Alan Dershowitz: On His Magnum Opus, The Preventive State
In this, his 57th book, the legendary law professor presents a framework he's been working on since his 20s that grapples with the trade-off between infringing liberty and preventing harm.
Alan Dershowitz, the famous Harvard Law School professor who just turned 87, published what he considers his magnum opus earlier this year. His 57th book, The Preventive State, explores questions he has been grappling with since his 20s. Primarily, Professor Dershowitz seeks to provide a framework societies can use to assess how to reduce harm while also balancing the ensuing risks to liberty. He suggests that there is always a trade-off between liberty and security; however, thus far, legal scholars have paid far too little attention to questions in this vein. Peppered throughout the book are also interesting insights—for example, that tough cases make bad precedent–as well as that many popular understandings of the law ought to be reconsidered upon closer examination such as the famous thought experiment about "yelling fire in a crowded movie theater" (from the 1919 Supreme Court case Schenck v. United States).
"A lot of people think you can get a free lunch."
In this interview with Merion West editor-in-chief Erich J. Prince, Professor Dershowitz observes that this book, despite being likely his most important, has received comparatively little media attention, something he attributes to the fact that he was previously part of President Donald Trump's legal defense team.
Timeless reading in a fleeting world.
