Alan Keyes
Keyes at a 2008 Presidential campaign rally
16th Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs
In office November 6, 1985 – November 17, 1987
President	Ronald Reagan
Preceded by	Gregory J. Newell
Succeeded by	Richard S. Williamson
Personal details
Born	Alan Lee Keyes (1950-08-07) August 7, 1950 (age 61) Long Island, New York
Nationality	American
Political party	Republican Constitution Independent
Spouse(s)	Jocelyn Marcel Keyes
Children	Andrew Keyes Francis Keyes Maya Keyes
Residence	Maryland
Alma mater	Harvard University (B.A.), Harvard University (Ph.D.)
Occupation	Diplomat Pundit College Administrator Public Speaker
Religion	Roman Catholic
Website	http://www.alankeyes.com/

Alan Lee Keyes (born August 7, 1950) is an American conservative political activist, author, former diplomat, and perennial candidate for public office.^[1][2] A doctoral graduate of Harvard University, Keyes began his diplomatic career in the U.S. Foreign Service in 1979 at the United States consulate in Bombay, India, and later in the American embassy in Zimbabwe.

He ran for President of the United States in 1996, 2000, and 2008, and was a Republican nominee for the U.S. Senate in 1988, 1992, and 2004. Keyes was appointed Ambassador to the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations by President Ronald Reagan, and served as Reagan's Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs from 1985 to 1987; in his capacities as a UN ambassador, among Keyes's accomplishments was contributing to the Mexico City Policy.

Keyes also hosted a radio talk show, The Alan Keyes Show: America's Wake-Up Call, and a television commentary show on the MSNBC cable network, Alan Keyes Is Making Sense.

Personal life and family[link]

Born in a naval hospital on Long Island, New York,^[3] Keyes was the fifth child to Allison and Gerthina Keyes, a U.S. Army sergeant and a teacher. Due to his father's tours of duty, the Keyes family traveled frequently. Keyes lived in Georgia, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Texas, Virginia and overseas in Italy.^[4]

After high school, Keyes attended Cornell University, where he was a member of the Cornell University Glee Club and The Hangovers. He studied political philosophy with American philosopher and essayist Allan Bloom and has said that Bloom was the professor who influenced him most in his undergraduate studies.^[3] Keyes has stated that he received death threats for opposing Vietnam war protesters who seized a campus building.^[5] Keyes has stated that a passage of Bloom's book, The Closing of the American Mind, refers to this incident,^[6] speaking of an African-American student "whose life had been threatened by a black faculty member when the student refused to participate in a demonstration" at Cornell.^[7] Shortly thereafter, he left the school and spent a year in Paris under a Cornell study abroad program connected with Bloom.^[8]

Keyes continued his studies at Harvard University, where he resided in Winthrop House, and completed his Bachelor of Arts degree in government affairs in 1972. During his first year of graduate school, Keyes's roommate was William Kristol. In 1988, Kristol ran Keyes's unsuccessful U.S. Senate campaign in Maryland.^[9]

Keyes earned his PhD in government affairs from Harvard University in 1979, having written a dissertation on Alexander Hamilton and constitutional theory, under Harvey C. Mansfield.^[10] Due to student deferments and a high draft number, Keyes was not drafted to serve in the Vietnam War. Keyes and his family were staunch supporters of the war, in which his father served two tours of duty.^[11] Keyes was criticized by opponents of the war in Vietnam, but he says he was supporting his father and his brothers, who were also fighting in the war.^[12]

Keyes is married to Jocelyn Marcel Keyes, of Indian descent, from Calcutta. The couple has three children, Francis, Maya, and Andrew. Keyes is a traditional Catholic and a third-degree Knight of Columbus.^[13][14] He's also a close friend of Brazilian conservative philosopher Olavo de Carvalho.

In 2005, when Maya Keyes was 20 years old, she came out as a lesbian. There were reports her family threw her out of the house and stopped talking to her.^[15][16] In an interview with Metro Weekly, a Washington, D.C., LGBT newspaper, Maya confirmed that her father "cut off all financial support." In the same report Maya said, "It doesn't make much sense for him to be [financially] supporting someone who is working against what he believes in."^[17] Alan Keyes contradicted reports about his having disowned his daughter in October 2007. Keyes said that he loves his daughter and that she knows she has a home with him. He asserted that he never cut her off and never would, because it would be "wrong in the eyes of God." He also said he would not be coerced into "approving of that which destroys the soul" of his daughter. He contended that he must "stand for the truth [Jesus Christ] represents" even if it breaks his heart.^[18]

