How Rights Went Wrong: Why Our Obsession with Rights is Tearing America Apart

Jamal Greene is Dwight Professor of Law at Columbia Law School and author of the book "How Rights Went Wrong: Why Our Obsession with Rights is Tearing America Apart." His work reveals how our approach to rights is dividing America and shows how we can build a better system of justice.

Rights are a sacred part of American identity. Yet they also are the source of some of our greatest divisions. The varying responses to preventative measures enacted to stem the COVID-19 pandemic is a clear example of these divisions—especially today as students return to in-classroom instruction.

Jamal Greene argues that the system of legal absolutism distorts our law, debases our politics, and exacerbates our differences rather than helping to bridge them.

So how do we rethink our relationship with constitutional law, recover America’s original vision of rights, while also updating them to confront the challenges of the twenty-first century?

Join us in-person at the City Club as we discuss this, and more with author Jamal Greene.

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