marched of their own accord, they have led society away from disaster, moral abomination and failure. In 1903, child textile workers marched from Philadelphia to New York against labor abuses; in 1963, child activists marched in Birmingham to end segregation; they marched against the Vietnam War as well as the U.S. invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, each one a disaster. They show us the righteous path today. Racism and gun violence harm everyone. Climate change threatens the present and future of the entire human race. Every dollar we spend on early learning, and on preventative health care and stable housing for children produces many more dollars in increased productivity and reduced costs later. When we begin to listen to young people— and give them real power—we will make better societal decisions for current and future generations. Some fear that as soon as we extend participatory and other autonomy rights to children, we could be forced to remove many of the protections that they enjoy. Lower the voting age, goes this logic, and you

must also lower the age at which a person can be put to death for a crime or drafted into the army. But why? These are completely separate policy decisions involving quite different considerations. In fact, the relevant 1 — Child textile workers on strike in Philadelphia

psychological and neuroscientific research suggests that

in 1903 demanding a 55-hour work week. The

a nuanced approach is well justified: By 16, for exam-

strike won national attention when labor activist

ple, a teenager’s cognitive capacity relevant to voting

Mother Jones led a “Children’s Crusade” to the

is indistinguishable from an adult’s, but that’s not true

home of President Theodore Roosevelt on Long

with respect to the psychological processes that shape

Island carrying banners that read “We want to

criminal behavior, which include the ability to control

go to school and not the mines!”

impulses and resist peer pressure. We can give young people a voice in government and nonetheless recognize

2 — Children march in New York City as part of

that they still need protection from certain risks. We can

the September 2019 climate strikes held around

seat a 15-year-old on a jury and bar a 15-year-old from

the world.

being tried as an adult. We can give a middle schooler a say in the books she reads at school and still require

3 — A police dog attacks a young man during the

that there be no asbestos tiles in the classroom ceiling

Youth Mass Demonstration for civil rights in

above her. In truth, giving the vulnerable a voice may

Birmingham, Ala. in May 1963.

be the best way to ensure that we protect them from the right things.

4 — Young people sitting on a wall in front of the Lincoln Memorial on August 28, 1963 as part of the historic March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, where Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech.

Adam Benforado is professor of law at the Kline School of Law. His second book, The Rights of Children, will be published by Crown.

Clockwise from bottom left: William Rehnquist, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Thurgood Marshall.

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

C AOS AND THE UNITED STATES COURT by David S. Cohen

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

attack and died. Vinson was replaced by Earl Warren

to a special care facility, and he was soon unable to rec-

as chief, who then steered the court to unanimously

ognize her. Reports from those close to her indicate she

overturn Plessy and gave us the Brown opinion that we

began to regret her decision to retire after her husband’s

know and revere today.

rapid deterioration because, once he was in a facility,

Then, in 1977, the Supreme Court faced the case of

she was no longer needed in the same way. President

Vorchheimer v. School District of Philadelphia. This case

George W. Bush replaced O’Connor, a moderate conser-

was the sex equivalent of Brown, but most people have

vative who became the court’s swing justice toward the

never heard of it. Arising out of Central High School in

end of her career, with Justice Samuel Alito. Alito has

Philadelphia, the case squarely presented the question

spent his career solidifying the court’s far-right conser-

of whether single-sex public schools were constitu-

vative flank.

tional. It made it to the Supreme Court, but on the day it was argued, Justice William Rehnquist had to sit out the case because he was having back problems. Chief Justice Warren Burger pleaded with his colleagues to 1

rehear the case once Justice Rehnquist recovered, but he was unsuccessful—even though he went as far as calling the other justices “unregenerate unreconstructed rebels” for not agreeing to rehear the case! As a result, there were only eight justices to decide Vorchheimer, and they split evenly on the issue. An even split meant there was no opinion in the case, and the lower court, which found Central High’s sex segregation to be constitutional, was affirmed. Accordingly, the issue of whether single-sex education is indeed constitutional remains an open one to this day. (Central High was desegregated several years later after a Pennsylvania state court found sex segregation in the high school was unconstitutional under the state constitution.) In June 1991, after serving 24 years on the Supreme Court, Thurgood Marshall, one of the court’s leading

liberal justices, retired at the age of 82. “The strenuous demands of court work,” he wrote in his retirement letter, “and its related duties required or expected of a Justice appear at this time to be incompatible with my advancing age and medical condition.” Had his health allowed him to serve until his death in January 1993, he would have left the court during the start of Bill Clinton’s first term as president and could have been replaced by another liberal. As it was, due to his ill health, he was forced to retire during the administration of President George H. W. Bush. He was replaced with Clarence Thomas, one of the most conservative justices to ever serve, and certainly the most conservative mod-