On May 8, 2009, Keyes and 21 others were arrested while protesting President Barack Obama's commencement speech at the University of Notre Dame. Keyes was charged with trespassing and released on $250 bond.^[19] He was arrested a second time on May 16.^[20]

Diplomat[link]

A year before completing his doctoral studies, Keyes joined the United States Department of State as a protégé of UN Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick.^[21] In 1979, he was assigned to the consulate in Mumbai, India.^[22] The following year, Keyes was sent to serve at the embassy in Zimbabwe.^[22]

In 1983, President Ronald Reagan appointed Keyes as Ambassador to the United Nations Economic and Social Council. In 1985, he was appointed Assistant Secretary of State for International Organizations, a position he held until 1987. His stay at the UN provoked some controversy, leading Newsday to say "he has propounded the more unpopular aspects of US policy with all the diplomatic subtlety of the cannon burst in Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture."^[23] He also served on the staff of the National Security Council.^[24]

At a fundraiser for Keyes's senate campaign, President Reagan spoke of Keyes's time as an ambassador, saying that he "did such an extraordinary job ... defending our country against the forces of anti-Americanism." Reagan continued, "I've never known a more stout-hearted defender of a strong America than Alan Keyes."^[25] In 1987 Keyes was appointed a resident scholar for the American Enterprise Institute. His principal research for AEI was diplomacy, international relations, and self-government.^[26]

Following government service, Ambassador Keyes was President of Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) from 1989 to 1991, and founded CAGW's National Taxpayers' Action Day. In 1991, he served as Interim President of Alabama A&M University, in Huntsville, Alabama.^[27]

Role in the Reagan Administration[link]

Alan Keyes as a diplomat.

Among the U.S. delegation to the 1984 World Population Conference in Mexico City, Keyes was selected by Reagan as deputy chairman. In that capacity, Keyes negotiated the language of the Mexico City Policy to withhold federal funds from international organizations that support abortion.^[28][29] Additionally, Keyes fought against an Arab-backed U.N. resolution calling for investigation of Israeli settlements. The measure passed 83-2, with 15 abstentions and only Israel and the U.S. voting against it.^[30] Reagan again appointed Keyes to represent the U.S. at the 1985 Women's Conference in Nairobi.^[29]

During his time at the United States Department of State, Keyes defended the Reagan policy of not imposing economic sanctions on South Africa as punishment for apartheid.^[31] Stated Keyes, "I see the black people in South Africa as the most critical positive factor for eliminating apartheid and building the future of that country ... And that is not something you do with rhetoric, slogans and noninvolvement. It's not something you will achieve through disinvestment."^[23]

Political campaigns[link]

1988 Senate election[link]

In 1988, Keyes was drafted by the Maryland Republican Party to run for the United States Senate, and received 38 percent of the vote against victorious incumbent Democrat Paul Sarbanes.^[32]

1992 Senate election[link]

Four years later, he ran again for the Senate from Maryland, coming in first in a field of 13 candidates in the Republican primary. Against Democrat Barbara Mikulski, he received 29 percent in the general election.^[33]

During the 1992 election, Keyes attracted controversy when he took a $8,463/month salary from his campaign fund.^[34]

1996 Presidential election[link]

Keyes sought the Republican presidential nomination in 1996,^[35] in an effort to force abortion to the center of America's public policy debate. Many Republican leaders saw this as unnecessary and divisive.^[36] Keyes was particularly critical of Clinton during his campaign, saying, "This guy lies, but he lies with passion." He questioned whether a Republican candidate who is truthful, yet cold and heartless, had a chance to win against the incumbent.^[37] Keyes was also especially critical of Pat Buchanan, once saying during an interview on the Talk from the Heart program with Al Kresta (simulcast on KJSL-AM St. Louis and WMUZ-FM Detroit) that Buchanan had a "black heart." Keyes's entry into the Republican race after Buchanan had secured victories in New Hampshire and Louisiana led many to believe that Keyes was a stalking horse for neoconservative elements in the G.O.P., since Buchanan had been a well-known ardent foe of abortion and had suffered political fallout for bringing abortion and "cultural war" to the center of the public policy debate. Later during the primaries, Keyes was briefly detained by Atlanta police when he tried to force his way into a debate to which he had been invited, and then uninvited. He was never formally arrested and was eventually picked up 20 minutes later by Atlanta's mayor at the time, Bill Campbell.^[38][39]

2000 Presidential election[link]

Keyes again campaigned for the Republican nomination in the 2000 primaries on a pro-life, family values, tax reform plank.^[40] In Iowa, he finished 3rd, drawing 14 percent^[41] in a crowded field. He stayed in the race after the early rounds and debated the two remaining candidates, John McCain and George W. Bush, in a number of nationally televised debates. He finished second in 8 primaries. His best showing in the presidential primaries was in Utah, where he received 20 percent of the vote.^[42] He was also noted for jumping into a mosh pit during a Rage Against the Machine song during the Iowa caucus as part of a segment on Michael Moore's TV series The Awful Truth.^[43]

