The Rule of Law in a Time of Stress

A pre-recorded streaming VIDEO replay of the October 2025 webcast, The Rule of Law in a Time of Stress.

We hear a lot about the rule of law—and the various threats to it—these days.  But what is the “rule of law”?  Where does it come from?  Why (if at all) is it valuable?  And is it really threatened today? If so, how? 

Distinguished University of Virginia School of Law Professors A. E. Dick Howard and Charles Barzun explore the close relation between the rule of law and such fundamental constitutional values as constitutionalism, accountable government, due process of law, separation of powers, and judicial independence.

It has been said that the rule of law is “the name commonly given to the state of affairs in which a legal system is legally in good shape.”  If that’s right, then the “rule of law” is for lawyers what “health” is for doctors and medical professionals—the central and defining norm of our profession.  So, if the answers to the questions above are not immediately obvious, we think they are worth examining more closely.

Professor Charles Barzun, University of Virginia School of Law / Charlottesville 

Professor Charles Barzun joined the faculty in 2008. His areas of interest include constitutional law, torts, evidence and the history of legal thought. Barzun also serves as faculty advisor for the Dual-Degree (J.D./M.A.) Program in Legal History.

After receiving his A.B. in government from Harvard in 1997, Professor Barzun worked in corporate and product development at CNET Networks, an Internet media company in San Francisco. In 2005, he received a J.D./M.A. degree from Virginia. During law school, he served as notes development editor of the Virginia Law Review and won the Best Note Award for his student note, “Common Sense and Legal Science.” After graduating, he clerked for Judge Robert D. Sack of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Prior to joining the faculty, Professor Howard was a Climenko Fellow and lecturer at Harvard Law School. 

Professor A. E. Dick Howard, University of Virginia School of Law and Public Affairs / Charlottesville

Professor A. E. Dick Howard is the White Burkett Miller Professor of Law and Public Affairs at the University of Virginia. Born and raised in Richmond, Virginia, Professor Howard is a graduate of the University of Richmond and received his law degree from the University of Virginia. He was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, where he read philosophy, politics, and economics. After graduating from law school, he was a law clerk to Mr. Justice Hugo L. Black of the Supreme Court of the United States.

Active in public affairs, Professor Howard was executive director of the commission that wrote Virginia’s new Constitution and directed the successful referendum campaign for ratification of that constitution. He has been counsel to the General Assembly of Virginia and a consultant to state and federal bodies, including the United States Senate Judiciary Committee. From 1982 to 1986 he served as Counselor to the Governor of Virginia, and he chaired Virginia’s Commission on the Bicentennial of the United States Constitution.

Professor Howard has been twice a fellow of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, in Washington, D.C. His recognitions have included election as president of the Virginia Academy of Laureates and his having received the University of Virginia’s Distinguished Professor Award for excellence in teaching. James Madison University, the University of Richmond, Campbell University, the College of William and Mary, Longwood University, and Wake Forest University have conferred upon him the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws. In the fall of 2001, he was the first Distinguished Visiting Scholar in Residence at Rhodes House, Oxford.

An authority in constitutional law, Professor Howard is the author of a number of books, articles, and monographs. These include The Road from Runnymede: Magna Carta and Constitutionalism in America and Commentaries on the Constitution of Virginia, which won a Phi Beta Kappa prize. Other works include Democracy’s Dawn and Constitution-making in Eastern Europe.

Professor Howard has briefed and argued cases before state and federal courts, including the Supreme Court of the United States. He is a regular guest on television news programs; during the Senate Judiciary Committee’s hearings on the nomination of Robert Bork to the Supreme Court, Professor Howard did gavel-to-gavel coverage for the McNeil-Lehrer News Program. He did interviews with the justices for a film shown to visitors to the Supreme Court’s building in Washington.

Often consulted by constitutional draftsmen in other states and abroad, Professor Howard has compared notes with revisors at work on new constitutions in such places as Brazil, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Poland , Romania, Russia, Albania, Malawi , South Africa, and Zimbabwe. In 1996, the Union of Czech Lawyers, citing Professor Howard’s “promotion of the idea of a civil society in Central Europe,” awarded him their Randa Medal — the first time this honor has been conferred upon anyone but a Czech citizen. In 2004, the Greater Richmond Chapter of the World Affairs Council conferred on him their George C. Marshall Award in International Law and Diplomacy. The National Constitution Center and the University of Pennsylvania Law School appointed Professor Howard as their visiting scholar for 2009-10, the theme for the year being global constitutionalism.

In January 1994, Washingtonian magazine named Professor Howard as “one of the most respected educators in the nation.” In 2007, the Library of Virginia and the Richmond Times-Dispatch included Professor Howard on their list of the “greatest Virginians” of the 20th century. In 2013 the University of Virginia conferred on Professor Howard its Thomas Jefferson Award—the highest honor the University confers upon a member of the faculty. Each year, Virginia’s General Assembly names one person as that year’s Outstanding Virginian; in 2025, the legislators named Professor Howard.