Please join us at the 2013 Boden Lecture. This annual lecture remembers the late Robert F. Boden, who served as dean of Marquette University Law School from 1965 to 1984.
1 CLE credit
Parking is available on site.
Dark Money and the Future of Political Parties: The Real Problem with Citizens United
Heather Gerken
J. Skelly Wright Professor, Yale Law School
Few cases have generated as much controversy as Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, decided by the Supreme Court in 2010. The story told by reformers and reporters is that Citizens United ushered in a new era of dark money, with wealthy corporations spending wildly, saturating the airwaves, and taking over American politics. Most of that story is wrong, and some of it is nonsense. There is a bigger story about the relationship between Citizens United and American politics; it's just not the one we've been told.
Professor Gerken will argue that the "dark money" trend is a symptom of a deeper shift taking place in American politics, as we move from the political parties we know toward what she calls "shadow parties." And for all the brouhaha over dark money, we may one day think that the bigger and more important problem to emerge from the 2012 election is the shadow party.
Heather Gerken is the J. Skelly Wright Professor of Law at Yale Law School. She is a leading expert on voting rights and election law, the role of groups in the democratic process, and the relationship between diversity and democracy. Professor Gerken graduated summa cum laude from Princeton University and from the University of Michigan Law School. She then served as a law clerk for Judge Stephen Reinhardt of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and for Justice David H. Souter of the U.S. Supreme Court. Before joining the Yale faculty, she practiced law in Washington, D.C., and taught at Harvard Law School.
Contact Carol Dufek, Events Coordinator, 414.288.6452, or carol.dufek@marquette.edu.