2004 Senate election[link]

On August 8, 2004 – with 86 days to go before the general election – the Illinois Republican Party drafted Alan Keyes to run against Democratic Illinois Senate member and future President of the United States Barack Obama for the U.S. Senate, after the Republican nominee, Jack Ryan, withdrew due to a sex scandal, and other potential draftees (most notably former Chicago Bears coach Mike Ditka) declined to run. The Washington Post called Keyes a "carpetbagger"^[44] since he "had never lived in Illinois."^[45][46] When asked to answer charges of carpetbagging in the context of his earlier criticism of Hillary Clinton, he called her campaign "pure and planned selfish ambition", but stated that in his case he felt a moral obligation to run after being asked to by the state GOP. "You are doing what you believe to be required by your respect for God's will, and I think that that's what I'm doing in Illinois".^[47]

Keyes, who opposes abortion in all cases "except as an inadvertent result of efforts to save the mother's life",^[48] said in a September 7, 2004 news conference that Jesus Christ would not vote for Obama^[49] because of votes that Obama — then a member of the Illinois Senate Judiciary committee and a lecturer in constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School — cast in 2001 against a package of three anti-abortion bills that Obama argued were too broad and unconstitutional. The legislation, which provided "that a live child born as a result of an abortion shall be fully recognized as a human person,"^[50] passed the Republican-controlled Illinois Senate, but failed to pass out of the Democratic-controlled Illinois House Judiciary committee.^[51] After the election, Keyes declined to congratulate Obama, explaining that his refusal to congratulate Obama was "not anything personal", but was meant to make a statement against "extend[ing] false congratulations to the triumph of what we have declared to be across the line" of reasonable propriety. He said that Obama's position on moral issues regarding life and the family had crossed that line. "I'm supposed to make a call that represents the congratulations toward the triumph of that which I believe ultimately stands for ... a culture evil enough to destroy the very soul and heart of my country? I cannot do this. And I will not make a false gesture," Keyes said.^[52]

Keyes was also criticized for his views on homosexuality. In an interview with Michelangelo Signorile, a gay radio host, Keyes defined homosexuality as centering in the pursuit of pleasure, literally "selfish hedonism". When Signorile asked if Mary Cheney, Vice President Dick Cheney's lesbian daughter, fit the description and was therefore a "selfish hedonist", Keyes replied, "Of course she is. That goes by definition."^[53] Media sources picked up on the exchange, reporting that Keyes had "trashed", "attacked," and "lashed out at" Mary Cheney, and had called her a "sinner" – provoking condemnation of Keyes by gay Republicans and several GOP leaders.^[54][55] Keyes noted that it was an interviewer, not he, who brought up Mary Cheney's name in the above incident, and he told reporters, "You have tried to personalize the discussion of an issue that I did not personalize. The people asking me the question did so, and if that's inappropriate, blame the media. Do not blame me."^[56][57][58]

During the campaign, Keyes outlined an alternative to reparations for slavery. His specific suggestion was that, for a period of one or two generations, African-Americans who were descended from slaves would be exempt from the federal income tax (though not from the FICA tax that supports Social Security).^[59] Keyes said the experiment "would become a demonstration project for what I believe needs to be done for the whole country, which is to get rid of the income tax."^[60] He also called for the repeal of the 17th Amendment in order that US Senators should be appointed by state legislatures and no longer be directly elected.^[61]

Keyes finished with 27% of the vote^[62] despite winning a small number of southern Illinois counties.^[63]

2008 Presidential election[link]

On June 5, 2007, We Need Alan Keyes for President was formed as a political action committee to encourage Keyes to enter the 2008 presidential election.^[64] On September 14, 2007, Keyes officially announced his candidacy in an interview with radio show host Janet Parshall.^[65] On September 17, 2007, Keyes participated in the Values Voter Debate streamed live on Sky Angel, the Values Voter website, and radio. In a straw poll of the attending audience, Keyes placed third among the invited candidates, after Mike Huckabee and Ron Paul.^[66] Keyes was excluded from the Republican CNN/YouTube debate on November 28, 2007. Keyes's campaign called the exclusion "arbitrary, unfair, and presumptuous," arguing that CNN was playing the role of "gatekeeper" for the presidential election.^[67]

