The American Constitution Society (ACS) is a progressive

legal Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been vario ...

organization An organization or organisation (Commonwealth English; see spelling differences), is an entity—such as a company, an institution, or an association—comprising one or more people and having a particular purpose. The word is derived from ...

. ACS was created as a counterweight to, and is modeled after, the

Federalist Society The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies (abbreviated as FedSoc) is an American conservative and libertarian legal organization that advocates for a textualist and originalist interpretation of the U.S. Constitution. Headquartered ...

, and is often described as its progressive counterpart. Founded in 2001 following to the

U.S. Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...

decision ''

Bush v. Gore ''Bush v. Gore'', 531 U.S. 98 (2000), was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court on December 12, 2000, that settled a recount dispute in Florida's 2000 presidential election between George W. Bush and Al Gore. On December 8, th ...

'', ACS is headquartered in

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

The organization promotes and facilitates discussion and debate of progressive

public policy Public policy is an institutionalized proposal or a decided set of elements like laws, regulations, guidelines, and actions to solve or address relevant and real-world problems, guided by a conception and often implemented by programs. Public p ...

ideas and issues, providing forums for legal scholars, lawmakers, judges, lawyers, public policy advocates, law students, and members of the media. ACS reports that it has approximately 200 law school student chapters and 40 lawyer chapters around the country. The group's stated mission is to "promote the vitality of the

U.S. Constitution The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America. It superseded the Articles of Confederation, the nation's first constitution, in 1789. Originally comprising seven articles, it delineates the natio ...

and the fundamental values it expresses: individual rights and liberties, genuine equality, access to justice, democracy and the rule of law."

History

The American Constitution Society was founded in 2001 by Peter Rubin, a

Georgetown Law School The Georgetown University Law Center (Georgetown Law) is the law school of Georgetown University, a private research university in Washington, D.C. It was established in 1870 and is the largest law school in the United States by enrollment and ...

professor who served as counsel to

Al Gore Albert Arnold Gore Jr. (born March 31, 1948) is an American politician, businessman, and environmentalist who served as the 45th vice president of the United States from 1993 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton. Gore was the Democratic Part ...

in the

legal battle - A lawsuit is a proceeding by a party or parties against another in the civil court of law. The archaic term "suit in law" is found in only a small number of laws still in effect today. The term "lawsuit" is used in reference to a civil acti ...

over the 2000 election. The group was originally known as the Madison Society for Law and Policy. The organization was formed as a counterweight to the conservative

. It was founded in order to build a network of progressive lawyers and foster new avenues of progressive legal thought. ACS received its initial funding from the

William and Flora Hewlett Foundation The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, commonly known as the Hewlett Foundation, is a private foundation, established by Hewlett-Packard cofounder William Redington Hewlett and his wife Flora Lamson Hewlett in 1966. The Hewlett Foundation awa ...

. The

Democracy Alliance The Democracy Alliance is a network of progressive donors who coordinate their political donations to groups that the Alliance has endorsed. It has been described by ''Politico'' as "the country's most powerful liberal donor club". Members of th ...

lists ACS as a recommended funding recipient.

Board of directors

Members of the organization's board of directors have included David Halperin, a speechwriter in the

Bill Clinton William Jefferson Clinton ( né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He previously served as governor of Arkansas from 1979 to 1981 and agai ...

administration who also served as the organization's founding executive director from 2001 to 2003; and

Eric Holder Eric Himpton Holder Jr. (born January 21, 1951) is an American lawyer who served as the 82nd Attorney General of the United States from 2009 to 2015. Holder, serving in the administration of President Barack Obama, was the first African Amer ...

, former

Attorney General of the United States The United States attorney general (AG) is the head of the United States Department of Justice, and is the chief law enforcement officer of the federal government of the United States. The attorney general serves as the principal advisor to the p ...

. Among the organization's former board chairs is California Supreme Court Judge

Goodwin Liu Goodwin Hon Liu (born October 19, 1970; Chinese: 劉弘威) is an American lawyer, educator and an associate justice of the Supreme Court of California. Before his appointment by California Governor Jerry Brown, Liu was Associate Dean and Profes ...

Activities

ACS hosts press and

Capitol Hill Capitol Hill, in addition to being a metonym for the United States Congress, is the largest historic residential neighborhood in Washington, D.C., stretching easterly in front of the United States Capitol along wide avenues. It is one of the ...

briefings and public policy debates as well as an annual convention where an array of legal and public policy issues are discussed and debated. The organization disseminates ACS Issue Briefs, the ACSBlog, a journal titled ''

Harvard Law and Policy Review The ''Harvard Law & Policy Review'' is a law journal and the official journal of the American Constitution Society, a progressive legal organization. It was established in 2007. The journal publishes two printed editions per year, as well as addi ...

'', and ''Advance: The Journal of the ACS Issue Groups''. In 2008, ACS's executive director, Lisa Brown, went on leave to serve on the

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...

transition team. She headed the president-elect's agency review team and later served as the first White House Staff Secretary in the Obama White House. In 2009, ACS published ''Keeping Faith with the Constitution'' by

Pamela S. Karlan Pamela Susan Karlan (born 1959) is an American legal scholar who is the principal deputy assistant attorney general in the Civil Rights Division of the United States Department of Justice. She is on a leave of absence from Stanford Law School. A ...

, and Christopher H. Schroeder. It was re-issued by

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...

in 2010. The book serves as a primer for progressives interested in promoting liberal constitutionalism. Since 2009, ACS has given an annual award to a rising star in public interest law named in memory of

David Carliner David Carliner ( – ) was an immigration, civil liberties, and civil rights lawyer in Washington, D.C. Among the earliest practitioners of American immigration and naturalization law, he was an early combatant of anti-miscegenation laws, challe ...

. The Carliner award comes with a $10,000 prize for the winner, plus money for the winner's organization and for a finalist. On November 14, 2018, the American Constitution Society released a letter signed by over 1,600 attorneys nationwide calling for lawmakers and Justice Department officials to protect the special counsel's Russia probe in light of

Matthew Whitaker Matthew George Whitaker (born October 29, 1969) is an American lawyer, lobbyist and politician who served as the acting United States Attorney General from November 7, 2018, to February 14, 2019. He was appointed to that position by President D ...

's appointment as acting attorney general. The signatories call for Whitaker to recuse himself or "otherwise be removed from overseeing the Mueller investigation as a result of his profound ethical conflicts."

References

{{reflist, 30em

External links

Official website

JudicialNominations.org
Non-profit organizations based in Washington, D.C. Organizations established in 2001 2001 establishments in the United States Progressive organizations in the United States Legal organizations based in the United States

History

Board of directors

Activities

See also

References

External links