The Grace College Department of Communication, Social and Historical Studies will host nationally recognized scholar Dr. Derek Muller from the University of Notre Dame for a lecture titled “Elections Under Our Constitution.” The event, held in honor of Constitution and Citizenship Day, will take place on Wednesday, Sept. 17, in the Grace College Morgan Library, 921 Connection Cir, Winona Lake. The lecture is free and open to the public.
“At Grace, we believe it is important to commemorate Constitution Day with purposeful civic education,” said Dr. Pat Loebs, professor of communication at Grace. “Bringing in such a distinguished law scholar is an excellent way to accomplish that goal.”
Muller’s research focuses on the role of states in the administration of federal elections, the constitutional contours of voting rights and election administration, the limits of judicial power in the domain of elections and the Electoral College.
He has published more than two dozen academic works, and his op-eds have appeared in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, and The Wall Street Journal. He has testified before Congress and is a co-author of a Federal Courts casebook published by Carolina Academic Press.
“It is not often that we get to learn from someone who works so closely with constitutional law,” said Ella Throne, a communication student at Grace. “I’m looking forward to this event and better understanding how the Constitution still shapes our lives today.”
For more than a decade, Grace has used Constitution and Citizenship Day as an opportunity to explore broad themes and issues related to the intersection of Christian faith, politics and American citizenship each fall. Federal observance of this day began in 1940 when President Franklin D. Roosevelt approved a joint resolution to celebrate all who had “attained the status of citizenship” in America. In 2004, a new act of Congress augmented observance to include commemoration of the signing of the U.S. Constitution and mandated that all publicly funded institutions of higher education provide some form of educational programming to mark the occasion.
To learn more about Constitution and Citizenship Day at Grace, visit www.grace.edu/academics/academic-schools-departments/school-of-arts-and-humanities/department-of-communication-social-and-historical-studies/constitution-and-citizenship-day/. For more about the Department of Communication, Social and Historical Studies go to www.grace.edu/academics/academic-schools-departments/school-of-arts-and-humanities/department-of-communication-social-and-historical-studies/.
