James Wilson Institute Podcast

Join host Garrett Snedeker for an exciting discussion with author Brad Littlejohn, Ph.D., about his new book Called to Freedom: Retrieving Christian Liberty in an Age of License. The conversation explored conflicting definitions of liberty, the issue of expressive individualism, and misperceptions of the freedom secured by the Constitution. Pre-order Called to Freedom here. Brad Littlejohn (Ph.D, University of Edinburgh) is a Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center (EPPC), where he writes on technology policy and Protestant social ethics. He is also the founder and President Emeritus of The Davenant Institute, and the author or editor of nineteen books, the newest of which is Called to Freedom: Retrieving Christian Liberty in an Age of License. He writes (regularly) at his Substack, bradlittlejohn.substack.com, and tweets (irregularly) under the handle @WBLittlejohn.

JWI Affiliated Scholar & Professor of Philosophy Frank Beckwith confronts a troubling trend among some legal scholars who, in the aftermath of the Dobbs decision, have constructed and advocated for a right to abortion rooted in religious liberty. Since the overturning of Roe v. Wade and Casey in Dobbs, an increasing number of scholars argue that the Constitution may still vindicate the right to abortion, but through the First Amendment’s two religion clauses. They argue that state laws that limit access to abortion on the grounds that the fetus is a person or that prenatal life is sacred violate the Establishment Clause, since such laws are based on a contested religious view of what constitutes “personhood.” They also argue that prolife laws violate the Free Exercise rights of women whose religious views either permit or require them to procure an abortion in certain circumstances.Because all current post-Dobbs prolife laws include exceptions--such as for the life of the mother, substantial health risk

A recap of the largest annual gathering of the Right's lawyers, the Federalist Society's National Lawyers Convention, is the topic of discussion this week. Garrett Snedeker joins JWI Programs Director Daniel Osborne for a high-level account of the 2024 NLC. Snedeker shares his thoughts with Osborne on the convention's theme of group identity and the law, the backdrops of the convention including a new administration and a forthcoming change in leadership for the Society, and the happy presence of so many James Wilson Fellowship alumni at the convention. To watch videos of the convention's panels visit here

Who was for they/them versus who was for you? Join host Garrett Snedeker for a fascinating discussion with Jon Schweppe, Director of Policy for the American Principles Project (APP), on the power of the most influential political ads that shaped the 2024 presidential election. Jon Schweppe is the Director of Policy for APP. He advances the organization’s legislative priorities by working with allied groups and with federal and state lawmakers. Schweppe is an alumnus of the Claremont Institute’s Lincoln Fellowship. He has been published in a number of publications, including The New York Post, The American Mind, First Things, Newsweek, The Federalist, and the Daily Caller. He has worked on several political campaigns, focusing mainly on communications and policy. He is a graduate of Augustana College, where he majored in Economics and Finance. Follow Jon on X here. Learn more about APP here.

JWI Co-Director Gerry Bradley delivers remarks on what he calls the tragedy of "progressive" prosecution. Since George Floyd's death on May 25, 2020, the U.S. has undergone a significant reevaluation of its criminal justice system and has moved towards a more "progressive" prosecution. Professor Bradley explores the legal and societal implications of this evolution and will consider how a proper understanding of crime and punishment might provide a just solution; particularly in light of the moral responsibly of prosecutors and the need for a compelling justification for punishment in a fair society.

We are excited to be dive into Second Amendment jurisprudence and the Natural Right to Self Defense. Our entry into that topic is collection of opinions in Hanson v. United States from a divided panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit from October 29, 2024. In that case, the majority upheld the District’s ban on the possession and sale of what it called “extra-large capacity magazines." The panel ruled the city’s ten-round limit for magazines fit within the nation’s historical tradition of regulating “particularly dangerous weapons” and those “capable of unprecedented lethality,” even though there weren’t similar bans when the Second Amendment was ratified. A dissenting opinion held that “Magazines holding more than ten rounds of ammunition are arms in common use for lawful purposes. Therefore, the government cannot ban them.” Joining us on the episode is the lawyer who delivered theoral argument and represented Mr. Hanson and other plaintiffs at the D.C. Circuit, Edward “Ed” Wenger.