On December 12, 2007, Keyes participated in the Des Moines Register's Republican presidential debate, televised nationwide by PBS and the cable news networks. This was the first major presidential debate in which Keyes participated during the 2008 election season and the last Republican debate before the Iowa Caucuses.^[68][69] Although Keyes wasn't listed on the latest national CNN poll leading up to the debate,^[70] he registered with at least 1 percent of the Iowa vote in order to participate.^[71] During the debate, after the moderator began to ask a question of Texas Congressman Ron Paul, Keyes insisted he wasn't getting fair treatment. He interrupted the debate moderator at one point, saying that she hadn't called on him in several rounds and that he had to make an issue of it.^[72] He went on the offensive against his opponents during the debate, criticizing Rudy Giuliani's pro-choice position, as well as Mitt Romney's recent change in position on the same subject. In answering a question about global warming, he continued his criticisms of other candidates, saying, "I'm in favor of reducing global warming, because I think the most important emission we need to control is the hot air emission of politicians who pretend one thing and don't deliver".^[69] He also advocated ending the income tax, establishing state-sanctioned prayer in public schools, and abolishing abortion.^[72] Toward the end of the debate, Keyes stated he could not support Giuliani if he were to win the nomination due to the former New York mayor's position on abortion.^[73]

In the Iowa caucuses, Keyes did not appear on any of the election totals.^[74] Keyes stated that many of the caucus locations he visited did not list him as a choice. His campaign CEO, Stephen Stone blamed much of this on the media and on Keyes's decision to enter the race late. Stone explained that the media would not acknowledge Keyes's candidacy, making it difficult to run an effective campaign.^[74]

Keyes supports an amendment to the Constitution barring same-sex marriage.^[75] He stated he would not have gone to war in Iraq,^[76] but also said that the war was justified^[77] and defended President George W. Bush's decision in one of his 2004 debates.^[78] Keyes has stated that troops should stay in Iraq,^[79] but also said that he would have turned over operations to the United Nations.^[80] However, Keyes has also stated that even while he was an ambassador there he was not a supporter of the United Nations.^[81]

After the early states, Keyes exclusively campaigned in Texas,^[82] where he finished with 0.60 percent of all votes cast.^[83]

Following Texas, the Keyes campaign moved to seeking the Constitution Party presidential nomination, but he continued to appear on several Republican ballots. On May 6, Keyes scored his best showing of the campaign by winning 2.7% for fourth place in North Carolina, earning him two delegates to the Republican National Convention.

Departure from Republican Party[link]

Keyes first stated that he was considering leaving the Republican Party during a January 2008 appearance on The Weekly Filibuster radio show.^[84] He did not withdraw his candidacy after John McCain won the necessary 1,191 delegates to the Republican National Convention, even though he was no longer campaigning for the Republican nomination.^[82] On March 27, 2008, Keyes's campaign website began displaying the Constitution Party's logo, along with a parody of the trademarked GOP logo in the form of a dead elephant.^[85] This appeared to be an indication of Keyes's intentions to quit the Republican party and to begin officially seeking the Constitution Party's presidential nomination.

On April 15, Keyes confirmed his split from the Republican Party and his intention to explore the candidacy of the Constitution Party.^[86][87] He lost his bid for the party's nomination, however, coming in second to 2004 CP vice presidential candidate Chuck Baldwin at the party's national convention in Kansas City, Missouri on April 26, 2008.^[88] During the convention, the party's founder, Howard Phillips, gave a controversial speech in which he referred to Keyes as "the Neocon candidate" who "lingered in the Republican Party until a week ago."^[89] Following the defeat, Keyes held an interview with Mike Ferguson^[90] in which he compared his defeat to an abortion.^[91] Later, Keyes told a group of his supporters that he was "prayerfully considering" making a continued bid for the presidency as an independent candidate,^[92] and asserted his refusal to endorse Baldwin's candidacy.^[93]

Instead, Keyes' supporters formed a new third party, America's Independent Party, for his presidential candidacy. America's Independent Party gained the affiliation of a faction of California's American Independent Party. However, the AIP ticket, which had Brian Rohrbough, father of a victim of the Columbine High School massacre, of Colorado as its vice presidential candidate, was only on the ballot in California, Colorado, and Florida.

In the federal election held on November 4, 2008, Keyes received 47,694 votes nationally to finish seventh.^[94] About 86% (40,673) of the votes he received were cast in California.

