VLR Centennial Symposium to Revisit 4 Influential Articles

In honor of the 100th anniversary of the Virginia Law Review, scholars and judges from across the country will revisit some of the review's most cited — and talked about — articles during a symposium to be held March 28-29 in Caplin Pavilion at the University of Virginia School of Law.

The Virginia Law Review Centennial Symposium will focus discussion on four articles, from as early as 1936 to as recent as 2012. The panelists will include two federal judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit — Senior Circuit Judge and Chief Judge Emeritus Harry T. Edwards and Judge Brett Kavanaugh — as well as more than a dozen legal scholars representing universities around the country, including UVA. The panels will be moderated by UVA Law faculty.

Fred Rodell, "Goodbye to Law Reviews," 23 Va. L. Rev. 38 (1936)
John C. Jeffries, a constitutional and federal law expert, former dean of UVA Law and former editor-in-chief of the law review, will moderate discussion of "Goodbye," in which author Fred Rodell, the late Yale University law professor who became famous for his biting critiques of the legal profession, pens a prickly dismissal of law reviews.

Ronald J. Gilson and Reinier H. Kraakman, "The Mechanisms of Market Efficiency," 70 Va. L. Rev. 549 (1984)
Michal Barzuza, an expert in business law, will moderate discussion of "Mechanisms," a frequently cited paper about the institutional underpinnings of price formation in the securities market. UVA Law Dean Paul G. Mahoney, an expert in securities regulation, will be among the panelists.

Michael W. McConnell, "Originalism and the Desegregation Decisions," 81 Va. L. Rev. 947 (1995)
Caleb Nelson, a constitutional law expert, will moderate discussion of "Originalism," which attempts to examine the Fourteenth Amendment — and what it meant to those who drafted and ratified it — in relation to how it was applied in U.S. Supreme Court rulings that ended desegregation in public schools.

Anthony J. Bellia, Jr. and Bradford R. Clark, "The Law of Nations as Constitutional Law," 98 Va. L. Rev. 729 (2012)
Paul B. Stephan, an expert in international business and former executive editor of the law review, will moderate a discussion of "Law of Nations," which explores how Articles I and II of the Constitution influence U.S. power to exercise such functions as sending and receiving ambassadors, and declaring war.

Authors of three of the articles will be in attendance.

"The Centennial Symposium is a unique opportunity to celebrate the contribution that Virginia Law students, by operating one of the nation's premier law journals, have been making to legal scholarship for the last one hundred years," said Trevor Lovell, 2014-15 editor-in-chief. "Professor Rodell's well-taken criticisms not withstanding, I think the event will demonstrate the importance of student-run law journals, and the Virginia Law Review in particular, to the development of law."

Lovell said alumni of the review and all current students of UVA Law are invited to attend the symposium. To register, visit the review's registration page.

The symposium will cap off a year of activities surrounding the review's 100th anniversary, including publication this month of issue No. 1 of Vol. 100, a centennial dinner in February at which U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was guest of honor, and a yearlong fundraising campaign. 
 

Schedule - Friday, March 28

Saturday, March 29