Law Commons^™

No More 'Sha Still', Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

This op-ed laments the consequences of staying quiet in light of recent national and international events. It takes President Obama to task for blaming Israel for lack of progress in Middle East peace negotiations, as well as Congress for its ineptitude during the recent national debt ceiling negotiations.

Hammerin’ Hank & The Golden Arm: Remembering Baseball’S Jewish Hall Of Famers, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

This cover story focuses on two of baseball’s greatest players, Sandy Koufax, and Hank Greenberg. Besides describing their great talent for the game, it also chronicles the religious discrimination, taunts and abuse they had to endure for their religious beliefs, not just from the public, but occasionally from members of opposing teams as well.

Presidential Memories: Lincoln's Relationship With The Jews - Remembered On President's Day, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

This article examines the relationship President Abraham Lincoln had with members of the Jewish faith.

Ever since George Washington, U.S. presidents have made inclusive gestures toward Jewish-American citizens and soldiers, but only Abraham Lincoln, whose 291st birthday we celebrated last week, ever officially intervened on their behalf. He did it twice within the span of two years. During his political career Lincoln had many Jewish associates, advisers and supporters.

During the Civil War General Grant issued General Order No. 11, which is also discussed. This order was a result of Grant’s perception that Jews were participating in a black market …

The Gentleman From Hagerstown: How Maryland Jews Won The Right To Vote, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

This article discusses the early history of Maryland in the context of religious discrimination, specifically in reference to discrimination against those of the Jewish faith, even though the state "was founded as a haven of religious liberty and beacon of toleration." It also highlights a member of the Maryland House of Delegates, Thomas Kennedy, a Christian, as being the leader of the movement to ultimately correct this injustice. Part of the problem were clauses in the state's constitution requiring officeholders to be Christians. Kennedy lost his seat in the House, but didn't give up the battle. Ha had tried several …

Handling The Truth, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Ub Viewpoint – The Silence Of The Muslims, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

This article, written in the wake of the kidnapping and murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, questions the failure of Muslims strongly to condemn acts of violence and murder committed by Islamic extremists, and argues that such silence encourages neutral parties to wonder if moderate Muslims may indeed sympathize with "the killers of 'infidels'" - which in turn can lead to fear, bias, and group defamation.

International Red Cross Must Include Israel, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

Israel's corresponding relief agency, the Mogen David Adom, has provided emergency services to countries all over the world since 1939, and it meets or surpasses every other standard for IFRC membership. Yet Israel remains the only nation left out of the 178- country federation. Why?

An IFRC spokesman says that it is "governments, not the federation, that give emblems the protective force of international law," and that "governments" are preparing to adopt an additional emblem, with no religious or national connotations, to stand alongside the Red Cross and the Red Crescent, one that Israel could adopt as its own.

The …

Israel's Voice Muffled Amid Hail Of Stones: Distortion: Confronted With A Campaign Of Violence And Propaganda, Israel Goes Unheard In The Court Of World Opinion, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

"I am in the U.S. until February. A few weeks ago, I went to our embassy in Washington and offered to speak on Israel's behalf, to present the true story of what's going on, to counter the very effective job being done by the Palestinians of making it appear as if they are Davids fighting Goliath, and we are not getting the truth out. But the people at the embassy just shrugged."

He knows that in 1948 some 630,000 Arab refugees were encouraged to leave Israel by their leaders, who promised to purge the land of Jews. Instead, they became …

Holocaust Deniers Can't Be Ignored: History: As Victims And Witnesses Of World War Ii Die Off, Revisionist Views Of The Nazi Horrors Could Gain Broader Acceptance, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

On trial in an English courtroom, where British historian David Irving has sued American professor Deborah Lipstadt for defamation, is not only the scholars' reputations but history itself. Irving claims that he was libeled by Lipstadt's 1993 book, "Denying the Holocaust: The Growing Assault on Truth and Memory," in which she called him "one of the most dangerous of the `revisionists'" because, "familiar with historical evidence, he bends it until it conforms with his ideological leanings and political agenda." But under British law, the burden of proof in defamation is squarely on the defendant, thus making it necessary for Lipstadt …

Twain's Admiration Of Jews Conflicted His Article Of 100 Years Ago Seems Less Flattering Today, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

It's been exactly a hundred years since Mark Twain first revealed himself as an unmitigated admirer of Jewish people. "A marvelous race, by long odds the most marvelous that the world has produced, I suppose." he wrote in "Concerning the Jews," published in March of 1898 by Harper's magazine.

How different after all was Twain from H.L. Mencken, who (after the posthumous publication of his diaries) was attacked as an anti-Semite? As literary critic Joseph Epstein has pointed out, Mencken talked about Jews the way they talked about themselves: "But H.L. Mencken was no anti-Semite. For that he would have …

Passage Of Religious Freedom Act Necessary To Fulfill Maryland's National Leadership Role, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

Three hundred sixty-four years ago this month, two tiny sailing ships arrived near what is now St. Mary's City with the first settlers in Maryland. The Ark and the Dove were sent to the New World by Cecil Calvert. Lord Baltimore had founded his small colony as a haven for those persecuted in England because of their religious beliefs.

On numerous occasions since then - from passage of the Act of Toleration in 1649 to the achievement of full civil liberties for Jews in 1825 to landmark Supreme Court decisions involving the state in the 1960s - Maryland has been …

Denial On The Campuses Demonstrably False Ideas Should Not Necessarily Be Protected By Bill Of Rights, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

At Hopkins and elsewhere, the issue of granting historical revisionists equal access to curricula and classrooms is difficult enough, but it is complicated acutely when student editors become entangled in the black and nefarious thickets of Holocaust denial masquerading as "scholarship." The Johns Hopkins News-Letter is only the most recent university paper to succumb to the blandishments of a group calling itself the "Committee for Open Debate on the Holocaust," which promulgates claims that a plan to systematically rid Germany or Europe of Jews never existed, that no gas chambers ever operated and that the number of Jewish victims has …

Fight Muhammad's 'Secret' With Facts, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Right Of Soviet Jews To Emigrate, Richard L. Flax

University of Baltimore Law Forum

No abstract provided.