Floyd Abrams ’60 to Speak March 26 on The Courage of Lawyers

Floyd Abrams ’60, an expert in freedom of speech and press issues, will deliver a Dean’s Lecture on March 26, 2009, titled “The Courage of Lawyers: Four American Heroes.” The lecture will be held at 6:30 p.m. in Room 127 and is free and open to the public. A reception will follow in the Alumni Reading Room. The lecture is being hosted by Yale Law School’s Law and Media Program (LAMP).

Floyd Abrams is a Visiting Lecturer in Law at Yale Law School and the William J. Brennan Jr. Visiting Professor of First Amendment Law at the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism. He is also partner in the law firm Cahill Gordon & Reindel and has extensive experience in matters involving First Amendment, intellectual property, insurance, public policy and regulatory issues. He has argued frequently before the U.S. Supreme Court. He is author of Speaking Freely: Trials of the First Amendment (2005). He holds a B.A. from Cornell University and a J.D. from Yale Law School.

Abrams rose to national prominence in 1972 when he participated in the successful effort by the New York Times to compel the Nixon Administration to back away from efforts to suppress distribution of the Pentagon Papers. His clients, in addition to the Times, have included ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, Time Magazine, Business Week, The Nation, Reader’s Digest, and Hearst. He defended the Brooklyn Museum of Art when New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani attempted to close a controversial exhibit. In 2005, Abrams represented Judith Miller of the New York Times and Matthew Cooper of Time as they sought to fight off demands for disclosure of their confidential sources.

The Yale Law School Law and Media Program is generously supported by a grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.