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[[Image:Alan Dershowitz democracynow.jpg|frame|Alan Dershowitz on [[Democracy Now!]]]] |
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'''Alan Morton Dershowitz''' (born [[September 1]], [[1938]]) is a well known [[Politics of the United States|political figure]] and [[criminal law]] professor at [[Harvard Law School]], known for his extensive published works, support for [[Zionism]] and [[Israel]] and work as an [[attorney]] in several high-profile law cases. |
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Dershowitz was born in [[Brooklyn]], graduated from [[Yeshiva University]] high school and [[Brooklyn College]]. At [[Yale Law School]], he was first in his class and editor-in-chief of the [[Yale Law Journal]]. After [[law clerk|clerking]] for Chief Judge [[David Bazelon]] of the [[United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit|D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals]] and Supreme Court Justice [[Arthur Goldberg]], he was appointed to the Harvard Law School faculty at age 25 and became a full professor at age 28, then the youngest in the history of Harvard University (this record has since been surpassed by [[Noam Elkies]]). |
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In 1972, Dershowitz attempted to discredit the chairman of the [[Israel League for Human Rights]], [[Israel Shahak]], who had sharply criticized Israeli treatment towards Palestinians. Shahak was in the process of challenging contested election results for the chairmanship of the Israel League through courts. Dershowitz claimed the judge in the matter, Judge Lovenburg, had ruled that Shahak was properly unseated and challenged anyone to provide evidence to the contrary. In response, [[Noam Chomsky]] cited the court documents and claimed the court opined the elections had not been held properly, no conclusions or actions were to be drawn from it, and that Shahak and his colleagues were to continue to function as "those who now direct" the league. The incident created a lasting personal animosity between the intellectuals. Chomsky in recalling the incident in a 1997 book about his life disparaged Dershowitz noting that the evidence Chomsky had cited suggested he was a "Stalinist-style thug". "Ever since then," Chomsky wrote, "Dershowitz has been on a crazed jihad, dedicating much of his life to trying to destroy my reputation." [http://cognet.mit.edu/library/books/chomsky/chomsky/5/2.html] |
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In 1977, Dershowitz handled the appeal of porn star [[Harry Reems]] who had been convicted of [[conspiracy]] to distribute [[obscenity]], based on his acting in the movie ''[[Deep Throat (movie)|Deep Throat]]''. The conviction was overturned. |
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In 1983 the Jewish advocacy group [[Anti-Defamation League]] awarded Dershowitz the [[William O. Douglas First Amendment Award]] for his "compassionate eloquent leadership and persistent advocacy in the struggle for civil and [[human rights]]." [[Holocaust]] survivor and [[Nobel Prize|Nobel]] Laureate [[Elie Wiesel]], who presented the award, was quoted as saying, "If there had been a few people like Alan Dershowitz during the 1930s and 1940s, the history of European Jewry might have been different." |
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He successfully defended [[Claus von Bülow]] in [[1984]] on a charge of attempting to murder his wife with an injection of [[insulin]], a case dramatized in the film ''[[Reversal of Fortune]]'' ([[1990]]) starring [[Glenn Close]], [[Jeremy Irons]], and [[Ron Silver]] as Dershowitz. |
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Dershowitz worked on the legal defense team of boxer [[Mike Tyson]], who was convicted of rape in [[1992]]. |
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He was also a member of the legal defense team ("Dream Team") for [[O.J. Simpson]], who was acquitted in [[1995]] of double homicide. |
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A strong advocate for voting rights in the U.S., Dershowitz has leveled some of his harshest criticisms at former Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, William H. Rehnquist. Often citing what others claim were false or unproven charges, he frequently accused Justice Rehnquist, prior to his ascendency to the Court, of racially motivated "voter challenges", attempts to deny African-Americans their right to vote in Arizona. |
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Dershowitz has incited controversy by arguing that the issuing of [[warrant (legal)|warrant]]s for the [[torture]] of suspected terrorists would diminish the overall number of torture incidents. He has said that in "ticking bomb" cases — situations in which "a captured terrorist who knows of an imminent large-scale threat refuses to disclose it" — the use of torture would be justified in order to save many innocent lives. Other controversial positions include Dershowitz's accusations that faculty members at [[Columbia University]] encourage terrorism. |
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In September 2003, shortly after the publication of Dershowitz's best selling ''[[The Case for Israel]]'', [[Norman Finkelstein]] accused its author of plagiarism, noting that four of the |
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quotations in that book cited to original sources, instead of to [[Joan Peters]] in her ''[[From Time Immemorial]]'' — itself a work that Finkelstein and others had criticized, harshly, for poor scholarship. See ''[[Dershowitz-Finkelstein affair]]'' for more information. |
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Dershowitz has recently written about [[Saddam Hussein]]'s upcoming trial. |
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==Works== |
