Laurence H. Tribe

Carl M. Loeb University Professor

Professor of Law

Research Interests

• The Constitution

Subject Areas for Accepting Press Inquiries

• Abortion
• Cancer(tobacco/cigarette industry)
• Civil Rights and Liberties
• Civil Rights Legislation
• Constitutional Law
• Federalism
• First Amendment
• Free Speech
• Privacy
• Religion/Church and State
• Separation of Powers
• States' Rights
• Supreme Court

Education

• Harvard College A.B. 1962, Mathematics
• Harvard Law School J.D. 1966
• Gonzaga University LL.D. (Honorary) 1980
• University of the Pacific LL.D. (Honorary) 1987
• American University LL.D. (Honorary) 1987
• Illinois Institute of Technology LL.D. (Honorary) 1988
• Colgate University LL.D. (Honorary) 1997
• Hebrew University LH.D. (Honorary) 1998
• New York University LL.D. (Honorary) 2008
• University of Miami LL.D. (Honorary) 2010
• University of New Hampshire School of Law LL.D. (Honorary) 2011
• Government of Mexico degree honoris causa 2011

Appointments

• Assistant Professor of Law, 1968
• Professor of Law, 1972
• Ralph S. Tyler, Jr. Professor of Constitutional Law, 1982-2004
• Carl M. Loeb University Professor, 2004

Other Information

2011-2012 Faculty Disclosures re: Related Outside Interests and Activities

Biographical Statement

Laurence H. Tribe, the Carl M. Loeb University Professor and Professor of Constitutional Law at Harvard, has taught at its Law School since 1968 and was voted the best professor by the graduating class of 2000. A much sought-after appellate advocate as well as a distinguished academic, Tribe has prevailed in three-fifths of the many appellate cases he has argued (including 35 in the U.S. Supreme Court). The title "University Professor," which Tribe has held since 2004, is Harvard's highest academic honor, awarded to just a handful of professors at any given time and to fewer than 70 professors in all of Harvard University's history. Tribe was appointed in 2010 by President Obama and Attorney General Holder to serve as the first Senior Counselor for Access to Justice; currently serves as a Member of the President's Commission on White House Fellowships; and has written 115 books and articles, including his treatise, American Constitutional Law, cited more than any other legal text since 1950. Former Solicitor General Erwin Griswold wrote: "[N]o book, and no lawyer not on the [Supreme] Court, has ever had a greater influence on the development of American constitutional law," and the Northwestern Law Review opined that no-one else "in American history has... simultaneously achieved Tribe's preeminence... as a practitioner and... scholar of constitutional law." Born in China to Russian Jewish parents, Tribe entered Harvard at 16; graduated summa cum laude in Mathematics (1962) and magna cum laude in Law (1966); clerked for the California and U.S. Supreme Courts(1966-68); received tenure at 30; was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences at 38 and to the American Philosophical Society in 2010; helped write the constitutions of South Africa, the Czech Republic, and the Marshall Islands; and has received ten honorary degrees, most recently a degree honoris causa from the Government of Mexico in March 2011 that was never before awarded to an American.

Representative Publications

• Tribe, Laurence H. The Invisible Constitution (Oxford University Press 2008).
  Full text: AMAZON (Purchase)
  
• Tribe, Laurence H. "Lawrence v. Texas: The 'Fundamental Right' That Dares Not Speak Its Name," 117 Harvard Law Review 1893 (2004).
  Full text: LEXIS || WESTLAW
  
• Tribe, Laurence H. & Patrick O. Gudridge. "The Anti-Emergency Constitution," 113 Yale Law Journal 1801 (2004).
  Full text: WWW || HEIN (Harvard Users) || HEIN || LEXIS || WESTLAW
  
• Tribe, Laurence H. "The Unbearable Wrongness of Bush v. Gore," 19 Constitutional Commentary 571 (2003).
  Full text: HEIN (Harvard Users) || HEIN || LEXIS || SSRN (Harvard Users) || SSRN || WESTLAW
  
• Tribe, Laurence H. American Constitutional Law, Volume I (Foundation 3d ed. 2000).
  
• Tribe, Laurence H. "The Supreme Court, 1998 Term--Comment: Saenz Sans Prophesy: Does the "Privileges or Immunitites" Revival Reveal the Future--or Expose the Hidden Structure of the Present?" 113 Harvard Law Review 110 (1999).
  Full text: HEIN (Harvard Users) || HEIN || LEXIS || WESTLAW
  
• Tribe, Laurence H. & Michael Dorf. On Reading the Constitution (Harvard University Press 1991).
  Full text: AMAZON (Purchase)
  
• Tribe, Laurence H. Abortion: The Clash of Absolutes (W.W. Norton 1990).
  Full text: AMAZON (Purchase)
  
• Tribe, Laurence H. "The Curvature of Constitutional Space: What Lawyers Can Learn From Modern Physics," 103 Harvard L.aw Review 1 (1989).
  (reprinted in Quantum Politics: applying Quantum Theory to Political Phenomena (Theodore L. Becker, Editor) (Praeger Press 1991))
  
• Tribe, Laurence H. American Constitutional Law (Foundation Press 2nd ed. 1988).
  Full text: AMAZON (Purchase)
  

Bibliography

View bibliography