Obama citizenship lawsuit[link]

On November 14, 2008, Keyes filed a lawsuit—naming as defendants California Secretary of State Deborah Bowen, President-elect Barack Obama, Vice President-elect Joe Biden, and California's 55 Democratic electors^[95][96]—challenging Obama's eligibility for the U.S. Presidency. The suit requested that Obama provide documentation that he is a natural born citizen of the United States.^[97][98]

Following the inauguration, Keyes claimed President Obama had not been constitutionally inaugurated, refused to call him president, and called him a "usurper" and a "radical communist".^[99][100] Keyes also claimed that President Obama's Birth Certificate had been forged and he was not qualified to be president.^[101]

Media and advocacy[link]

Keyes has worked as a media commentator and talk show personality. In 1994, he began hosting a syndicated radio show called The Alan Keyes Show: America's Wake-Up Call from Arlington, Virginia. The show became simulcast on cable's National Empowerment Television in 1997.^[102] Keyes also launched various web-based organizations — notably Renew America and the Declaration Foundation, both headquartered in Washington, D.C.

Keyes has served on the board of advisors for the Catholic League, a non-profit, Roman Catholic advocacy group headed by William A. Donohue. In 1997, he was quoted as calling in that capacity the ABC television show Nothing Sacred "propaganda dressed up as entertainment, the way the Nazis used to make movies. The entertainment elite's belief that there are no moral absolutes deeply contradicts the religious view of Christianity."^[103]

In 2002, he hosted a live television commentary show, Alan Keyes Is Making Sense, on the MSNBC cable news channel.^[104] The network canceled the show in July, citing poor ratings. The cancellation triggered a currently ongoing boycott led by Jewish activism website Mesora.org that numbers more than 72,000 members.^[105] The show was unsympathetic to supporters of the al-Aqsa Intifadah – whom Keyes frequently debated on the program – and supported the Israeli crackdown on Palestinians. The show also featured critical discussion of homosexuality and of priests accused in the Roman Catholic Church sex abuse scandals. The last episode was broadcast on June 27, 2002. As a result of Keyes's strong advocacy of Israel on his MSNBC show, in July 2002 the state of Israel awarded him a special honor "in appreciation of his journalistic endeavors and his integrity in reporting" and flew him in to meet Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.^[106]

In August 2003, Keyes came out in defense of Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore, citing both the U.S. Constitution and the Alabama constitution as sanctioning Moore's (and Alabama's) authority to publicly display the Ten Commandments in the state's judicial building, in defiance of a court order from U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson.^[107][108] Although the monument was ultimately removed by state authorities, the issue impelled Keyes to spend the next year advocating his understanding of the Constitution's protection of the right of states to display monuments that reflect the religious sentiments of the people in their states. As a result, he published an essay describing his rationale titled "On the establishment of religion: What the Constitution really says."^[109]

In early 2005, Keyes sought to intervene in the Terri Schiavo case, arguing that Schiavo's life was protected by the Florida constitution, and that Governor Jeb Bush had final authority to determine the outcome of the case under state provisions. He attempted to meet with Bush to discuss the provisions of Florida law that authorized the governor to order Schiavo's feeding tubes reinserted – something Bush claimed he wished to do, but for which he said he lacked authority – but the governor declined to meet with Keyes. Keyes subsequently wrote an essay directed openly at Governor Bush titled "Judicial review and executive responsibility",^[110] days after Schiavo's feeding tube had been removed.

In November 2006, Keyes criticized Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney for instituting gay marriage entirely on his own – according to Keyes – with no requirement or authority to do so under Massachusetts law. Keyes said Romney's actions, which he suggested were due to a complete misunderstanding of his role as governor and of the limitations of the judicial branch of government, were not necessitated by a ruling of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court in November 2003 that directed the state legislature to institute same-sex marriage. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial court had ruled that the state law banning same-sex marriage was not constitutional.^[111] The court gave the Massachusetts Legislature 180 days to modify the law; after it failed to do so, Gov. Mitt Romney ordered town clerks to begin issuing marriage licenses on May 17, 2004, in compliance with the court ruling.^[112]

Commenting on the issue, Keyes asked rhetorically, "Since the legislature has not acted on the subject, you might be wondering how it is that homosexuals are being married in Massachusetts. It's because Mitt Romney, who is telling people he's an opponent of same-sex marriage, forced the justices of the peace and others to perform same-sex marriage, all on his own, with no authorization or requirement from the court. Tells you how twisted our politicians have become."^[113]

In December 2009, Keyes authored a column for the World Net Daily critical of evolution and in support of Intelligent Design.^[114]

Keyes also made a widely discussed appearance in the 2006 film Borat.^{[115][116][117][118][119][120]} In 2010, About.com, owned by The New York Times Company, named Keyes one of the top 20 conservatives to follow on Twitter.^[121]

