The Federalist Society
for Law and Public Policy Studies
Appalachian School of Law Chapter
Mission Statement
The legal profession and law schools are currently strongly
dominated by a form of orthodox liberal ideology that advocates
a centralized and uniform society. While some members of the
legal community have dissented from these views, by and large
they are taught simultaneously (and indeed as if they were)
the law.
The Appalachian School of Law Chapter of the Federalist Society
for Law and Public Policy Studies is a group of conservatives
and libertarians interested in the current state of the legal
order. It is founded on the principles that the state exists
to preserve individual freedom, that the separation of governmental
powers is central to our Constitution, and that it is emphatically
the province and duty of the Judiciary to say what the law
is, not what the law should be. The Appalachian School of Law
Chapter seeks to both promote an awareness of these principles
and to further their application through its activities.
This entails reordering priorities within the legal system
to place a premium individual liberty, traditional values,
and the rule of law. It also requires restoring recognition
of the importance of these norms among lawyers, judges, law
students and professors. In so doing, the ASL Chapter of the
Society will seek to create a conservative intellectual network
extending to all levels of the legal community.
Caleb Newton -- President
Jeff Greene-- Vice President
Jeremiah Jarmin -- Secretary
Daniel Berry -- Treasurer
Constitution
National
Federalist Society
Statement of Principles
The legal profession and law schools are currently strongly
dominated by a form of orthodox liberal ideology that advocates
a centralized and uniform society. While some members of the
legal community have dissented form these views, by and large
they are taught simultaneously (and indeed as if they were)
the law.
The Federalist Society for Law and Public
Policy Studies is a group of conservatives and libertarians
interested in
the state of the legal order. We believe that the principles
and legal rules strongly influence the direction of societal
development and in so doing can secure or destroy individual
rights and liberties. From a position of shared values, the
Society’s purpose is to investigate the role of law as
one of the great organizing forces of our society and to participate
in that shaping process.
We start from the following principles:
The state exists to preserve individual freedom;
Economic and political liberties are inextricably intertwined;
The separation of governmental powers is central to our Constitution;
It is emphatically the province and duty of the Judiciary to
say what the law is, not what the law should be;
The task of objective interpretation is not so far beyond man’s
grasp that we should despair, and in the name of “realism,” fall
back on prejudice in making judicial determinations;
The Constitutional scheme did not contemplate the imposition
by fiat of the legislative preferences of members of the Judiciary,
under the banner of “societal evolution;”
This type of judicial legislation, being insulated from the
check of popular support, has been a key instrument in the
expansion of federal government power;
This expansion has been at the expense of individuals’ ability
to control their own destinies, and of intermediate institutions
such as families, churches, personal property and the states,
which helped shield people from government’s full force;
And the true purpose of the legal order is to ensure that the
power conferred upon the state is used to secure people’s
lives and goods, the true purpose of an independent judiciary
is to prevent the rigging of the legal order into an extension
of the sovereign’s will, and that neither the legal order
or the judiciary is presently serving these purposes.
The Society seeks to both promote an awareness of these principles
and to further their application through its activities.
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