Judge Rosemary Barkett Final.pdf - Columbia Law School

JUDGE ROSEMARY BARKETT FINAL.DOC 8/19/2007 8:32:54 PM
474 COLUMBIA HUMAN RIGHTS LAW REVIEW [38:471
These programs have included as students at least four
Supreme Court justices, including Justice Breyer, and hundreds of
judges from every single federal circuit and from the highest courts of
many of our states.
We’re talking about, over the years: some fifteen judges from
the First Circuit, fourty-four judges from the Second, over thirty
judges from the Third, twelve judges from the Fourth, sixteen judges
from the Fifth, over seventeen judges from the Sixth, twenty judges
from the Seventh, ten judges from the Eighth, fourty-one judges from
the Ninth, twelve judges from the Tenth, fifteen judges from the
Eleventh, fifteen from the D.C. Circuit, and thirty-five to fourty state
court judges—many from the highest courts of their state. The list
includes most, if not all, of the most illustrious members of the
judiciary throughout this entire country.
When the program first started (and I was one of the very
first participants in that program), many judges, however, attended
with their skepticism in high gear. International law, in our minds,
was like having to learn a foreign language, and one which we did
not think would be of much use to us. It was a difficult subject for
most judges because it was so remote at that time from our everyday
experiences. Lou understood that and was able to take us from what
we knew to a whole new area of knowledge that we had not known.
To use the vernacular, we were “blown away” by his complete
command of the U.S. Constitution and thereby, in his modest but
clear and authoritarian way, he was able to walk us through the
comparable doctrines of international law and the documents of
international human rights.
As a reviewer of one of his books noted, “Professor Henkin is
one of the very few law professors who has divided their academic
careers between constitutional law and international law and he has
written brilliantly in both fields . . . [H]e is at home in history and
political science as well as in law. Above all, Henkin is a true scholar,
not a polemicist or a promoter.” 14 The judges were quick to recognize
that. As another reviewer said, “his marriage of erudition and
persuasion is irresistible.” 15
14. Andreas F. Lowenfeld, Book Review, Foreign Affairs and the
Constitution, 87 Harv. L. Rev. 494, 498 (1973).
15. Anne-Marie Burley, Book Review, Constitutionalism, Democracy and
Foreign Affairs, 86 Am. J. Int’l L. 415, 416 (1992).