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Masters of the Dream: The Strength and Betrayal of Black America by Alan Keyes, William Morrow & Company, Inc., 1994. ISBN 0-688-09599-2
• Our Character, Our Future by Alan Keyes, Zondervan, 1996. ISBN 0-310-20816-5
• The Jerusalem Alternative: Moral Clarity for Ending the Arab-Israeli Conflict by Dmitry Radyshevsky (Editor), Jenny Grigg (Editor), 2004. ISBN 0-89221-592-5 Contains speeches from the inaugural Jerusalem Summit, featuring: Richard Perle, Benjamin Netanyahu, Alan Keyes, Daniel Pipes, and other leading intellectual and political leaders.
• Leadership Defined: In-Depth Interviews with America's Top Leadership Experts by Richard Tyler, Alexander M. Haig, Warren Bennis, Alan Keyes, 2004. ISBN 1-932863-10-9
• Judicial Tyranny by Mark Sutherland, William J. Federer, Dave Meyer, 2005. ISBN 0-9753455-6-7 Features conservative perspectives on the United States judicial system from Mark Sutherland, US Attorney General Ed Meese, Ambassador Alan Keyes, Dave Meyer, Phyllis Schlafly, the Honorable Howard Phillips, Alan Sears, William Federer, Ben DuPre, Rev. Rick Scarborough, David Gibbs, Mathew Staver, Don Feder and Herb Titus.

External links[link]

Biography portal

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Alan Keyes

Wikinews has related news: Alan Keyes still in presidential race

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Alan Keyes

• RenewAmerica.us
• Alan Keyes Archives
• WorldNetDaily column
• Declaration Foundation
• Declaration Alliance
• Black America's Political Action Committee
• Alan Keyes at the Internet Movie Database
• Appearances on C-SPAN
• Works by or about Alan Keyes in libraries (WorldCat catalog)

2004 Senate campaign

• Alan Keyes for Senate 2004
  • Keyes-Obama debates
• Alan Keyes's campaign finance reports and data at the Federal Election Commission

2008 presidential campaign

• Alan Keyes for President - America's Revival
• Biography, voting record, and interest group ratings at Project Vote Smart
• Issue positions and quotes at On the Issues
• Financial information at OpenSecrets.org
• Campaign finance reports and data at the Federal Election Commission
• Spartan Internet Political Performance Index weekly Internet ranking for Alan Keyes

v t e Assistants Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs Rusk Hickerson Murphy Key Wilcox Cleveland Sisco De Palma Popper Buffum Lewis Maynes McCall Abrams Newell Keyes Williamson Bolton Bennet Lyman Welch Holmes Silverberg Hook Brimmer

Alan Dershowitz
Born	Alan Morton Dershowitz (1938-09-01) September 1, 1938 (age 73) Brooklyn, New York
Nationality	American
Ethnicity	Jewish
Education	Brooklyn College (A.B.) Yale Law School (LL.B)
Occupation	Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School
Spouse	1. Sue Barlach 2. Carolyn Cohen
Parents	Harry and Claire Dershowitz
Website
www.alandershowitz.com

Alan Morton Dershowitz (born September 1, 1938) is an American lawyer, jurist, and political commentator. He has spent most of his career at Harvard Law School where in 1967, at the age of 28, he became the youngest full professor of law in its history. He has held the Felix Frankfurter professorship there since 1993.^[1]

Dershowitz is known for his involvement in several high-profile legal cases and as a commentator on the Arab–Israeli conflict. As a criminal appellate lawyer, he has won 13 of the 15 murder and attempted murder cases he has handled, and has represented a series of celebrity clients, including Mike Tyson, Patty Hearst, and Jim Bakker.^[2] His most notable cases include his role in 1984 in overturning the conviction of Claus von Bülow for the attempted murder of his wife, Sunny, and as the appellate adviser for the defense in the O.J. Simpson trial in 1995.^[3]

A political liberal,^[4][5][6][7] he is the author of a number of books about politics and law, including Reversal of Fortune: Inside the von Bülow Case (1985), the basis of the 1990 film; Chutzpah (1991); Reasonable Doubts: The Criminal Justice System and the O.J. Simpson Case (1996); the best-selling The Case for Israel (2003); Rights From Wrongs: A Secular Theory of the Origins of Rights (2004)^[8] and The Case for Peace (2005).

