Author archives

Linda C. McClain Professor of Law, Boston University. Prof. McClain is known for her work in family law, gender and law, and feminist legal theory. Her most recent book, Who’s the Bigot? Learning from Conflicts over Marriage and Civil Rights Law (Oxford University Press, 2020), argues that, although denouncing and preventing bigotry is a shared political value with a long history, people disagree over who is a bigot and what makes a belief, attitude, or action bigoted. This is evident from the rejoinder that calling out bigotry is intolerant political correctness, even bigotry itself. The book addresses puzzles about bigotry by tracing the rhetoric of bigotry and conscience across a range of debates relating to marriage and antidiscrimination law. In the words of one reviewer, “this is required reading for anyone who wants to understand our polarized society and how we got here.” Professor McClain is the author of several other books (described below) and numerous scholarly articles and book chapters. Her scholarship addresses the respective roles of families, other institutions of civil society, and of government in fostering citizens’ capacities for democratic and personal self-government. She has engaged with prominent communitarian, civic republican and feminist critiques of liberal legal and political theory and offered a reconstructive liberal feminist approach to such matters as privacy, family and marriage, reproductive issues and welfare law. Her work also addresses sex equality as a legal and constitutional commitment and public value, the responsibility of government to promote equality, and societal tensions over equality and its relationship to other values.

Roe overturned: What you need to know about the Supreme Court abortion decision

The ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization – handed down on June 24, 2022 – has far-reaching consequences. Nicole Huberfeld and Linda C. McClain, health law and constitutional law experts at Boston University, explain what just happened, and what happens next.

Subjects: Health, Healthcare, Human Rights, Legal Research, Privacy, United States Law