Great Books, Great Conversations: Making Law: A Memoir of Good Times

We will be joined by trustee emeritus Richard C. Cahn, who will be discussing his memoir, Making Law: A Memoir of Good Times.

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This unusual memoir, Making Law, weaves the stories of six dramatic, very public court cases into the fabric of the American legal system, and shows how lawyers and judges at every level of the system are our last remaining protection against tyranny. Cahn demonstrates that the integrity, independence and effectiveness of the court system needs to be preserved.

This Great Books, Great Conversations event will be hosted by Jacqueline Jones LaMon, JD, professor, and vice president of diversity, equity and inclusion; and plastic surgeon and avid reader, Sybile Val ’99, MD.

About the Author

Richard C. Cahn

Credit: ©2006 William Baker. All rights granted to Adelphi University. All rights reserved for any use by anyone else.Richard C. Cahn started his career in the Justice Department as a member of Attorney General Herbert Brownell’s Program for Honor Law Graduates, and went on to practice law as a private attorney for more than 60 years, fighting court battles pitting ordinary citizens and the government against each other. He argued the nation’s first local government reapportionment case before the Supreme Court. He became president of a major county bar association, served for many years on judicial screening committees for the federal and state courts, prosecuted attorneys for professional misconduct.

Unlike many, he believes that judges have long “legislated from the bench” when necessary to do justice, and that they deserve admiration and respect for doing so, rather than condemnation. He also believes that because many court cases are being brought today in an attempt to change public policies about which the two major political parties passionately disagree, it is particularly important that the judges deciding them be free of partisan political influence, as intended by the Founding Fathers. We must put a stop to actions of the executive and legislative branches of the government to demean, weaken, and politicize the court system, which have brought public approval of the courts — including the Supreme Court — to a new low.

Mr. Cahn is a graduate of Dartmouth College and Yale Law School. He was long involved in higher education as regional counsel for the State University of New York, and served twelve years as a Trustee of Adelphi University.