Early life[link]

Dershowitz was born in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, to Harry and Claire Dershowitz, an Orthodox Jewish couple, and was raised in Borough Park.^[9] His father was a founder and president of the Young Israel Synagogue in the 1960s, served on the board of directors of the Etz Chaim School in Borough Park, and in retirement was co-owner of the Manhattan-based Merit Sales Company.^[10] According to Dershowitz, Harry had a strong sense of justice and talked about how it was "the Jew's job to defend the underdog."^[11]

Dershowitz's first job was at a deli factory on Manhattan's Lower East Side in 1952, at age 14. He recalls tying the strings that separated the hot dogs and once getting locked in the freezer.^[12] He attended Yeshiva University High School, where he played on the basketball team. He was a rebellious student, often criticized by his teachers. The school's career placement center told him he had talent and was capable of becoming an advertising executive, funeral director, or salesman. He later said his teachers told him to do something that "requires a big mouth and no brain ... so I became a lawyer."^[13] After graduating from high school, he attended Brooklyn College and received his A.B. in 1959. Next he attended Yale Law School, where he was editor-in-chief of the Yale Law Journal,^[9] and graduated first in his class with a Bachelor of Laws (LL.B.) in 1962.^[1] He has been a member of a Conservative minyan at Harvard Hillel, but is now a secular Jew.^[14] He is married to Carolyn Cohen and has three children.^[15]

Career[link]

After being admitted to the bar, Dershowitz served as a clerk for David L. Bazelon, the chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He said that "Bazelon was my best and worst boss at once ... He worked me to the bone; he didn't hesitate to call at 2 a.m. He taught me everything—how to be a civil libertarian, a Jewish activist, a mensch. He was halfway between a slave master and a father figure." During the 1963–1964 term, he served as law clerk for the Supreme Court Associate Justice Arthur Goldberg. He told Tom Van Riper of Forbes that getting a Supreme Court clerkship was probably his second big break; his first was when, at age 14 or 15, a camp counselor told him he was smart but that his mind operated a little differently.^[12] He joined the faculty of Harvard Law School as an assistant professor in 1964, and was made a full professor in 1967 at the age of 28, at that time the youngest full professor of law in the school's history.^[16] He was appointed Felix Frankfurter professor of law in 1993.^[1]

Much of his legal career has focused on criminal law, and his clients have included high-profile figures such as Patty Hearst, Harry Reems, Leona Helmsley, Jim Bakker, Mike Tyson, Michael Milken, O.J. Simpson and Kirtanananda Swami. He sees himself as a "lawyer of last resort"—someone to turn to when the defendant has few other legal options—and takes those cases that are what he calls "the most challenging, the most difficult and precedent-setting cases."^[15] He is currently advising Julian Assange's legal team.^[17]

Recognition[link]

Dershowitz has been described by Newsweek as America's "most peripatetic civil liberties lawyer and one of its most distinguished defenders of individual rights."^[1] He was named a Guggenheim Fellow in 1979, and in 1983 received the William O. Douglas First Amendment Award from the Anti-Defamation League for his work on civil rights.^[18] In November 2007, he was awarded the Soviet Jewry Freedom Award by the Russian Jewish Community Foundation.^[19] In December 2011, he was awarded the Menachem Begin Award of Honor by the Menachem Begin Heritage Center at an event co-sponsored by NGO Monitor.^[20] He has been awarded honorary doctorates in law from Yeshiva University, the Hebrew Union College, Monmouth University, University of Haifa, Syracuse University, Fitchburg State College, Bar-Ilan University, and Brooklyn College.^[1] In addition, he is a member of the International Advisory Board of NGO Monitor.^[21]

Cases[link]

Pornography (1976)[link]

In 1976, Dershowitz handled the successful appeal of Harry Reems, who had been convicted of distribution of obscenity resulting from his acting in the pornographic movie Deep Throat. In public debates, Dershowitz commonly argues against censorship of pornography on First Amendment grounds, and maintains that consumption of pornography is not harmful.^[22]

Claus von Bülow (1984)[link]

Dershowitz represented Claus von Bülow, a British socialite, at appeal for the attempted murder of his wife, Sunny von Bülow, who died in 2008 after going into a coma in Newport, Rhode Island in 1980. He had the conviction overturned, and von Bülow was acquitted in a retrial.^[23] Dershowitz told the story of the case in his book, Reversal of Fortune: Inside the von Bülow case (1985), which was turned into a movie in 1990. Dershowitz was played by actor Ron Silver, and Dershowitz himself had a cameo role as a judge.

