Constitutional Law Casebooks Examined during Bill of Rights Journal Conference
On February 21 and 22, 2025, William & Mary Law School hosted the William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal’s (BORJ) Symposium on Constitutional Law Casebooks.
Caroline Olsen '25, the Journal’s Editor-in-Chief, and Professor Sanford Levinson of The University of Texas School of Law organized the Symposium, with support from the Institute of Bill of Rights Law, directed by Professor Allison Orr Larsen of William & Mary Law School.
The symposium brought together important creators of casebooks and thinkers about the pedagogy of constitutional law to discuss various issues related to the whole idea of casebooks and some of the problems presented by their creation and use.
Leading constitutional law scholars from across the country contributed to the event, including Professors William Araiza (Brooklyn, Jack Balkin (Yale), Randy Barnett (Georgetown), Jeffrey Bellin (William & Mary), Joseph Blocher (Duke), Erwin Chemerinsky (UC Berkeley), Neal Devins (William & Mary), Michael Dorf (Cornell), William Funk (Lewis & Clark), Mark Graber (Maryland Carey), Margaret Hu (William & Mary), Allison Orr Larsen (William & Mary), Sanford Levinson (UT Austin), Victoria Nourse (Georgetown, Christina Ponsa-Kraus (Columbia), Mark Tushnet (Harvard, emeritus), Ernest Young (Duke), and Timothy Zick (William & Mary Law). 
Panelists were invited to articulate the basis for their casebook choices, as well as grapple with the object, audience, and influence of constitutional law casebooks more generally. Some authors, like Professors Chemerinsky, Balkin, and Levinson, are on their seventh or eighth edition of their constitutional law casebooks, while others, like Professor Blocher and Ponsa-Kraus, are publishing their first, blazing new trails in constitutional law pedagogy.
Invited to share their perspectives and reflections, panelists discussed a wide range of issues related to constitutional law casebooks. Panels included discussion of, and debate surrounding, the role of historical narrative in teaching constitutional law; how to teach constitutional law in controversial times; the influence of casebooks on what students view as authoritative doctrine and its impact on how constitutional issues are litigated; whether students should learn overruled cases; and the meaning of a “constitutional crisis” and whether the United States is in one today.
The BORJ invited William & Mary Law and undergraduate students, many of whom are casebook “consumers,” to participate in these important conversations, motivated by this central question: What precisely should be taught about the U.S. Constitution at this point in our history?