1 — Lawyers confer at the Supreme Court prior to

ern justice. The switch from Marshall’s liberal vision

presenting arguments against school segregation.

of justice to Thomas’s conservative vision continues to

Harold Boulware, Thurgood Marshall and

impact the court and American law today.

Spottswood Robinson III (left to right) were the

Finally, in 2006, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor retired from the Supreme Court. At 75 years old, she was com-

lead lawyers in the groundbreaking Brown v. Board of Education case.

paratively young to retire from the court, but she did so because she said that she needed to care for her husband,

2 — The “Fearless Girl” statue that stands in front of the

whose Alzheimer’s disease was rapidly deteriorating.

New York Stock Exchange wears a makeshift lace

Months after her retirement, O’Connor’s husband’s

collar honoring recently deceased Supreme Court

condition declined to the point that he needed to move

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

BOOK REVIEW

The Circle Game by Paul Horwitz

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

Jack Balkin’s book on American constitutionalism opens with an “astronomical diversion”: the total solar eclipse seen across the country in August 2017. Once sources of terror, eclipses are now understood as “natural phenomena caused by the concatenation of different cycles,” which are “soon over.” But they still arouse wonder. The eclipse remains “an amazing spectacle, and some people have called it a life-altering event.” Balkin, the Knight Professor of Constitutional Law and the First Amendment at Yale Law School, draws the expected connection to contemporary American politics: “Our present condition is a little like an eclipse, although much less enjoyable.” Like an eclipse, it has happened before—and it will pass. Like many analogies, this one suggests interesting questions. How does one live in the moment, while remaining aware that the present is part of a long cycle in which any given moment is “soon over?” Many people in recent years have asserted that some political event has been life-altering for them. Would this be any less true if they knew that what they were experiencing has happened before in some form and will recur? Does the long view produce wisdom—or passivity? And in our journey through the cycles of constitutional time, have we mislaid any essential baggage? At the center of this thought-provoking book is a simple observation. We tend to think about American constitutional law, according to the author, “in linear terms.” But this is not the only way to understand history. We can, he asserts, also understand it as a series of cycles, “like the strains of a ballad that repeatedly returns to its refrain.” This cyclic account lacks the redemptive assurance of the linear understanding of American law, which suggests that we can improve upon (or restore) the original vision of the United States Constitution. But it holds out its own sort of reassurance: Things can and will get worse, but they can and will get better, too. The “recent unpleasantness,” as Balkin calls the last few years of polarized American politics—and specifically the presidency of Donald Trump—is real. But it is not permanent.

Does the long view produce wisdom— or passivity? And in our journey through the cycles of constitutional time, have we mislaid any essential baggage?

Jack M. Balkin,

The Cycles of Constitutional Time. Oxford University Press, 2020. viii, 246 pp.

BOOK REVIEW: THE CIRCLE GAME

Regimes and Regime Change

judges to defer to the political branches. Over time, as they fill the courts with their own picks, they will “rec-

The Cycles of Constitutional Time builds on the work of

ognize the advantages of judicial review in protecting

the political scientist Stephen Skowronek, who describes

and promoting the party’s values and commitments.”

a cycle of political regimes in American history. In each

Eventually, each “side” will change places in their views

regime, a political party dominates politics and “struc-

on the role of the courts.

