Garrett Epps
Professor of Law
gepps@ubalt.edu
410.837.4956, Law Center 311
Administrative Assistant: Shavaun O'Brien
410.837.4635, Law Center 300
Education
LL.M. (Comparative and International Law), Duke University
J.D., Duke University
B.A., Harvard College M.A., Hollins College
Curriculum Vitae
Areas of Expertise
Advanced Topics in Constitutional Law
Constitutional Law I
Creative Writing
Read Epps' New York Times
book review of Jeffrey Toobin's new book
The Oath: The Obama Whitehouse and the Supreme Court.
Garrett Epps joined the University of Baltimore School of Law in 2008 and teaches Constitutional Law and Creative Writing. Epps has published numerous books, scholarly articles, and articles for general audiences in the field of constitutional law and civil rights. His most recent book, Wrong and Dangerous: Ten Right Wing Myths about Our Constitution, has received five-star reviews. His former book, Democracy Reborn: The Fourteenth Amendment and the Fight for Equal Rights in Post-Civil War America (2006), was a finalist for the American Bar Association's Silver Gavel Award. A novelist and former journalist, Epps is a former staff writer for the Washington Post, and has also written for, Inter Alia, The New York Times, The New Republic, and The New York Review of Books. Epps began his academic career after clerking for the Hon. John O. Butzner, Jr., of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Virginia. He earned both his LL.M. (in Comparative and International Law) and his J.D. from Duke University, where he served as articles editor of Law and Contemporary Problems. Prior to attending law school, Epps earned his M.A. in English Writing from Hollins College in 1975, and his B.A. from Harvard College in 1972, where he was editor of the Harvard Crimson. Epps is a frequent contributor to The Atlantic.com.
Selected Publications
Books (Nonfiction)
Wrong and Dangerous: Ten Right Wing Myths about Our Constitution (Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2012)
Democracy Reborn: The Fourteenth Amendment and the Fight for Equal Rights in Post-Civil War America (New York: Henry Holt & Co., 2006). Finalist for 2006 Silver Gavel Book Award of the American Bar Association
To an Unknown God: Religious Freedom on Trial (New York: St. Martin's, 2001). Finalist for 2002 Silver Gavel Book Award of the American Bar Association. Selected by Georgetown University Law Center as required reading for all entering students, Fall 2005
Books (Novels)
The Floating Island: A Tale of Washington (Boston MA: Houghton Mifflin, 1985)
The Shad Treatment (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons Inc., 1977, republished 1995 by University Press of Virginia)
Articles and Essays
Interpreting the Fourteenth Amendment: Two Don'ts and Three Dos. 16 William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal (forthcoming 2007)
Second Founding: The Story of the Fourteenth Amendment. Inaugural Hollis Lecture. 85 Ore. L. Rev. 895 (2007)
Some Animals are More Equal than Others: The Rehnquist Court and Majority Religion. 21 Washington University Journal of Law & Policy 323 (2006)
The Other Sullivan Case. 1 New York University Journal of Law & Liberty 783 (2005)
'You Have Been in Afghanistan': A Discourse on the Van Alstyne Method. 54 Duke L. J. 1555 (2005)
Symposium: Bruce Springsteen and the American Lawyer: 'Meanness in This World.' 14 Widener L. Rev. 847 (2005)
(Translator) Ignacio Gomez Palacio, With a Note in My Hand (El Pagaro en la Mano), 7 Ore. Rev. Intl L. 304 (2005)
The Undiscovered Country: Northern Views of the Defeated South and the Political Background of the Fourteenth Amendment. 13 Temple Pol. & Civ. Rights L.Rev. 110 (2004)
The Antebellum Political Background of the Fourteenth Amendment. 67 Law & Contemp. Probs. 175 (2004)
Speech: The Bill of Rights. 82 Ore. L. Rev. 517 (2004)
The Story of Al Smith: The First Amendment Meets Grandfather Peyote. Michael Dorf, ed., Constitutional Law Stories (New York: Foundation Press, 2004)
The Amish and the American Oyster. Donald Kraybill, ed., The Amish and the State (Baltimore MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2d ed. 2003)