Former Georgia lieutenant governor and noted legal journalist to teach at Georgia Law this spring

Abstract

Writer: Curry Andrews, 706/542-5172, lawprstu@uga.edu
Contact: Paul Kurtz, 706/542-7140, pmkurtz@uga.edu

Athens, Ga. - The University of Georgia School of Law is pleased to announce that former Georgia Lt. Gov. Pierre Howard and Slate magazine's Dahlia Lithwick will join the law school's faculty for the spring semester. Howard will serve as the Sanders Political Leadership Scholar and Lithwick will hold a visiting professorship.

"We are very honored and excited that Pierre Howard and Dahlia Lithwick have agreed to teach courses next semester," Georgia Law Dean Rebecca H. White said. "We strive to offer our students a strong and varied curriculum. I am confident that by studying under either of these distinguished guests, our students will gain valuable insights into the role of law in our society that they otherwise would not have experienced."

As a Sanders Scholar, Howard will teach a course on law and politics. He joins the Georgia Law faculty with a long and distinguished public service record that includes representing the 42nd District of Georgia as a state senator for 18 years as well as serving as lieutenant governor from 1991 to 1999 and as a municipal court judge in Decatur. A holder of a law degree and a bachelor's degree in French, Howard practiced law with his father before forming his own firm in 1976, four years after becoming a state senator. In 1993, he joined Alston & Bird, where he practiced until 1999 and became a Senior Faculty Fellow at the UGA School of Ecology. In 2009, Howard was named president of the Georgia Conservancy, the post he currently holds.

The Sanders Political Leadership Scholar position is named for Georgia's 74th Governor and Georgia Law alumnus, Carl E. Sanders. It was created so law students could learn from individuals who have distinguished themselves as leaders in politics or other forms of public service.

Previous Sanders Scholars who have taught at the law school include: former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Newt Gingrich, former U.S. Sen. Wyche Fowler Jr., prominent media personality and political consultant Paul E. Begala, former Georgia Secretary of State Cathy Cox, former U.S. Department of Commerce Deputy Secretary Theodore "Ted" W. Kassinger, former U.S. Sen. J. Maxwell "Max" Cleland and former Georgia Supreme Court Justice George T. Smith.

Lithwick, a senior editor and legal correspondent for Slate magazine, will teach the class The Media and The Courts as a visiting professor. She writes the "Supreme Court Dispatches" and "Jurisprudence" sections for Slate in addition to covering other legal issues. Her work has also appeared in Elle, The New Republic, Newsweek, The New York Times, the Ottawa Citizen and The Washington Post as well as on CNN.com. She is a frequent commentator for several National Public Radio shows, including "Talk of the Nation." She is also co-author of Me v. Everybody: Absurd Contracts for an Absurd World and I Will Sing Life: Voices from the Hole in the Wall Gang Camp. Lithwick earned her undergraduate degree cum laude from Yale University and her Juris Doctor from Stanford University. Additionally, she served as a judicial clerk for Chief Judge Procter Ralph Hug Jr. of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit.

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