tures the basic ideological assumptions of the politics of

This analysis suggests Balkin’s second lesson: Courts

its time.” During the “New Deal/Civil Rights regime” of

will not get us out of a cycle of constitutional rot and into

the 1930s to the 1970s, Republicans sometimes led the

a period of “constitutional renewal.” They “will either

government, but liberalism still “shaped the basic polit-

do little to help or actively make things worse.” In short,

ical assumptions of the period,” Balkin writes. We are now at the tail end of the “Reagan regime,” in which the agenda was one of “neoliberalism, deregulation, declin-

constitutional rot will end “through political action,” not “judicial decision.” I would add a third lesson. Despite their preten-

ing labor unions, and lower taxes—especially for the

sions, constitutional scholars and intellectuals—Balkin

wealthy.” President Ronald Reagan may have written

throws the term around too freely; not all law professors

the tune. But from a regime perspective, President Bill

are intellectuals—do not stand above or apart from their

Clinton, who declared that “the era of big government is

times. Whether they know it or not, they are well-edu-

over,” danced to it, too.

cated weathervanes.

A regime may seem permanent. Inevitably, however,

This brings us back full circle, fittingly, to my open-

regimes crumble. Old coalitions fracture; new ones form;

ing questions. It is reassuring to know that things change,

ideas, circumstances and constituencies change. As they

even if they also change back. Learning from experience

do, a new regime rises, and “the cycle of political time

is the essence of wisdom. But wisdom can also cause

begins again.” There is no guarantee that the November

passivity or quietism. Why try to steer a train that is on a

2020 election signaled the start of a new regime, or what

fixed track?

shape it will take. But it is coming, Balkin asserts. Balkin argues that that there is not just one cycle at work in American constitutional history, but three. If the first is the cycle of regimes described by Skowrenek, then the second is the “cycle of polarization.” In some periods, alliances within and between parties allow for political compromise. In others, no compromises occur, and the style is one of division and vituperation. You don’t need a Twitter account to know which way the wind blows these days. Finally, Balkin argues that we also experience cycles of “constitutional rot and renewal.” Constitutional rot “is the process through which a constitutional system becomes less democratic and less republican over time.” It is unresponsive to public opinion and lacks a “devotion to the public good.” When both values are weak, “the result is oligarchy.” We also witness a fraying of “political norms of mutual forbearance and fair political competition that make it possible for people who disagree with each other to jointly pursue the public good.” Instead, we have “hardball” politics and efforts to entrench the waning regime in power. What has constitutional law to do with any of this? Balkin offers two central lessons. First, the federal judiciary (and the scholars and intellectuals who serve it) is equally subject to cyclical influence. Consider the dynamics of judicial review. The length of judicial tenure means the old regime’s judges remain in place. The new regime will be skeptical of judicial review, wanting

In some periods, alliances within and between parties allow for political compromise. In others, no compromises occur, and the style is one of division and vituperation.

LEX YESTERDAY & TOMORROW

If we want renewal, we must work for it—in law, but especially in the political realm.

for the inculcation of an ethos of republicanism (in other words, concern for the public good). The “norms of mutual forbearance” that allow people “to jointly pursue the public good” are taught—in and through institutions. And for these norms to thrive in larger formal public institutions like the U.S. Congress, they need not only the public’s trust, but officials who believe that the institution itself matters. Public trust in a wide range of institutions is currently incredibly low. Beyond this, there has been a sea change in the degree to which people care about them as institutions as such. Political arguments, campus controversies,

Institutions and the Public Good

internal disputes at newspapers—the players in these

Of course, this is not what Balkin wants. Cyclical

ters. The idea that the institutions themselves matter,

change may be inevitable but is not automatic. If we

that they cannot do anything and everything, and that

debates treat the substantive controversy as all that mat-

want renewal, he argues, we must work for it—in law,

they should not be casually made over or done away

but especially in the political realm. Still, one won-

with, is almost absent. That is true, understandably, for

ders whether an awareness of constitutional cycles will

activists inside and outside of those institutions. But it is

encourage that work. The Cycles of Constitutional Time

also increasingly true of the leaders of these institutions,

offers us the wisdom of experience. But working for

who seem unaware of their history and importance or

change may require a state of innocence—innocence that

unwilling to stand up for them. This is a rot of its own.

