Linfield College students now have the new option of  majoring in law, rights, and justice.

The interdisciplinary major will examine the relationship between law, rights, and competing concepts of justice. Students will study topics within political science, philosophy, history, English, business and economics to explore the connections they have on  rule of law, politics and public policy.

Nicholas Buccola, who holds the Elizabeth and Morris Glicksman Chair in Political Science at Linfield, said that the degree would be a great for students who might want to go to law school, graduate school or enter the professional world.

The Frederick Douglass Forum on Law, Rights, and Justice are going to host three upcoming events on Linfield’s McMinnville campus to kick off the new major.  

The first event is a lecture from Oregon Supreme Court Justice Thomas Balmer on “Lawyers, Guns and Money: A Judge Looks at Law, Liberal Arts and Law School.”

Balmer received his bachelor’s degree from Oberlin College and his law degree from the University of Chicago and he will talk about the influence the liberal arts had on him. The talk is on March 5, at 4:30 p.m. in the Austin Reading Room in the Nicholson Library.

On March 15 the second event is a full-day symposium on “What’s So Liberating about the Liberal Arts?: A Symposium on Liberal Education and the American Experiment.” It will start at 10:30 a.m. at the Nicholson Library.

The symposium will bring together scholars that include venture capitalist Scott Hartley, Roosevelt Montás of Columbia University and Susan McWilliams of Pomona College.  They will talk about the power of a liberal arts education through their different fields and points of view.

The third event will bring Lisa Hay, the federal public defender for the district of Oregon, to give a talk called  “Guilty as Charged: A Public Defender’s Journey from Liberal Arts to Law.”

Hay has been the head of Federal Public Defender’s office since 2014. This event is on April 24 at 4:30 p.m. in the Austin Reading Room of the Nicholson Library.