Minnesota Center for Legal Studies : Our Mission

The breadth of legal scholarship has expanded greatly in the last several years, increasing the need for strong connections between far-flung legal and scholarly communities that are often unaware of what each other is doing. Understanding this need for intellectual connection, law professor Daniel Farber founded the Minnesota Center for Legal Studies in 1991 to enhance relationships between Law School faculty and legal scholars across the country through a combination of workshops, publications and lectures.

Professor Oren Gross, an expert in international law and national security law, took over as director of the center in the fall of 2004. He plans to continue much of what the center has been doing and he also has some new ideas of his own.“I wanted the job because I think there’s a lot of potential for this center,” he explains.“There’s a lot of room for creativity in what we do and it’s a good opportunity to get the University’s name out there as a leader in legal knowledge and research.” It will take additional funding, but in the future—perhaps as early as next year—Gross would like to see the center host an annual conference on diverse topics chosen by faculty members at the Law School.“It’s a communal affair, so I think we should all get together and think about what sorts of topics would be of interest to all of us,” he says, adding that he’s thinking that, to get things rolling, the first conference could be about his specialty, national security.

Gross would also like to see the center establish a fellowship program through which resident scholars would receive scholarships to do research and publish under the auspices of the center.“A lot of law schools have similar fellowships and this would put us in step with them,” he notes.

Currently, the center’s major activity is bringing in leading scholars to speak to Law School faculty on a range of topics over the noon hour every Thursday. Six speakers on this year’s list are from the University.The rest will be coming from schools including Berkeley, Columbia, Harvard,Yale, Chicago, Michigan, Georgetown, USC, Emory, University of Toronto, and Rutgers and will cover topics involving criminal law, international law, constitutional law, law and economics, immigration, arbitration, and legal theory and history.

Several of the speakers, however, will not be talking about legal issues at all, says Gross.“Having non-lawyers come and talk about their work in progress is good for us because we don’t often get exposure to other fields and this interdisciplinary experience will definitely help us with our own work.The people we invite are doing cuttingedge research and the lectures are well attended because we all want to know what’s going on out there.”



		Our Mission The breadth of legal scholarship has expanded greatly in the last several years, increasing the need for strong connections between far-flung legal and scholarly communities that are often unaware of what each other is doing. Understanding this need for intellectual connection, law professor Daniel Farber founded the Minnesota Center for Legal Studies in 1991 to enhance relationships between Law School faculty and legal scholars across the country through a combination of workshops, publications and lectures. Professor Oren Gross, an expert in international law and national security law, took over as director of the center in the fall of 2004. He plans to continue much of what the center has been doing and he also has some new ideas of his own.“I wanted the job because I think there’s a lot of potential for this center,” he explains.“There’s a lot of room for creativity in what we do and it’s a good opportunity to get the University’s name out there as a leader in legal knowledge and research.” It will take additional funding, but in the future—perhaps as early as next year—Gross would like to see the center host an annual conference on diverse topics chosen by faculty members at the Law School.“It’s a communal affair, so I think we should all get together and think about what sorts of topics would be of interest to all of us,” he says, adding that he’s thinking that, to get things rolling, the first conference could be about his specialty, national security. Gross would also like to see the center establish a fellowship program through which resident scholars would receive scholarships to do research and publish under the auspices of the center.“A lot of law schools have similar fellowships and this would put us in step with them,” he notes. Currently, the center’s major activity is bringing in leading scholars to speak to Law School faculty on a range of topics over the noon hour every Thursday. Six speakers on this year’s list are from the University.The rest will be coming from schools including Berkeley, Columbia, Harvard,Yale, Chicago, Michigan, Georgetown, USC, Emory, University of Toronto, and Rutgers and will cover topics involving criminal law, international law, constitutional law, law and economics, immigration, arbitration, and legal theory and history. Several of the speakers, however, will not be talking about legal issues at all, says Gross.“Having non-lawyers come and talk about their work in progress is good for us because we don’t often get exposure to other fields and this interdisciplinary experience will definitely help us with our own work.The people we invite are doing cuttingedge research and the lectures are well attended because we all want to know what’s going on out there.”

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	Minnesota Center for Legal Studies 430 Walter F. Mondale Hall 229 Nineteenth Avenue South Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455