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FOR OR AGAINST? U.S. DEBATE ATTHE NATIONAL CONSTITUTION CENTER

Top scholars to face off on whether the president has the authority to target and kill U.S. citizens abroad

Philadelphia, PA (February 7, 2014) – Hailed as the “equivalent of a pro-wrestling smackdown,” by , award-winning NPR show Intelligence Squared U.S. comes to the National Constitution Center for an exciting and lively debate. Following the traditional Oxford-style debate format, with one side proposing and the other side opposing a topic, the interactive program asks the audience to vote both before and after the debate, thus judging which team has had more influence in their argument. The debate will take place Wednesday, March 5, 2013 at 6:30 p.m. and features top scholars Alan Dershowitz and Noah Feldman of Harvard Law School, the American Civil Liberties Union’s Hina Shamsi, and Ohio Northern University Pettit School of Law’s Michael W. Lewis. John Donvan of ABC News will moderate. This program is supported by the Daniel Berger Programming Fund.

Admission to the program is $30 and is FREE for 1787 Society members. Reservations are recommended and can be made by calling 215-409-6700 or visiting constitutioncenter.org.

The debate will examine the recent drone strike on accused terrorist and New Mexico- born Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen, and President Obama’s subsequent testing of the limits of executive power. At the heart of the deliberations will lie the question, does the president have constitutional authority under the due process clause to kill U.S. citizens abroad, or is it a violation of this clause to unilaterally decide to target and kill Americans? -MORE-

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The moderator of Intelligence Squared U.S. debates since 2008, ABC News’ John Donvan has served as ABC’s White House Correspondent, along with postings in Moscow, London, Jerusalem, and Amman. He is currently writing a book on the history of autism to be published by Crown in 2015.

Arguing For the Motion

Alan M. Dershowitz, the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, has been called “the nation’s most peripatetic civil liberties lawyer” and one of its “most distinguished defenders of individual rights.” He is a graduate of Brooklyn College and Yale Law School and joined the Harvard Law Faculty at age 25, after clerking for Judge David Bazelon and Justice Arthur Goldberg. He has published more than 1,000 articles in magazines, newspapers, journals, and blogs such as the New York Times Magazine, the Washington Post, , the Harvard Law Review, the Yale Law Journal, and the Huffington Post. Dershowitz is the author of numerous bestselling books, and his autobiography, Taking the Stand: My Life in the Law, was recently published by Crown.

Michael Lewis, professor of Law at Ohio Northern University Pettit School of Law, has written extensively on various aspects of the laws of war and the conflict between the U.S. and al Qaeda. He has testified before Congress on the legality of drone strikes in Pakistan and Yemen. Prior to earning his J.D. from Harvard Law School, cum laude, in 1998, he served in the U.S. Navy from 1987 to 1995 where he flew F-14’s from the aircraft carrier USS Independence. He graduated from the Navy’s Strike Fighter Tactics Instructor program in 1992.

Arguing Against the Motion

Noah Feldman is the Bemis Professor of Law at Harvard University as well as a senior fellow of the Society of Fellows. A contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine and Bloomberg View, he has authored five books and, most recently, co-authored Constitutional Law, Eighteenth Edition (2013). He served as senior constitutional advisor to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, and advised members of the Iraqi -MORE-

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Governing Council on the drafting of the Transitional Administrative Law or interim constitution. Previously, he served as a law clerk to Justice David H. Souter of the U.S. Supreme Court. He received his A.B., summa cum laude, from Harvard University in 1992, finishing first in his class. Selected as a Rhodes Scholar, he earned a DPhil in Islamic Thought from Oxford University and a J.D. from Yale Law School, where he served as the book reviews editor of the Yale Law Journal.

Hina Shamsi is director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s (ACLU) National Security Project, which is dedicated to ensuring that U.S. counterterrorism policies and practices do not violate the Constitution or the ’ obligations under international law. She is litigating the ACLU’s lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the U.S. government’s killing of three U.S. citizens in Yemen in 2011. She has litigated numerous cases relating to post-9/11 torture, unlawful detention, discrimination against racial and religious minorities, and the freedoms of speech and association. Shamsi teaches a Columbia Law School course on international human rights, and has monitored and reported on the military commissions at Guantánamo Bay. She previously directed Human Rights First's Law & Security Program, and also served as senior advisor to the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Executions.

About Intelligence Squared U.S. Debates (IQ2US) Winner of the 2013 Silver Radio Award for Best Public Affairs Program and named one of the "Five Podcasts that Will Change the Way You Think" by Forbes, Intelligence Squared U.S. was founded in in 2006 by Robert Rosenkranz, and has grown into an internationally syndicated series heard and watched by millions. The debates have attracted some of the world's top thinkers, including Steven Forbes, Paul Krugman, , Malcolm Gladwell, and . With over 80 debates, Intelligence Squared U.S. has encouraged the public to “think twice” on a wide range of provocative topics. Author and ABC News correspondent John Donvan has moderated IQ2US since 2008. The executive producer is Dana Wolfe.

About the National Constitution Center The National Constitution Center in Philadelphia is the Museum of We the People, -MORE-

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America’s Town Hall, and a Headquarters for Civic Education. As the Museum of We the People, the National Constitution Center brings the United States Constitution to life for visitors of all ages and inspires active citizenship by celebrating the American constitutional tradition. The museum features interactive exhibits, engaging theatrical performances, and original documents of freedom. As the only institution established by Congress to “disseminate information about the United States Constitution on a non- partisan basis,” the National Constitution Center serves as a Headquarters for Civic Education—offering cutting-edge learning resources including the premier online Interactive Constitution. As America’s Town Hall, the National Constitution Center hosts timely constitutional conversations uniting distinguished leaders, scholars, authors, and journalists from across the political spectrum. For more information, call 215-409- 6700 or visit constitutioncenter.org.

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