Charles Barzun

  • Professor of Law
  • Director, Program on Legal and Constitutional History

Charles Barzun joined the faculty in 2008. His areas of interest include constitutional law, torts, evidence and the history of legal thought. Barzun also serves as faculty advisor for the Dual-Degree (J.D./M.A.) Program in Legal History.

After receiving his A.B. in government from Harvard in 1997, Barzun worked in corporate and product development at CNET Networks, an Internet media company in San Francisco. In 2005, he received a J.D./M.A. degree from Virginia. During law school, he served as notes development editor of the Virginia Law Review and won the Best Note Award for his student note, "Common Sense and Legal Science." After graduating, he clerked for Judge Robert D. Sack of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Prior to joining the faculty, Charles was a Climenko Fellow and lecturer at Harvard Law School.

Education

  • J.D.
    University of Virginia School of Law
    2005
  • M.A.
    University of Virginia
    2005
  • A.B.
    Harvard University
    1997

Forthcoming

Taking Experience Seriously: A Comment on Professor Zipursky’s “Benjamin Cardozo and American Natural Law Theory”, Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities, 59–72 (2023).

Works in Progress

Clash of the Titans: Hercules v. Dennis Martinez, or Why Dworkin and Fish are Both Wrong (2021).

Book Chapters

Legal Realism and Natural Law (with Dan Priel), in Law in Theory and History: New Essays on a Neglected Dialogue, Hart, 167–187 (2016).
Chicago v. Sturges, 222 U.S. 313 (1913), in Encyclopedia of the Supreme Court of the United States, Macmillan Reference USA, 293–294 (2008).

Articles & Reviews

Alzheimer’s, Advance Directives, and Interpretive Authority, 48 Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 50–59 (2023).
Pragmatism, Logic and Law. By Kellogg, Frederick. (reviewing Frederick Kellogg, Pragmatism, Logic and Law) 55 Law and Society Review 681–683 (2021).
Conflict Avoidance in Constitutional Law (with Michael D. Gilbert), 107 Virginia Law Review 1–56 (2021).
Quentin Skinner v. Charles Taylor: Explanation and Practical Reasoning in History, Philosophy, and Law, 31 Yale Journal of Law and Humanities 299–315 (2021).
The Common Law and Critical Theory, 92 University of Colorado Law Review 1221–1236 (2021).
The Tale of Two Harts; A Schlegelian Dialectic, 69 Buffalo Law Review 9–42 (2021).
Is a Progressive Reading of the Constitution Possible? (reviewing Erwin Chemerinsky, We the People: A Progressive Reading of the Constitution for the Twenty-First Century) The New Rambler (2019).
Constructing Originalism or: Why Professors Baude and Sachs Should Learn to Stop Worrying and Love Ronald Dworkin, 105 Virginia Law Review Online 128–148 (2019).
The Genetic Fallacy and a Living Constitution, 34 Constitutional Commentary 101–131 (2019).
Justice Souter’s Common Law, 104 Virginia Law Review 655–726 (2018).
Three Forms of Legal Pragmatism, 95 Washington University Law Review 1003–1034 (2018).
Jerome Frank, Lon Fuller, and a Romantic Pragmatism, 29 Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities 129–164 (2017).
The Positive U-Turn, 69 Stanford Law Review 1323–1388 (2017).
Causation, Legal History, and Legal Doctrine, 64 Buffalo Law Review 82–99 (2016).
Working for the Weekend: A Response to Kessler & Pozen, 83 University of Chicago Law Review 225–241 (2016).
Inside/Out: Beyond the Internal/External Distinction in Legal Scholarship, 101 Virginia Law Review 1203–1288 (2015).
Jurisprudence and (Its) History (with Dan Priel), 101 Virginia Law Review 849–867 (2015).
Metaphysical Quietism and Functional Explanation in the Law, 34 Law & Philosophy 89–109 (2015).
Getting Substantive: A Response to Posner and Vermeule, 80 University of Chicago Law Review 267–290 (2013).
Impeaching Precedent, 80 University of Chicago Law Review 1625–1681 (2013).
Legal Rights and the Limits of Conceptual Analysis: A Case Study, 26 Ratio Juris 215–234 (2013).
Review of Kristen Rundle, Forms Liberate: Reclaiming the Jurisprudence of Lon L. Fuller, 76 Modern Law Review 935–948 (2013).
The Forgotten Foundations of Hart and Sachs, 99 Virginia Law Review 1–61 (2013).
Jerome Frank and the Modern Mind, 58 Buffalo Law Review 1127–1174 (2010).
Rules of Weight, 83 Notre Dame Law Review 1957–2018 (2008).
Politics or Principle? Zechariah Chafee and the Social Interest in Free Speech, 2007 Brigham Young University Law Review 259–326 (2007).
Common Sense and Legal Science, 90 Virginia Law Review 1051–1092 (2004).

Op-Eds, Blogs, Shorter Works

Dobbs and the Relevance of Experience, Balkinization (July 1, 2022).
Judging Progress: Roe, Casey and the idea of social change, The Point (June 3, 2022).
The Constitution and Genealogy, Balkinization (July 6, 2020).
Unoriginal Joke (Part III): Living Constitutionalism and Social Progress, Balkinization (June 26, 2020).
An Unoriginal Joke (Part II), or Why We are all Living Constitutionalists, Balkinization (June 9, 2020).
An Unoriginal Joke, Part I, Balkinization (May 30, 2020).
The Oath Argument, Balkinization (May 19, 2020).
This Episode of Black Mirror Sucks: On Civil Discourse and Political Faith, The Point (August 24, 2018).
A Letter to My Grandfather, Chronicle of Higher Education B7-B9 (May 17, 2013).

Current Courses

Evidence
Rule of Law and its Threats
Seminar in Ethical Values (YR)
Social Identity, Critical Theory, and the Law (SC)

All Courses

Evidence
Jurisprudence
Torts
Seminar in Ethical Values

IN THE NEWS

05/10/2023
Hart Surgey (Jotwell)
07/01/2022
Dobbs and the Relevance of Experience (Balkinization)
06/03/2022
Judging Progress: Roe, Casey and the Idea of Social Change (The Point)
03/09/2021
Charles Barzun on the Common Law (The Private Law Podcast)
02/09/2021
UVA Law Professor Breaks Down Trump’s Second Impeachment Trial (NBC29)
01/07/2021
UVA Law Professors Explain What the 25th Amendment Means (NBC29)
07/06/2020
The Constitution and Genealogy (Balkinization)
06/26/2020
Unoriginal Joke (Part III): Living Constitutionalism and Social Progress (Balkinization)
06/09/2020
An Unoriginal Joke (Part II), or Why We are all Living Constitutionalists (Balkinization)
05/19/2020
The Oath Argument (Balkinization)
03/25/2020
Annual Reviewer Award (Cambridge University Press)
08/21/2019
Is a Progressive Reading of the Constitution Possible? (The New Rambler)
08/26/2018
This Episode of Black Mirror Sucks (The Point)
05/27/2018
The Starters (Oral Argument)
10/01/2016
Episode 113: The Entrails of Fowl With Guest Charles Barzun (Oral Argument)
06/28/2016
HearSay Headlines 6/28 (WHRV)
06/27/2016
SCOTUS Rules on Texas Abortion Clinics Case (WINA)

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