Political leaders are increasingly engaging in "constitutional hardball" - bending lawmaking rules for partisan gain. This lecture contextualizes this phenomenon historically and describes how constitutional hardball weakens American democracy today.

Organized by the Department of Political Science and cosponsored by the Center for Social Science Scholarship.

Robinson Woodward-Burns researches American constitutional thought and development, focusing on civil rights, federalism, slavery, and abolitionism. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania, an M.A. from the University of Maryland, and a B.A. from the College of William and Mary.

His first book, Hidden Laws: How State Constitutions Stabilize American Politics, was published in 2021 by Yale University Press. Using datasets and historical case studies, the book argues that high barriers to national constitutional change have encouraged reformers to instead seek state constitutional revision, addressing national controversies over economic and labor regulations and voting, civil, and gender rights. He is writing a second book, on constitutional hardball, as a 2022 Kluge Fellow at the Library of Congress. His research has also been published in The Journal of Politics, Polity, Perspectives on Politics, Studies in American Political Development, The Maryland Law Review, The Nebraska Law Review, and The Tulsa Law Review, The Atlantic, and The Washington Post. You can find more information on his website and Twitter profiles.

UMBC is offering the free ten-week AI4ALL program again this Fall. It's an excellent opportunity for undergraduate students (Fresh., Soph., and Juniors) in any major to learn about artificial Intelligence. If you'd like to share this opportunity with Political Science undergraduate majors, you can email them the text below, which includes links to more information.  AI4ALL is particularly interested in engaging students from under-represented groups and from outside traditional STEM disciplines

Get more information here apply by September 14, and contact ai4all@csee.umbc.edu with any questions.

Dear UMBC Community,

UMBC's Office of Sustainability engages with the campus community in numerous ways to help inform our work to promote sustainability within our interconnected environment, society, and economy. One way we engage is through surveys, which help us to develop benchmarks for various initiatives and to inform ongoing and new projects.

This is a reminder about the following survey, which assesses specific knowledge, beliefs, and practices of UMBC students, faculty, and staff. The input you provide will help the Office of Sustainability to create programs, services, and procedures allowing us to better serve you and your fellow Retrievers. 

Those who participate in the survey have the option to enter into a drawing for a UMBC Sustainability Matters reusable water bottle and sticker!  We will randomly select five students, one faculty member, and one staff member at the end of the survey. Winners will be notified via email. 

If you have not already done so, you can access the survey by clicking here.

If the survey does not open automatically, please copy and paste the following link to your internet browser's address bar: https://tinyurl.com/umbcsustainability

The survey should take no more than 10-15 minutes to complete. We need all responses by 11:59 PM on Friday, September 23, 2022.

Thank you for your time! 

UMBC Office of Sustainability

Dear UMBC Community,

UMBC's Office of Sustainability engages with the campus community in numerous ways to help inform our work to promote sustainability within our interconnected environment, society, and economy. One way we engage is through surveys, which help us to develop benchmarks for various initiatives and to inform ongoing and new projects.

This is a reminder about the following survey, which assesses specific knowledge, beliefs, and practices of UMBC students, faculty, and staff. The input you provide will help the Office of Sustainability to create programs, services, and procedures allowing us to better serve you and your fellow Retrievers. 

Those who participate in the survey have the option to enter into a drawing for a UMBC Sustainability Matters reusable water bottle and sticker!  We will randomly select five students, one faculty member, and one staff member at the end of the survey. Winners will be notified via email. 

If you have not already done so, you can access the survey by clicking here.

If the survey does not open automatically, please copy and paste the following link to your internet browser's address bar: https://tinyurl.com/umbcsustainability

The survey should take no more than 10-15 minutes to complete. We need all responses by 11:59 PM on Friday, September 23, 2022.

Thank you for your time! 

UMBC Office of Sustainability