Your Views on the Supreme Court, Dutch Art, and Science Funding

Chief Justice John Roberts

Lincoln Caplan’s profile of Chief Justice John Roberts (“The Kingmaker?”, November-December 2025, page 20) reflects his liberal bias and, therefore, predicts a future that is too bleak. It is true that Roberts, despite claiming his job is to call balls and strikes, has a conservative bias. Nevertheless, Caplan’s discussion overstates the impact Roberts’s future decisions are likely to have on presidential overreach. He argues that the decision on presidential immunity motivates the Trump administration’s lawless acts. But it is difficult to believe this president would have acted any differently even in the absence of immunity. And since courts have not yet had an opportunity to define “official acts,” we cannot know how presidential immunity is likely to impact future presidents.

To compare the decision on immunity to Dred Scott, as Caplan does, seems unfair as that decision deprived a whole class of people of their constitutional rights because of race, whereas presidential immunity could, at most, embolden a dishonest president to ignore constitutional rights or line his or her own pockets. Further, this risk is minimized if voters take care in who they elect as future presidents.

That Roberts has voted with the conservative block in preliminary rulings is also less ominous than Caplan projects. Concededly, it’s not yet clear how the Court will eventually rule on important issues such as the president’s power to impound funds, to fire political and career officials, to intrude on university governance, and to issue effective injunctions. But the Court’s decisions are only preliminary: once the nuances are revealed, one can hope the Court will respond in a sensible way. Unlike Caplan, I find this possibility plausible.

David A. Levitt, J.D. ’72

Lincoln Caplan suggests that John Roberts may have cemented his legacy as a “kingmaker” by reversing the appellate panel decision that a former president is entitled to no immunity from criminal prosecution. The appeals court had rejected Donald Trump’s utterly ridiculous assertion that a former president is entitled to absolute immunity. In so doing, it reached the equally absurd and irresponsible conclusion that a former president is entitled to no immunity whatsoever.

If a district attorney in any of the 90 percent of American counties that preferred Trump in November 2024 or if any of the 91 U.S. attorneys he has appointed were to indict Barack Obama today for the 2011 murders of Anwar al-Awlaki or his 16-year-old son, “citizen Obama” would have no defense based on a statute of limitations. He would, though, thanks to John Roberts, be entitled to a dismissal of the indictment on immunity grounds.

The American-born Islamist cleric was killed in Yemen by a drone. Another American citizen, an Awlaki supporter, was also killed. President Obama authorized the strike. It marked the first time since the Civil War that a citizen had been executed without trial on orders of a president. A week later, Awlaki’s 16-year-old son, also American-born, was killed by a drone. Our nation was not at war with Yemen. There was no evidence that Awlaki was an imminent threat; that he had ever planned or taken part in an attack; or that he had ever so much as picked up a weapon. He was a cleric—a poisonous one to be sure, but not a combatant.

Barack Obama is nevertheless entitled to immunity. And we should feel good about that.

Frank Barron ’73, J.D. ’78

My old friend Lincoln Caplan is letting Trump Derangement Syndrome obscure his judgment. The point he misses is that the bad behavior of no president other than an outlier like our current incumbent would have raised the issues that had to be decided in Trump v. United States. Is the president, being “a branch of government,” simply different—occupying to some extent “a law-free zone” (Justice Elena Kagan)—from the rest of us? Justice Roberts, along with five associates, said yes. Reasons were given, mainly that we don’t want our presidents inhibited in the exercise of their judgment by concerns that they may subsequently be second-guessed in criminal or civil court.

The three dissenters—and, plainly, Mr. Caplan—would have called it the other way. “Good decisions [e.g., endorsement of putting the judicial wood to an outrageously bad actor] make bad law.” Cf. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., A.B. 1861, LL.B. ’66, LL.D. ’95.

John Thorndike ’64, J. D. ’68

Lincoln Caplan nailed it: under John Roberts’s unctuous leadership the Supreme Court’s “conservative” majority has repeatedly enabled presidential superiority over the other two branches of democratic governance. In Trump v. United States, Roberts wrote that “unlike anyone else, the president is a branch of government, and the Constitution vests in him sweeping powers and duties.” In absolving Mr. Trump from criminal prosecution, Roberts wrote, the Court must focus on “the enduring consequences upon the balanced power structure of our Republic.”

As we troublingly see day by day, however, the maximalist view of the presidency unbalances our Republic, eclipsing both Congress and the courts. As University of Virginia law professor Caleb Nelson, a real conservative, has noted, the “originalism” tactic that Roberts and the Court’s sycophantic six often use selectively to undercut progressive public protections does not support a “unitary executive” excuse for Trump’s supremacy over the other two cardinal branches. As my students often heard, the Founding Fathers studiously avoided making George Washington and his successors a “king” or an “emperor” of the United States—instead the chief executive of our Republic was more cautiously denominated “the preside-nt.” So the Article II officeholder is a “presider” over the executive branch, not the exclusive “decider” of national governance. That carefully weighed wording from the Framers surely deserves Roberts’s notice.

Zygmunt J.B. Plater

Mr. Caplan asserts that it would be a tragedy for Roberts but also for the Supreme Court and the nation if Roberts were remembered only as the author of the Trump v. United States decision. If this is true, it is a tragedy only in the Greek sense that the tragedy was the result of the protagonist’s tragic flaw. No one forced Roberts to write as he did, without precedent or reason. If his apologists now assert that he was attempting to avoid a constitutional crisis, I have to ask how he thinks he has the right to control when and how such a crisis may present itself. His job was to reason from the law and precedent and to answer the question before him, all of which he failed to do. If his apologists further contend that Roberts had no way of knowing that Trump would make a mockery of him and his decision, I have to ask: how out of touch with reality is he?