fuels action, even as it guarantees that we will repeat the

Our apparent rejection of allegiance to institutions—sim-

steps that, in time, bring about another cycle of reversal

ilar to the loss of our common vocabulary for discussing

and rot. Inevitably, any cyclical account will provoke the protest, “But things are different this time!” and cite the impact of the Internet, globalization, President Donald

the public good—could make constitutional renewal much more difficult. So, as always, history offers no guarantees. The waxing and waning of regimes within a constitutional

Trump and so on—take your pick. Balkin’s account is

system is inevitable, but those systems are not eternal.

robust enough to overcome those objections, which

They require work and commitment, both individ-

could be right but are not obviously so.

ual and institutional. We should not take The Cycles of

I do wonder, however, about two related concerns

Constitutional Time as gospel and should take the proper

that get insufficient weight in this book. The first is

kind of comfort from it—a hard sort of comfort, perhaps.

concern for the “public good,” one of the central features

But that does not detract from its value. In a nation with a

of Balkin’s account of constitutionalism. The problem is

deep-seated belief in providence and progress, in which

not so much that it is under-served by American society.

our transient media fuel an obsession with the moment,

It is that it requires a vocabulary and set of assumptions—

it is valuable to remember Ecclesiastes: “What has been

about character, virtue and a greater good — that extends

will be again, what has been done will be done again;

beyond individuals or even affinity groups. However rarely

there is nothing new under the sun.”

it was honored in practice, that classically influenced vision was essential to the founding generation’s project. For Balkin, the loss of a “connection to the joint pursuit of the public good” is a key element of constitutional rot; conversely, because he believes that “constitutional renewal” is still possible, a recovery of belief in the public good presumably remains available to us. One may wonder, though, whether we still speak that language or share the assumptions that make belief in the public good possible—not just at the current moment, but altogether. I am not sure we do. Finally, the book includes relatively little discussion about the role of institutions—political, civic, religious, professional and more. Healthy institutions are essential

Paul Horwitz is Gordon Rosen Professor at the University of Alabama School of Law. He teaches and writes on constitutional law and the First Amendment.

Cathedral Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul and Shrine of St. Katharine Drexel

The Franklin Institute Kelpius Cave

Drexel University

Pennsylvania Convention Center Philadelphia City Hall

The Kline Institute of Trial Advocacy

Kline School of Law

1903 March of the Mill Children

1967 Anti-war protest

The Liberty Bell 1858 Pencil with attached eraser invented

Kimmel Cultural Campus

Rittenhouse Square

CITY DIGEST

Kline Launches Law Tech Lab with Alumni Gift

As technology advances ever faster, lawyers without the right skills and expertise risk falling behind. To ensure that Kline School of Law graduates begin their careers ready to fully exploit all the opportunities that new technologies offer the legal profession, the school is establishing the Buchholz Law Tech Lab, with the mission to equip Kline Law students to be experts in legal technology—before they begin their very first days as practicing attorneys. 46

The lab, which will be located in Kline’s Legal Research Center (LRC), will be man-

Buchholz’s gift marks an important milestone for Kline: the first gift named for an alumnus in the school’s 15-year history.

aged by the LRC’s director, Professor Rebecca Rich. According to Rich, it will be one of only a handful of legal technology labs within American law schools and will help faculty incorporate the use of legal technology in their courses to build and reinforce students’ technical abilities. “Technology is becoming ever more central to the practice of law,” said Rich. “Now our students will have a critical leg up in the profession, because they will be able to

The lab is made possible by a generous gift from Craig Buchholz, JD ’17, the senior

work more efficiently thanks to their knowledge of legal technology.”

vice president of global communications for

In addition, the lab will host both

General Motors and a member of the Law

in-person and virtual workshops for alumni,

School Board, which is Kline’s key exter-

vendors, LRC staff and information technol-

nal support group. Buchholz’s gift marks

ogy experts. And to complement the lab, the

an important milestone for Kline: the first

LRC will also expand its selection of books

gift named for an alumnus in the school’s

related to legal technology, which students

15-year history.

and alumni will be able to check out.

