Professor Larry May

“Habeas Corpus, Procedural Rights, and Fundamental Law"

Public lecture - All welcome

Date: Thursday, 4th September 2008
Time:  6 to 7 pm Lecture; 7 to 7.30 pm Light refreshments               
Venue: Monash University Law Chambers, 472 Bourke Street, Melbourne
RSVP: castan.centre@law.monash.edu.au or tel 9905 3327

Larry May, JD, Ph.D, is a Professor of Philosophy at Washington University in St Louis and current Research Professor of Social Justice at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics, Australian National University, and Charles Sturt University.  He is a political philosopher who has worked on conceptual issues in collective and shared responsibility, as well as normative issues in international criminal law.  He has published numerous books on social responsibility and war crimes including “Crimes Against Humanity” which won an honourable mention from the American Society of International Law, and best book award from the North American Society for Social Philosophy.  The second volume in this series, “War Crimes and Just Wars” won the Frank Chapman Sharp prize for the best book on the Philosophy of War and Peace from the American Philosophical Association.  He is also a past president of AMINTAPHIL, the American section of the International Society for Philosophy of Law.

The right of habeas corpus, at least since the time of Magna Carta, was understood as the right to be brought out of prison and told of what one is charged with.  This right has been the basis of fundamental law for theorists from Blackstone until the present. Yet, the right is merely procedural, and so innocuous that it seems odd that Kings and Presidents worry so much about it. In this presentation, Larry May provides a jurisprudential analysis of habeas that tries to make sense of these disparate facts.