Sanford Levinson

Sanford Victor Levinson (born June 17, 1941) is an American legal scholar known for his writings on U.S. constitutional law. A professor at the University of Texas Law School, Levinson is notable for his criticism of the United States Constitution as well as excessive presidential power and has been widely quoted on such topics as the Second Amendment, gay marriage, nominations to the Supreme Court, and other legal issues. He has called for a Second Constitutional Convention of the United States.

Early life and education Levinson was born on June 17, 1941, in Hendersonville, North Carolina. He is Jewish. After graduating from Duke University in 1962 with a Bachelor of Arts, Levinson earned a Ph.D. in government from Harvard University in 1969. He then attended Stanford Law School, graduating with a J.D. in 1973.

Academic career Levinson was a member of the department of Politics at Princeton. London, Auckland and Melbourne.

Books, scholarship, activism Levinson is quoted often in publications about numerous legal topics. He has described himself as "a card-carrying A.C.L.U. member who doesn't own a gun" and has argued that the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution limits the government's authority to regulate private gun ownership. Levinson's opinions on constitutional law, including his opinions about Second Amendment cases, have been reported in the media. Levinson has been a panelist on programs sponsored by the Association of American Law Schools and has spoken on topics alongside prominent lawyers such as Kenneth W. Starr. Levinson has been identified as a "prominent liberal law professor" and been grouped with other professors including Laurence H. Tribe of Harvard and Akhil Reed Amar of Yale. Levinson's opinion has been cited during the nominating process for Supreme Court nominees. Levinson has called for term limits for Supreme Court justices, as has a growing list of "scholars across the ideological spectrum."

Levinson is particularly noted for his 1989 "seminal article" in the Yale Law Journal entitled "The Embarrassing Second Amendment". He argued that the Second Amendment offers neither gun rights advocates nor gun control advocates a refuge. He argued "society must decide the issue of gun control on practical as well as on constitutional grounds ... the issue is to what extent does the Second Amendment permit the Government to do what it wants in controlling firearms, just as we have to establish the extent to which it can limit speech or break into your house without a warrant. Levinson's article was cited in Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas' concurring opinion in Printz v. United States.

Levinson taught a course called Torture, Law and Lawyers at Harvard Law School in 2005. Levinson has written essays in The New York Times. Levinson edited Torture: A Collection (2005). A reviewer commented: "What's most striking about these essays is that despite their abstract and theoretical content, they generally do not contradict the depiction of actual interrogators described by Mackey and Miller. The wall between the liberal campus and a conservative, utilitarian-minded military breaks down because the questions are so serious that few of this book's contributors want to engage in polemics, and few – to their credit – ever seem completely comfortable with their own conclusions." Presidents "have an incentive to declare emergencies" and assume "quasi-dictatorial powers," wrote Levinson. Levinson commented about a ban on gay marriage proposed by former President George W. Bush in legal terms as a Constitutional issue.

Levinson has criticized the Constitution (invoking comparisons to Thomas Jefferson) for what he considers to be its numerous failings, including an inability to remove the President despite lack of confidence by lawmakers and the public, the President's veto power as being "extraordinarily undemocratic", the difficulty of enacting Constitutional amendments through Article 5 and a lack of more representation in the Senate for highly populated states such as California. He also criticizes the primary process in which important states which aren't considered "battleground states" are ignored by presidential candidates.

Levinson appeared on the Bill Moyers television program in 2007. Levinson's research interests include American Constitutional development, Constitutional design, law, religion, multiculturalism, society, and theories of Constitutional interpretation.

Publications

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