The James Wilson Foundation on Natural Rights and the American Founding

We invite you to read Prof. Arkes writing for First Things, in which he addresses the grave matters at stake if Hillary Clinton is elected president. “At a recent gathering in Washington, D.C., a conservative lawyer, active in the bar of the Supreme Court, turned furious when he heard the declarations of a Never Trumper: […]

We invite you to read an interview of Prof. Arkes in The World Magazine with Marvin Olasky.  In this interview, Prof. Arkes reflects on being a professor, the 2016 election, the pro-life movement, his Faith, and his marriage. Some excerpts: Olasky: “Would both major presidential candidates get an F on one of your exams?” Arkes: “I […]

Prof. Arkes provides a commentary on the Catholic VP running-mate of Hillary Clinton for the 2016 elections in his column “Tim Kaine: An Explosion Waiting to Happen?” “We have seen this script before: The Democrats, confirmed now as a radical, pro-abortion party, will fill out their presidential ticket with a Catholic candidate for Vice President. […]

We invite you to read Prof. Arkes’s essay, “The Shell Game of ‘Tiers of Scrutiny’ Exposed, Once and for All,” in the Library of Law and Liberty.  In the piece, Prof. Arkes offers commentary on the 2016 Texas abortion case, Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, drawing upon the reasoning contained in Justice Thomas’s dissent.  Prof. Arkes joins Justice […]

Prof. Arkes switches our focus for a moment from considering the 2016 presidential candidates as the individual personalities of Trump and Clinton, to considering them as standard bearers of their respective parties. In a piece for The Catholic Thing, “On the Alchemy of Party,” Prof. Arkes discusses how the parties have absorbed into themselves different hierarchies of […]

In a piece in The Catholic Thing, Prof. Arkes further elaborates on the notion of “subsidiarity” with “Revisiting Subsidiarity: Temptations and Limits.”  Prof. Arkes further explains the proper place of this valuable principle in Catholic social teaching, while cautioning  that a deference toward “subsidiarity” does not excuse our federal government from ordering society based on objective moral […]

After the terrible loss at the Supreme Court for the state of Texas in Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, Prof. Arkes provides an analysis of the weakness of the argument from the pro-life side in the case with his piece in The Catholic Thing “Pro-Lifers Discover Again the Perils of Indirection.”  “We run the risk now of sounding […]

In The Catholic Thing, Prof. Arkes writes about the principle of subsidiarity gone wrong: when it prevents the nation as a whole from affirming fundamental moral principles that apply to all times, and to all places.  Subsidiarity ought not be an empty political structure which does recognize the foundations of human nature which transcend it. […]

In a piece for The Catholic Thing, “Lincoln’s Teaching–and Our Politics,” Prof. Arkes calls for our politicians to lead by talking about the most central issues in American law. Currently, 1.2 million Americans die by abortion each year, and yet this horrific practice is often absent in political discourse, and consequently absent in American consciousness.  It is time to […]

Listen to Prof. Arkes give his classic defense of the fundamental principles of law on the Dan Cheely Show from Relevant Radio. The segment aired on May 30, 2016. Audio Courtesy of Relevant Radio