 |
NCPA Economic Policy Forum & Author Series
|
|
WHEN: |
Tuesday, March 30, 2010 |
|
WHERE: |
Belo Hall at Belo Mansion |
Discounted self parking is available at the Olive Street entrance.
Copies of Mr. Howard's book Life Without Lawyers: Restoring Responsibility in America will be available for purchase at the luncheon. Mr. Howard will sign copies after the luncheon.
In Life Without Lawyers: Restoring Responsibility in America, Philip Howard describes the abuse of American law and its consequences, demonstrating how the justice system hinders freedom and confounds Americans who simply want to do the right thing. Either through litigation or the fear of it, Howard argues, we've ceded our everyday decision-making to the lawyers resulting in everything from "no running on the playground" signs to a 5-year-old handcuffed at school by police; from diminishing health care quality and spiraling costs to doctors afraid of discussing treatments among themselves over email.
Howard, as Chair of the nonpartisan advocacy organization Common Good, has a great deal of knowledge and a catalog of abuses that will elicit fury and despair. In this time of financial depression and political hope, Howard may have found the perfect moment to sound his alarm.
Howard has a long record as a prominent civic leader and public policy activist. He has advised national political leaders on legal and regulatory reform for fifteen years, including Vice President Al Gore and various 2008 presidential hopefuls. In addition to Life Without Lawyers (W. W. Norton & Company, 2009), Philip is the author of The Death of Common Sense (Random House, 1995) and The Collapse of the Common Good (Ballantine Books, 2002). He is Vice-Chairman of the law firm Covington & Burling, LLP.
In 2002, Philip formed Common Good, a nonpartisan national coalition dedicated to restoring common sense to America, and which he still chairs.
Philip writes periodically for the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, and the New York Times, and has appeared on Oprah, Today, Good Morning America, Charlie Rose, the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, Paula Zahn Now, 20/20, Nightline, and numerous other programs.
Howard has advised leaders of both parties on reform initiatives. He was special advisor to the Securities and Exchange Commission on regulatory simplification, worked on environmental and management reforms with Vice President Al Gore's reinventing government program, advised the Republican leadership on regulatory reform, and worked on overhauling civil service and other bureaucratic institutions with several governors, including Zell Miller in Georgia, Bill Weld in Massachusetts and Jeb Bush and Lawton Chiles in Florida.
He is a graduate of Yale College and the University of Virginia Law School, and lives in Manhattan with his wife Alexandra. They have four children.