Abstract
What follows in these pages is some of the scholarship that law professors from around the country came to discuss at the fall 2024 Nebraska Law Review Symposium: Democracy Without Trust? Professors Jennifer Breen and Brandon Johnson both tackle the question of whether institutions deserve trust, especially the nation’s courts. Professor Jacob Eisler discusses the role of party politics and gerrymandering. Professor Anthony Gaughan examines the rise and fall of trust in American higher education. The Nebraska Law Review chose this topic—proposed by Professor Johnson—for its timeliness ahead of a consequential presidential election. The Nebraska Law Review would like to thank additional panelists including Wayne Bena, Professor Haiyun Damon-Feng, Professor Kyle Langvardt, Professor Daniel Walters, Professor Anthony Michael Kreis, Professor Eric Berger, Professor Wilfred Codrington III, Sen. Danielle Conrad, Professor Michael Dimino, and Dr. Gina Ligon. Our thanks extend to Nebraska College of Law Dean Richard Moberly for supporting this symposium and to the college’s Law and Democracy Series with generous funding from Ron and the late Barb Schaefer.
If trust is indeed the fabric that binds our society—and our democracy—together, then the words of warning from Abraham Lincoln in 1858 are especially relevant in this moment: “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” Lincoln’s words served as a prophecy for when the American house came apart in 1861. In our modern political era, some researchers claim the nation’s polarization is at its worst since the Civil War. We hope a sustained effort at examining country’s trust deficit and working to repair it can reverse the trend and strengthen our system of government to keep our collective American house standing strong for generations to come.
Recommended Citation
David Earl Wietlispach,
Introduction,
104 Neb. L. Rev. 1
(2025).
Available at: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/nlr/vol104/iss1/2