A debate examining the issues surrounding same-sex marriage will be held Monday, Nov. 26, at 7:30 p.m. in the Richard and Lucille Ice Auditorium in Melrose Hall at Linfield College.
The debate, “Should Oregon law recognize same-sex marriage?” will feature Pamela Karlan of Stanford Law School and Justin Dyer of the University of Missouri.
In 2004, Oregon voters approved Measure 36, which amended the state constitution to define marriage as the union of one man with one woman. As early as 2014, Oregon voters may have an opportunity to reconsider this issue. Should Oregon law recognize same-sex marriage?
Karlan, the Kenneth and Harle Montgomery Professor of Public Interest Law and the co-director of the Supreme Court Litigation Clinic at Stanford University, was a law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun. One of the nation’s leading experts on voting and the political process, Karlan has served as a commissioner on the California Fair Political Practices Commission and an assistant counsel and cooperating attorney for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. She is the author of numerous books including “Keeping Faith with the Constitution.”
Dyer, assistant professor of political science at the University of Missouri, is the author of “Natural Law and the Antislavery Constitutional Tradition.” His research interests span American constitutional theory and development, constitutional law, and American political thought. His research has been published in Polity, Journal of Politics, PS: Political Science and Politics, Perspectives on Political Science, and Politics & Religion. Currently, he is completing a book project that explores the jurisprudential and historical parallels between the issues of slavery and abortion in American politics.
The debate is free and open to the public, and sponsored by the Frederick Douglass Forum on Law, Rights and Justice. For more information, contact Nick Buccola, assistant professor of political science, 503-883-2246, nbuccol@linfield.edu.
