
Colloquium Series Co-Hosted by Martha Minow and Emily Broad Leib
Wednesdays 12-1pm from September 9 to November 18
“COVID-19 is the most important development in my professional lifetime. The 1918 pandemic, the 1929 economic decline, the 1968 social implosion and the Andrew Johnson presidency all at once is how it’s been described. Labor markets, financial markets and international relations will never be the same.”
Lawrence Summers is Charles W. Eliot University Professor.

From 9/11 to COVID-19: A Brief History of FDA Emergency Use Authorization
The ongoing fight against COVID-19 has thrown a spotlight on the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and its power to ...
Read More
Read More

Federal, State, and Local Responses to Student Absenteeism during COVID-19
In the past several years, school attendance and absenteeism have been key focus areas of education policy. Consistent school attendance ...
Read More
Read More

All Rise, All Mute: Online court proceedings, coronavirus, and access to justice
“[O]ur system of courts is archaic and our procedure behind the times.” - Roscoe Pound (Former Dean of Harvard Law ...
Read More
Read More

Protecting Workers During the COVID-19 Pandemic
The absence of a cohesive federal strategy during the pandemic has allowed many businesses to continue operating without standard safety ...
Read More
Read More

Unprecedented Expulsion of Immigrants at the Southern Border: The Title 42 Process
In March, President Trump relied on a little-used public health rule to drastically restrict immigration at the United States’ land ...
Read More
Read More

Interview with Glenn Cohen
Now that Pfizer and Moderna have begun distributing their COVID-19 vaccines to hospitals across the U.S., a new question has ...
Read More
Read More

The Education Divide Caused by COVID-19
The United States has entered a ‘third’ wave of Covid-19 , and many students are entering yet another month of online ...
Read More
Read More

COVID-19 and Undocumented Workers: A Catastrophic Confluence
Jacob Morales is pictured at a protest in New Jersey to advocate for the state to pass a bill providing ...
Read More
Read More

Protecting Public Health Will Require a Culture Shift Alongside Legal Change
Dr. Anthony Fauci has noted that Australia had the fewest number of flu cases “in memory” during its winter flu ...
Read More
Read More

Telework for Caregivers: A Gap in Employment and Disability Law
The pandemic has exposed a gap in our employment and disability laws—a lack of care for caregivers. The workforce is ...
Read More
Read More

Stay-at-Home Orders and Religious Freedom: How Courts Balance the Free Exercise Clause and State Emergency Powers
In the wake of the initial impact of COVID-19, state governments rushed to respond to breakouts. The resulting executive orders ...
Read More
Read More

The Constitutionality of Technology-Assisted Contact Tracing
The COVID-19 pandemic has posed an impossible set of choices for governments, forcing them to weigh the competing interests of ...
Read More
Read More

Decarceration and the Coronavirus Pandemic
At the start of the coronavirus pandemic, many hoped and expected that the pandemic would serve as a natural catalyst ...
Read More
Read More

Contracts in the Age of COVID-19: A Look At Force Majeure Clauses
As businesses continue to confront the harsh economic realities of the ongoing Coronavirus pandemic, many are looking for legal solutions ...
Read More
Read More

COVID-19 and the FDA Emergency Use Authorization Power
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is responsible for protecting public health by regulating the production, distribution, and consumption of ...
Read More
Read More

Police Should Not Be Enforcing Emergency Public Health Orders
On a weekend when police officers were handing masks to white residents in parks around New York City, NYPD Officer ...
Read More
Read More

Travel Restrictions During Coronavirus
Why is traveling during COVID-19 a problem? Whether by airplane, bus, train, or car, traveling increases a person’s chances of ...
Read More
Read More

Coronavirus and the Class Action
As coronavirus has upended life across the globe, the disruption has been followed by a wave of class action cases ...
Read More
Read More

Election Litigation in the Era of COVID-19
The 2020 Presidential election promises to be unlike any in history. The country is still in the midst of a ...
Read More
Read More

A Critical Analysis of the International Response to COVID-19: Reflections from Colombia
In the face of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, questions of resource allocation, information access, aseptisation, and biopolitics that were once reserved ...
Read More
Read More

COVID-19 in Rural America and the Indian Nations: Refocusing Development to Support At-Risk Communities
For many, the COVID-19 pandemic is likely to conjure scenes of once-bustling urban centers grinding to a halt. However, for ...
Read More
Read More

Pandemic Property: What Covid-19 Taught Us about Housing Law
The Covid-19 pandemic has brought to light longstanding problems in housing law. This sudden emergency has exposed systemic deficiencies in ...
Read More
Read More

Digital Contact Tracing: Hope or Hype?
In prior pandemics, manual contact tracing has been key to slow the spread. Contact tracing entails conducting interviews with infected ...
Read More
Read More

Emergency Measures: Free Speech and Online Content Moderation During Coronavirus
A Conversation with HLS Lecturer evelyn douek In the chaos and confusion of the Coronavirus pandemic, few have stopped to ...
Read More
Read More

Returns to Public Investment in Drug Discovery: Some Fundamental Questions
Fred Ledley, Ekaterina Cleary, and Matthew Jackson[1] “I am disposed to ask: "Does teaching consist in putting questions?" Indeed, the ...
Read More
Read More

Voter Suppression: Disinformation and Harmful Narratives around Voting
This memo was originally written by the Disinfo Defense League (DDL) and published by their writers on August 27, 2020 ...
Read More
Read More

Prioritizing Life: the Grim Irony of Capital Punishment in the Time of Coronavirus
As it has transformed almost every aspect of social and economic life in America, the Coronavirus pandemic has forced local ...
Read More
Read More