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*[[2005]]: ''The Case for Peace : How the Arab-Israeli Conflict Can be Resolved'' (ISBN 0471743178) |
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* [[2004]]: ''Rights From Wrongs: A Secular Theory of the Origins of Rights'' (ISBN 0465017134) |
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* [[2004]]: ''America on Trial: Inside the Legal Battles That Transformed Our Nation--From the Salem Witches to the Guantanamo Detainees'' (ISBN 0446520586) |
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* [[2003]]: ''America Declares Independence'' (ISBN 0471264822) |
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* [[2003]]: ''[[The Case for Israel]]'' (ISBN 047146502X) |
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* [[2002]]: ''Shouting Fire: Civil Liberties in a Turbulent Age'' |
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* [[2002]]: ''Why Terrorism Works: Understanding the threat, responding to the challenge'' |
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* [[2001]]: ''[[Supreme Injustice]]: How the High Court Hijacked Election 2000'' |
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* [[2001]]: ''Letters to a Young Lawyer'' |
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* [[2000]]: ''The Genesis of Justice: ten stories of biblical injustice that led to the Ten Commandments and modern law'' |
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* [[1999]]: ''Just Revenge'' (fiction) |
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* [[1998]]: ''Sexual McCarthyism: Clinton, Starr, and the emerging constitutional crisis'' |
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* [[1997]]: ''The Vanishing American Jew: in search of Jewish identity for the next century'' |
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* [[1996]]: ''Reasonable Doubts: The Criminal Justice System and the O.J. Simpson Case'' (ISBN 0684830213) |
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* [[1994]]: ''The Abuse Excuse: and other cop-outs, sob stories, and evasions of responsibility'' |
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* [[1994]]: ''The Advocate's Devil'' (fiction) |
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* [[1992]]: ''Contrary to Popular Opinion'' |
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* [[1991]]: ''Chutzpah'' |
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* [[1988]]: ''Taking Liberties: a decade of hard cases, bad laws, and bum raps'' |
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* [[1985]]: ''[[Reversal of Fortune]]: Inside the von Bülow Case'' |
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* [[1982]]: ''The Best Defense'' |
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* [[1973]]: ''In Defense of Shahak, Boston Globe'' |
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==Quote== |
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* Alan Dershowitz: "Foolish liberals who are trying to read the [[Second_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution|Second Amendment]] out of the Constitution by claiming it's not an individual right [are] courting disaster by encouraging others to use the same means to eliminate portions of the Constitution they don't like." - Dan Gifford in a 1995 Tennessee Law Review article, "The Conceptual Foundations of Angloamerican Jurisprudence in Religion and Reason", attributes the origins of this quote to a 1994 phone interview. |
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==External links== |
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*[http://www.law.harvard.edu/faculty/directory/facdir.php?id=12 Dershowitz's homepage] from [[Harvard]] (includes a list of publications) |
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*[http://www.freeman.org/m_online/sep03/shapiro.htm Review of: The Case for Israel, by Alan M. Dershowitz (Bernard J. Shapiro) September, 2003] from the Freeman Center for Strategic Studies |
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*[http://www.harrywalker.com/speakers_template.cfm?spea_id=90 Lecture Agency's Biography on Dershowitz] |
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* [http://www.ultravires.ca/nov02/news_dershowitz.htm Dershowitz defends Israel at talk: Professor condemns U.S. divestiture program] |
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Anti-Dershowitz links: |
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* [http://www.amnestyusa.org/askamnesty/torture200112.html Ask Amnesty: Torture] |
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* [http://www.zmag.org/content/print_article.cfm?itemID=7650§ionID=107 The Case Against Alan Dershowitz: Public Committee Against Torture in Israel vs. Dershowitz][http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article8559.htm Alternate URL] |
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* [http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/article.php?pg=11&ar=29 Alan Dershowitz's Latest Accusation: Read and Compare] |
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* [http://www.killingtrain.com/archives/000392.html conflict Finkelstein in Toronto] |
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[[Category:1938 births|Dershowitz, Alan]] |
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[[Category:American lawyers|Dershowitz, Alan]] |
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[[Category:American legal writers|Dershowitz, Alan]] |
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[[Category:American law professors|Dershowitz, Alan]] |
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[[Category:Jewish Americans|Dershowitz, Alan]] |
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[[Category:Harvard Law School professors|Dershowitz, Alan]] |
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