Józef Glemp (1989)[link]

In 1989, Dershowitz filed a defamation suit against Cardinal Józef Glemp, then Archbishop of Warsaw, on behalf of Rabbi Avi Weiss. Glemp had accused Weiss and six other New York Jews of attacking nuns at a much-disputed convent on the site of the Auschwitz concentration camp. Glemp's statement about Weiss, made in July 1989, was coupled with suggestions that Jews control the world's news media. Dershowitz's account of the lawsuit appears in his book Chutzpah (1991).^[24]

Mike Barnicle (1990)[link]

Dershowitz sued The Boston Globe in 1990 over a remark reporter Mike Barnicle attributed to him, in which Dershowitz allegedly said he preferred Asian women because they are deferential to men. Dershowitz reportedly received a $75,000 out-of-court settlement and the newspaper's ombudsman questioned Barnicle's credibility, according to The Boston Phoenix.^[25]

O.J. Simpson (1995)[link]

O.J. Simpson murder case Dershowitz acted as an appellate adviser to O.J. Simpson's defense team during the trial, and later wrote a book about it, Reasonable Doubts: The Criminal Justice System and the O.J. Simpson Case (1996). He wrote: "the Simpson case will not be remembered in the next century. It will not rank as one of the trials of the century. It will not rank with the Nuremberg trials, the Rosenberg trial, Sacco and Vanzetti. It is on par with Leopold and Loeb and the Lindbergh case, all involving celebrities. It is also not one of the most important cases of my own career. I would rank it somewhere in the middle in terms of interest and importance."^[26] The case has been described as the most publicized criminal trial in American history.^[27]

Jeffrey Epstein (2006)[link]

Dershowitz provided legal assistance to friend and reported billionaire Jeffrey Epstein, who was investigated following accusations that he had repeatedly solicited sex from minors. Dershowitz investigated some of Epstein's accusers and provided both the police and the State attorney’s office with a dossier containing information about their personal behavior, which had been obtained from their personal MySpace pages, including allegations of alcohol and drug use. Eventually, in 2008, Epstein plead guilty to a single state charge of soliciting prostitution and began serving an 18-month sentence.^[28]

Views[link]

On Israel[link]

While Dershowitz is a leading supporter of Israel, Dershowitz self-identifies as "Pro-Israel and Pro-Palestine".^[29] Dershowitz engaged in highly publicized debates with a number of other commentators, including Meir Kahane, Noam Chomsky, and Norman Finkelstein. When former U.S. President Jimmy Carter had his book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid (2006) published—in which he argues that Israel's control of Palestinian land is the primary obstacle to peace—Dershowitz challenged Carter to a debate at Brandeis University. Carter declined, saying, "I don't want to have a conversation even indirectly with Dershowitz. There is no need to debate somebody who, in my opinion, knows nothing about the situation in Palestine."^[30] Carter did address Brandeis in January 2007, but only Brandeis students and staff were allowed to attend. Dershowitz was invited to respond on the same stage only after Carter had left.^[31]

He also took part in the Doha Debates at Georgetown University in April 2009, where he spoke against the motion "this House believes it's time for the US to get tough on Israel," with Dore Gold, President of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs. Speakers for the motion were Avraham Burg, former Chairman of the Jewish Agency for Israel and former Speaker of the Knesset; and Michael Scheuer, former Chief of the CIA Bin Laden Issue Station. Dershowitz's side lost the debate, with 63 percent of the audience voting for the motion.^[32]

Harvard-MIT divestment petition[link]

Randall Adams of The Harvard Crimson writes that, in the spring of 2002, a petition within Harvard calling for Harvard and MIT to divest from Israel and American companies that sell arms to Israel gathered over 600 signatures, including 74 from the Harvard faculty and 56 from the MIT faculty. Among the signatures was that of Harvard's Winthrop House Master Paul D. Hanson, in response to which Dershowitz staged a debate for 200 students in the Winthrop Junior Common Room. He called the petition's signatories antisemitic, bigots, and said they knew nothing about the Middle East. "Your House master is a bigot," he told the students, "and you ought to know that." Adams writes that Dershowitz cited examples of human rights violations in countries that the United States supports, such as the execution of homosexuals in Egypt and the repression of women in Saudi Arabia, and said he would sue any professor who voted against the tenure of another academic because of the candidate's position toward Israel, calling them "ignoramuses with PhDs."^[33]

"New Response to Palestinian Terrorism" (2002)[link]

In March 2002, Dershowitz published an article in The Jerusalem Post entitled "New Response to Palestinian Terrorism." In it, he wrote that Israel should announce a unilateral cessation in retaliation, at the end of which it would "announce precisely what it will do in response to the next act of terrorism. For example, it could announce the first act of terrorism following the moratorium will result in the destruction of a small village which has been used as a base for terrorist operations. The residents would be given 24 hours to leave, and then troops will come in and bulldoze all of the buildings." The list of targets would be made public in advance.^[34] The proposal attracted criticism from within Harvard University and beyond.^[35] James Bamford argued in The Washington Post that it would violate international law.^[36] Norman Finkelstein wrote that "it is hard to make out any difference between the policy Dershowitz advocates and the Nazi destruction of Lidice, for which he expresses abhorrence—except that Jews, not Germans, would be implementing it."^[37]