Bainbridge - As I explained in my TCS column, most of the dearth of conservatives in the academy can be ascribed to instituional biases. Sometimes, however, it is actual bias.
The latest example comes from the hiring of famed international law professor Jack Goldsmith at Harvard law School. Although Goldsmith was hired, his liberal opponents not only went public with their opposition, but also are continuing to try to get him fired. This is an almost unheard of breach of academic courtesy.
Nobody I know seriously claims that Jack Goldsmith is not qualified to serve on the Harvard Law Faculty. Indeed, according to the Boston Globe, Harvard Law School Dean Elena Kagan (a former Clinton staffer) observed of Goldsmith:
Goldsmith, author of noted books and articles on international law, has moved into his office at Harvard and is scheduled to begin teaching in January. Kagan said Tuesday that ''I'm as proud of this appointment as I could be."
Goldsmith's ''work was lauded by a great many people, and we determined that he was an absolutely superb teacher and scholar," she said. ''He puts issues on the table that everyone focuses on and debates, and he's done that in a very short career. He's a very agenda-setting scholar, and that's exactly the kind of exciting scholarship that we want to have here."
Glenn Reynolds opines that: "Notwithstanding that Goldsmith has been critical of my position on cyberporn and the Commerce Clause, I think that he's a first-class scholar and a good hire for Harvard."
So why are the liberals, including three of the five international law specialists at Harvard, opposing him? Not because he is incompetent, but because they don't like what he thinks. It is the worst sort of McCarthyism; but, of course, that's precisely what the academic left is best at. And all of Chait's obfuscation can't change that basic fact.
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