“My experience at the law school had a

“When I decided to make my gift, I

significant positive impact on me,” Buchholz

consulted with Dean Filler on several occa-

explained. “Even before I graduated, I knew

sions,” Buchholz explained. “Eventually, it

that I would find an opportunity to give back

became clear that the Law Tech Lab would

because of the relationships I had built with

help continue to distinguish the school and

the faculty and the administration. It was

accelerate the vision of preparing attorneys

clear that, even at a comparatively young age,

who are practice-ready from the day they

the school was on a rapid upward trajectory.”

graduate. I wanted to help enable that.”

Craig Buchholz, JD ’17

Advocate, Benefactor and Friend: Kline Remembers Andy Stern

Powerhouse litigator. Devoted husband and

The school was stunned to learn of his

father. Philanthropist. Mentor. Outdoorsman.

unexpected death. “The community felt this

Andy Stern was many things, but on the Kline

loss very deeply,” Dean Daniel M. Filler said.

Law campus he will be most lovingly remembered—and most deeply missed—as a friend. Andrew J. Stern died at age 60 on May

“Andy was an important figure here.” The Sterns’ commitment to the clinic went far beyond their generous dona-

29 after an accident on the Jersey Shore.

tion, according to Filler. “Andy threw

As a successful trial attorney, he took on

himself into the work on behalf of clients

high-profile cases and won record-breaking

at the clinic, helping students prepare cases

settlements. In 2000, he won $100 million in

for trial. His passion for the work radiated,”

Pennsylvania’s largest medical malpractice

he said.

verdict. Later he represented Mariya Plekan,

In an email, Professor Rachel López, the

a Ukrainian immigrant who was trapped for

clinic’s director, wrote that she had met with

13 hours in rubble after a Salvation Army store

Andy Stern on Zoom just the week before his

in Philadelphia collapsed in 2013, killing

death. “It was always so inspiring to see him

seven people and injuring another 13. In 2017,

in action, advocating on behalf of his cli-

the survivors and their families received $227

ents who were vulnerable and desperately

million, which was the largest personal injury

in need of someone on their side… It says so

settlement ever in a Pennsylvania court.

much about him that he earned the respect

Working with journalist George Anastasia, Stern later told the story of his experience rep-

of his clients and opposition alike. The clinic will not be the same without him.”

resenting Plekan in the book, Justice Under the

After many years as a partner with

Rubble. Anastasia was struck by Stern’s concern

Philadelphia law firm Kline and Specter,

for his client.

Stern had recently fulfilled a longtime pro-

“He was more than just her lawyer.

fessional goal by launching his own firm with

He was her advocate in every sense of the

Elizabeth Crawford, JD ’12. (The firm also

word,” Anastasia told The Philadelphia Inquirer.

employed several other Kline Law alumni.)

Stern’s strong sense of advocacy and

On a statement on the Stern Crawford web-

commitment to justice for everyone were

site, Crawford wrote, “The trial lawyer bar

well known at the Kline School of Law,

has lost a phenomenal visionary and world

where his wife, Gwen Stern, is a faculty

class lawyer, and the world has lost a pas-

member. In 2019, the couple donated $1.65

sionate community and family man. Those of

million to what is now the Andy and Gwen

us who have been fortunate enough to know

Stern Community Lawyering Clinic.

and work with Andy have lost a dear friend and an inspiring mentor.”

Alumna Becomes Acting PA Secretary of Health

Her professors remember Alison Beam, JD ’13, as smart and compassionate, a star student, a leader and someone with a passion for improving health care. So, they weren’t surprised when Beam, one of the first students in Kline Law’s Health Law concentration, was nominated in January by Governor Tom Wolf to be Pennsylvania’s secretary of health. Beam became the commonwealth’s acting secretary of health on January 23, following the departure of Dr. Rachel Levine, whom President Joe Biden nominated to serve as assistant secretary of health in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Beam took office during the height

policy in the state,” said Filler. “Alison is

of the winter surge in Covid-19 cases and

smart and compassionate. I can think of

made vaccine distribution her highest pri-

no better person to serve as secretary of the

ority, calling her new job “an opportunity

department of health and lead Pennsylvania

to serve Pennsylvanians at a time of unprec-

through the COVID-19 pandemic.”

edented crisis, which also creates a path to

Beam, 34, has already had a career rich

reconstruct a better society than that which

in experience across the healthcare sector.

existed prior to the pandemic.”

