In a claim that has been contested by secular and religious scholars of the law, American legal Edward Levi suggested that the law could be studied as liberal art. In this seminar, we will consider the merit of Levi’s proposal by examining classics of legal thought from antiquity to the twentieth century. We will consider a variety of questions, including: What is the relationship between justice and the law? Can there be a human law and a divine law? What is distinctively human about living in a law-governed society?
Undergraduates, graduate students, and law students are invited to join Collegium Institute as we explore these questions and more in “Law as a Liberal Art: Classics of Legal Thought,” the Fall 2026 Legal Humanities Fellowship. The Legal Humanities Fellowship invites a small group of advanced undergraduate and law student fellows to participate in six seminar-style discussion sessions per semester. The discussions will be facilitated by academics and professionals in law, history, and philosophy. The seminars seek to cultivate reflection on the relationship between law and the good life, exploring questions like: How can law — its substance and practice — help us to become more fully human?
This semester of Legal Humanities will be primarily facilitated by Dr. Joseph Haydt, a second-year law student at Penn Carey Law School. Dr. Haydt received his Ph.D. in German from the University of Chicago in 2022. His research examines the reception of Greek and Roman thought in modern (post-Enlightenment) German literature and philosophy. He will be joined by Penn faculty in discussion with our student fellows.
Dates: Mondays, 12:00 - 1:15 pm. Lunch will be provided for all participants.
September 7: Jean-Jacques Rousseau
September 21: Hannah Arendt
September 28: Montesquieu with Prof. Christian Burset (Professor of Law, Penn Carey Law School)
October 5: The Book of Exodus with Prof. Talya Fishman (Associate Professor, Penn Department of Near Eastern Languages & Civilizations)
October 12: Plato
October 19: G.E.M. Anscombe with Dr. Gregory Brown (Postdoctoral Fellow, Penn Program for Research on Religion and Urban Civil Society)
Location: University of Pennsylvania (Exact location TBA)
To apply for the Fall 2026 Legal Humanities Fellowship, complete the brief application below.
Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis. Final application deadline: Thursday, September 3
Please direct any questions to Quinn Moore (qmoore@collegiuminstitute.org).
This fellowship was supported by a grant from the Lumen Christi Institute with funding from the John Templeton Foundation (Grant #63614).