Join Anchoring Truths Podcast host Garrett Snedeker and journalist Conn Carroll for an exciting discussion about Carroll's new book Sex and the Citizen and the importance of marriage. In Sex and the Citizen, Conn Carroll shows how the assault on marriage conducted by cultural and political elites is undermining the very foundations of our democracy. Carroll's book is a powerful and urgent exploration of one of the most overlooked forces shaping the political landscape today: the rapid decline of marriage. Once the cornerstone of American life, marriage has seen a dramatic fall from grace. In 1960, four out of five households were led by married couples; today, that number has plummeted to less than half, with more people choosing cohabitation over commitment. The American family, as we once knew it, is unraveling. Sex and the Citizen offers a bold vision for restoring the stability and prosperity that marriage once provided. By learning from history, we can rebuild a society where love and commitment are the

In this minisode, host Garrett Snedeker speaks with returning guest Mark Bauerlein about the current decline in educational quality at universities, and the challenges that technology poses to the intellectual development of youth. Mark W. Bauerlein is an English professor emeritus at Emory University and a senior editor of First Things. He also serves as a visitor of Ralston College, a start-up liberal arts college in Savannah and as a trustee of New College of Florida.

The world is not a machine. Humanity is not a mistake. Those should not be such bold words and yet, according to this week’s guest, Spencer Klavan, they need to be repeated as often as possible today. For centuries, a grim anti-human outlook has taken hold of the public imagination, teaching us all to view ourselves as random products of a cruel and uncaring natural world. The pursuit of scientific understanding of the material world has made mastery of it and determinism the reigning orthodoxy. Light of the Mind, Light of the World, Spencer's new book, tells a daring new story about how we got here, and how we can chart a better path forward. He argues that science itself is leading us not away from God but back to him, and to the ancient faith that places the human soul at the center of the universe. Spencer A. Klavan is returning guest to the Anchoring Truths Podcast. A graduate of Yale, he earned his doctorate in ancient Greek literature from Oxford University. He is the author of the acclaimed book How

Join host Garrett Snedeker and JWI Programs Director Daniel Osborne for special look inside JWI's Law School Seminar program. Highlighting their trips to Harvard Law and Notre Dame Law, Snedeker and Osborne provide an overview of the seminars JWI hosts on campuses across the country and the impact of these seminars on law students.

JWI Deputy Director, Garrett Snedeker, and 2023 James Wilson Fellow Jack Kieffaber discuss the impact of impending AI developments on the judiciary. Kieffaber's new article "Predictability, AI, and Judicial Futurism: Why Robots Will Run the Law and Textualists Will Like It," forthcoming in 2025 in the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, is a stirring challenge to avowed textualists. In this podcast, Kieffaber shares his predictions about the development of "Judge.AI," discusses this system's implications on the popular understanding of textualism, and expounds on the role of normative judgments in textualist inquiry. This episode has been edited since its original release.

As Constitution Day approaches, we feature a forthcoming book that tackles how far we’ve come in the Progressives’ quiet regime change over the last century, replacing our constitutional republic with rule by the administrative state. That book is American Leviathan: the birth of the Administrative State and Progressive Authoritarianism by Ned Ryun. Ryun is the Founder and CEO of American Majority and Voter Gravity. The son of the former congressman, Olympian, and Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient Jim Ryun, Ned is also the author of Restoring Our Republic and The Adversaries: A Story of Boston and Bunker Hill. A frequent commentator on Fox News, Ryun currently resides in Western Loudoun County, VA, with his wife and four children. Buy or pre-order American Leviathan here. Follow Ned Ryun on Twitter.

