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Legally Speaking: Conversations with the Most Interesting Lawyers in the World


Legally Speaking is a series of probing interviews with prominent lawyers, judges, and academics, co-produced by UC Hastings and California Lawyer.

Interview with Justice Stephen G. Breyer 

Host: Professor David Faigman; Guest: Justice Stephen G. Breyer

Justice Stephen G. Breyer Interview Video

What are the nine unelected justices of the U.S. Supreme Court really good for? In a wide ranging interview Associate Supreme Court Justice Stephen G. Breyer talks about the role that the High Court plays in determining the fate of the nation.

Interview with Nancy Gertner 

Host: Professor Lisa FaigmanGuest: Nancy Gertner 

Nancy Gertner Interview Video

Long before Nancy Gertner became a federal judge she had made a name for herself defending a lesbian revolutionary who stood accused of killing a police officer. She then became known for her work on abortion and sex discrimination cases. Gertner talks about her unusual career with UC Hastings law professor Lisa Faigman.

Interview with Aharon Barak

Host: Martin Lasden; Guest: Aharon Barak 

Aharon Barak Interview Video

Aharon Barak was chief justice of the Israeli Supreme Court from 1995 to 2006, and in that role championed what he called a "constitutional revolution." In this wide ranging conversation with California Lawyer editor Martin Lasden, he talks about torture, the death penalty, Arab-Israeli rights, and his own experiences as a Holocaust survivor.

Interview with Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Host: Professor Joan C. Williams; Guest: Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg 

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg Interview Video

UC Hastings Professor Joan Williams welcomes U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg for a conversation that touches on a broad range of subjects, from opera to marriage to work/life balance, doctrinal questions, and cases from the 1970's to present, including the court's role in establishing individual rights and equal protection.  

Interview with Martha Nussbaum

Host: Martin Lasden; Guest: Martha Nussbaum 

Martha Nussbaum Interview Video

In a wide ranging interview, Martha Nussbaum, one of the world's most prominent moral and legal philosophers talks about the relationship between law and emotion, abortion, animal rights, and social justice. 

Interview with Michelle Alexander

Host: Martin Lasden; Guest: Michelle Alexander

Michelle Alexander Interview Video

Michelle Alexander, a long time civil rights advocate and litigator as well as a law professor at Ohio State University, speaks with California Lawyer Magazine's Martin Lasden about Alexander's new book, "The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness."

Interview with Bruce Ackerman

Host: Martin Lasden; Guest: Bruce Ackerman

Bruce Ackerman Interview Video

Marty Lasden of California Lawyer Magazine welcomes American constitutional law scholar and Yale professor Bruce Ackerman for a discussion of his new book "The Decline and Fall of the American Republic," in which he argues that the American presidency is becoming too powerful for our own good.

Interview with Scott Turow

Host: Evan Lee; Guest: Scott Turow

Scott Turow Interview Video

Writer and attorney Scott Turow is the author of nine best-selling novels. He reflects on his work as a fiction writer and a practicing attorney with UC Hastings Professor and Associate Dean of Research, Evan Lee.

The Divider

Host: Martin Lasden; Guest: Alan Dershowitz

Alan Dershowitz Interview Video

Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz talks about the erosion of civil liberties, the future of the Arab-Israeli peace process, and his own troubled adolescence.

The Conservative Assault on the Constitution

Host: Evan Lee; Guest: Erwin Chemerinsky

Erwin Chemerinsky Interview Video

Chemerinsky discusses his thesis:  “Ever since Richard Nixon ran for president in 1968, conservatives have sought to dramatically change constitutional law [and] in almost every area, they succeeded.”  His recently published book is entitled The Conservative Assault on the Constitution.

Interview with Justice Scalia

Host: Calvin Massey; Guest: Antonin Scalia

Antonin Scalia Interview Video

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Scalia engages in a question-and-answer session with UC Hastings Professor Calvin Massey, a noted constitutional law scholar.

The Myth of Rights

Host: Martin Lasden; Guest: Ashutosh Bhagwat

Ashutosh Bhagwat Interview

UC Hastings Professor Ashutosh Bhagwat contends that most Americans have a fundamental misunderstanding of how our constitutional rights are supposed to work. His book, The Myth of Rights: The Purposes and Limits of Constitutional Rights, was published in February 2010.

On Death Row

Host: Martin Lasden; Guest: David Dow

David Dow Interview

A distinguished professor at the University of Houston Law Center, David Dow has represented more than 100 death row inmates over the last 20 years. His memoir, The Autobiography of an Execution, was published in February 2010.

Washington Insider

Host: Martin Lasden; Guest: Roger Wilkins

Roger Wilkins Interview

At age 33, Roger Wilkins became the highest-ranking African American in President Lyndon Johnson's Justice Department. He went on to serve on the editorial boards of the Washington Post, where he won a Pulitzer Prize, and the New York Times. He also wrote two highly acclaimed books and for more than two decades taught history at George Mason University.

In the Hybrid Economy

Host: Ashutosh Bhagwat; Guest: Lawrence Lessig

Lawrence Lessig Interview

Recognized  by Scientific American as one of the country's Top 50 Visionaries, Lessig (who is also known as the "Elvis of cyberlaw") is a professor at Harvard Law School. His most recent book is entitled Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy.

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