Before matriculating at Kline, she worked

Beam has certainly confronted unusual

in New York City as a senior consultant

challenges as secretary of the department

for McBee Associates, a healthcare con-

of health during a pandemic, but Kline Law

sulting firm. In 2013, during the middle

Dean Daniel M. Filler said she has shown

of her third year in law school, she took a

herself to be more than ready for them.

leadership position at the Pennsylvania

“Alison’s passion for improving the

Department of Insurance, eventually mov-

heath, and health care, of Pennsylvanians

ing to Independence Blue Cross in 2014. She

has been evident since she was a student at

transitioned out of the private sector and

the law school. Even during law school, she

into public service when she became Wolf’s

took a leadership role in developing health

chief of staff in 2017.

Beam has confronted unusual challenges as secretary of health during a pandemic.

Robert I. Field is a professor at both Kline Law and Drexel’s Dornsife School of

continued. “I am thrilled, but not too surprised, to see her reach this milestone.”

Public Health and directs Drexel’s JD-MPH

Beam cites the training she received at

program. He echoes Filler’s praise. “Alison

Kline as integral to her advancement in the

was one of the most energetic and engaged

field of public health. “[Kline Law] prepared

health law students I have taught at the law

me for a career in public health,” she said,

school,” he said. “In addition to being a star

“by cultivating a broad, yet deep, health law

student, she eagerly helped me outside of

curriculum, with dedicated instructors who

class with a public health law course.”

seamlessly integrated policy-driven and

“Her interest in playing a major role in

strategic thinking into the classroom.”

health policy was apparent back then,” he

Alison Beam, JD ’13 51

Kline Law and Spelman College Launch Joint 3+3 Program

The Kline School of Law has created a 3+3 program with Spelman College, the historically Black women’s liberal arts college located in Atlanta. This is the first such partnership for Kline with a historically Black college or university (HBCU).

Under the 3+3 program, students can

“This partnership will expand Kline

earn an undergraduate degree at Spelman

Law’s commitment to creating opportu-

College and a juris doctorate from Kline

nities for students from underrepresented

Law in six years rather than seven, saving

populations in law schools and increas-

time and money. Participating students will

ing diversity in the legal profession,” said

spend three years at Spelman, completing

Boardley, who has worked with Spelman

general education and major coursework

College students as part of the Stephen and

requirements. In the fourth year, they

Sandra Sheller Diversity Pipeline Program.

will begin their legal studies at Kline Law. Credits earned in the fourth year will satisfy degree requirements at Spelman while also counting toward their law degree. Spelman is a highly regarded institution—in 2021 US News ranked it as the country’s top HBCU. Several of its graduates have gone on to become path-breaking lawyers, including Stacey Abrams and Marian Wright Edelman. Within Kline Law, the program, set to begin at the start of the 2021-2022 academic year, was formed after Dean Daniel M. Filler and Danielle Boardley, assistant dean for diversity, inclusion and student life,

Danielle Boardley,

explored the benefits of strategic collabora-

Assistant Dean for Diversity,

tion with leaders at Spelman College.

Inclusion and Student Life

Sweet Fifteen Sometimes you just have to celebrate. In 2006, Drexel opened the doors of its new law school. Our faculty was passionate about both teaching and the intensive research that marks Drexel as an R1 Research University. We placed experiential education at our core. And all of you—our students, alumni and friends— helped turn this fledgling project into an institution. If you’re feeling proud, you’ve got good reasons. This year, we placed in the Top 20 nationally for graduate employment—proving that employers value your education. Above the Law ranked us #37 and we’ve risen nearly 50 places in the U.S. News rankings in only five years. Outcomes fluctuate from year to year, and the ranking algorithms are their own adventure. But here’s what we are convinced is the truth: Together, we have lived up to Drexel University’s high aspirations. Kline Law has a solid foundation as we write our next chapter. Whether you were here at the beginning, just graduated or simply cheered from the sidelines, you played a critical role in our growth. And we want you to stay connected. Come visit sometime. We’d love to share some of our plans for the next 15 years. And we’d really love to hear yours.