After the Supreme Court's blockbuster decision in Loper Bright/Relentless on administrative law, the question remains what will happen next in the effort to rein in the administrative state. Host Garrett Snedeker discusses a recent essay he wrote in which he urges close attention to the lower courts wrestling with the precedent in a post-Loper Bright future with JWI Programs Director Daniel Osborne. Read Snedeker's essay from TomKlingenstein.com here.

Join JWI Deputy Director Garrett Snedeker and Intern Catherine Hickam for a discussion with Prof. Michael Pakaluk about Natural Law and the traditional Thomistic and New Natural Law perspectives.

Guest Ben Weingarten, the Editor at Large at RealClearInvestigations, joins host Garrett Snedeker to document how public and private actors (government, academia, media, and tech) have acted to curtail our natural right to speak freely in a concerted effort that Weingarten calls "The Censorship Industrial Complex." Mr. Weingarten has also testified before Congress on this issue. They discuss the recent Supreme Court decision in Murthy v. Missouri as well as how the history of the Censorship Industrial Complex stretches back to the late 1940s. Weingarten is a Senior Contributor to The Federalist, columnist at Newsweek and The Epoch Times, and a Fellow of the Claremont Institute. He is author of American Ingrate: Ilhan Omar and the Progressive-Islamist Takeover of the Democratic Party. He co-hosts the Edmund Burke Foundation’s “NatCon Squad” podcast. Ben has appeared on “The Rush Limbaugh Show,” “The Ingraham Angle,” and “The Ben Shapiro Show,” among many other programs. He is founder and CEO of Chang

For Minisode 7, host Garrett Snedeker along with JWI Program Manager Daniel Osborne offer a live update from the 2024 Summer James Wilson Fellowship for Young Lawyers. Snedeker and Osborne discuss JWI's flagship program, the lessons on law and morality taught at the Fellowship, the broader experience for young lawyers, and how the Fellowship has grown over its eleven years.

Join the Anchoring Truths Podcast team and Dr. Yuval Levin for a deep-dive into how the Constitution may unify us again. In his new book American Covenant: How the Constitution Unified Our Nation and Could Again, Levin gives us a thorough analysis of both the written and unwritten constitution and why that structure that the American Founders gave us is still morally good and durable. Levin argues that we today through our institutions need to devote ourselves toward the project of recovering those habits and practices that historically have sustained our life under the Constitution. Yuval Levin is the director of Social, Cultural, and Constitutional Studies at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where he also holds the Beth and Ravenel Curry Chair in Public Policy. He is the author of numerous books besides American Covenant. The founder and editor of National Affairs, he is also a senior editor at The New Atlantis, a contributing editor at National Review, and a contributing opinion writer at New York

Listen as Joshua Turner, Chief of Constitutional Litigation and Policy for the State of Idaho and James Wilson Fellowship Alumnus, unpacks the ramifications of the Court's decision to return the case of Idaho v. United States back to the 9th Circuit, dismissing it as improvidently granted. Josh outlines some of what we may expect from this case as it progresses.

Host Garrett Snedeker and JWI intern Isaac Michael speak with Prof. Andrew Walker of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary about his new book Faithful Reason: Natural Law Ethics for God’s Glory and Our Good. Professor Walker discusses his intended audience for the book, its main ideas, and his hopes for a revival of the Natural Law in American legal discussions. He also touches upon common difficulties many Protestants have with the Natural Law and makes the case for the authority of the Natural Law in Protestant moral thought. He ultimately presents a Christ-centered case for Natural Law reasoning which he sees as essential to any coherent account of a natural moral order.   Dr. Walker serves as Associate Dean in the School of Theology, and Associate Professor of Christian Ethics and Public Theology. He is also the Director of the Carl F. H. Henry Institute for Evangelical Engagement. Additionally, he is a fellow in Christian Political Thought at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and serves as the Man

For a special minisode, Hadley Arkes and Garrett Snedeker, who attended the 2024 National Conservatism Conference July 8-10, share impressions of both the public panel discussions and how the conference fits within our larger political and cultural moment. Edmund Burke Foundation, Organizer of NatCon 4 Video of NatCon 4 speeches and panels