Barbara Hickingbottom, J.D. ’87

Lincoln Caplan well describes the baleful consequences of the Supreme Court’s Trump v. United States decision. But I respectfully dissent from his conclusion that the legacy of that decision is “unlikely to be the one [Chief Justice John Roberts] wants.”

John Roberts is a smart man. Since his appointment as chief justice, he has well played his hand in a long game of turning the court from such liberalism as remained from the era of the Warren Court to its current embodiment of ultra-conservative jurisprudence. His eloquence, respectful writings, occasional tactical compromises, and famously pleasing personality have allowed him to steer his court rightwards without emerging as a divisive ideologue.

The chief justice cannot be happy about the dramatic loss of faith in and respect for the Supreme Court voiced by many Americans and respected organizations. But you can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs, and this too shall pass. The court survived Dred Scott, even if it did take a civil war. It is we the people who can bemoan what has happened to our jurisprudence and what is happening to our country. As for Chief Justice Roberts—he can be proud.

Vic Glasberg, Ph.D. ’72

In 1965, Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel recorded “A Simple Desultory Philippic (Or How I Was Robert McNamara-ed into Submission)” for their Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme album. While the album went platinum, the song itself has largely been forgotten.

Here in 2025 comes Lincoln Caplan with the sequel “The Kingmaker?” that should have been subtitled “(Or How I Was John Roberts-ed into Submission).” Like Simon, Caplan finds no redeeming virtue in anything done by the object of his wrath.

Had Harvard Magazine meant to actually weigh John Roberts’s legacy, there might have been some words of balance by a serious opposing point of view. But Harvard Magazine wanted a screed, mud slung against the wall, as a means to—how did Caplan put it—“work the ref.”

John Roberts’s work deserves a much more thoughtful and balanced assessment. I suspect Caplan’s article will find itself in the same dustbin of history as Paul Simon’s neurotic paranoid ’60s parody.

John G. Rodman, M.P.A. ’93

“The Kingmaker?” is unfortunately typical of the hysteria presented by Harvard and the radical left over conservative views currently ascending. It states that we are witnessing the “remaking of the American presidency into something closer to a dictatorship.” That the outcome of recent cases “carry the seeds of an American tragedy.” So on and so forth. I was enraged as I read further.

Justice Roberts is exemplary in his fairness and perspective. This president was elected by the people, and they knew what he represented. There was no mention of the outrages imposed by the previous administration, and I thank the lucky stars for a president who pulled this great nation back from the brink of disaster. Certainly, many are opposed, but this display by Harvard Magazine of this level of Trump Derangement Syndrome is regretful and illustrative of why Harvard is mired in such controversy now.

Raymond Ghelardi, M.C.P. ’75

At one time, Chief Justice John Roberts appeared destined for distinction through service on the Supreme Court in the tradition of Joseph Story, Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., Louis Brandeis, Felix Frankfurter, William Brennan, and Harry Blackmun. However, that opportunity was lost. Roberts is now more likely to be remembered, inexplicably, as the judiciary’s foremost enabler of President Donald Trump’s pursuit of monarchy, even dictatorship.

Roberts might have forgotten what he read as a history concentrator at the College, where he wrote an essay about longtime U.S. senator Daniel Webster, expressing admiration for “a disinterested, self-sacrificing man of wisdom who continually worked with others of his sort to resolve any controversy which threatened national harmony” [as quoted in outlets including History News Network]. In contrast, the mature Roberts leads a polarizing Court that has lost the respect of many Americans. He poses as a moderately conservative institutionalist who interprets the law as he understands it. Instead, Roberts has generally demonstrated himself to be a resolute partisan, especially in voting rights and criminal justice cases.

John Roberts is no Daniel Webster, and, as he should know, history has a long memory.

Steven S. Berizzi ’73

It was no surprise that Lincoln Caplan’s article on John Roberts is extremely critical of the chief justice. It would be truly surprising if Harvard Magazine published an article lauding the Court’s return to conservative principles. But that would represent real diversity.

Keith Paul Bishop ’78

After reading Lincoln Caplan’s excellent article on Chief Justice Roberts, it occurred to me that an Edward Gibbon of the future may write The Decline and Fall of the American Republic and cite Justice Roberts, Mitch McConnell, and Donald Trump as the primary architects of its destruction.

Charles G. Houghton ’67

It is clear that the majority of these justices made a truly idiotic decision in granting Trump immunity for official acts made as president. Simply put, Roberts and the rest considered only what would happen if they did NOT grant such immunity, and completely failed to seriously consider what might happen if they DID grant immunity, which is Trump acting with impunity from the law and court rulings.

If Roberts wants to even attempt to recover a shred of his reputation, he should follow the rule of 3 ups, which is well-known to responsible politicians: when you screw UP, own UP, and then clean it UP! The Court could easily do this by clarifying what they meant in that decision the next time the issue emerges, and, in effect, reversing it. Otherwise, it’s Roberts’s legacy and our disaster.

Steve Pomerance ’63

Thank you for publishing Mr. Caplan’s essay. In these dark times, that decision, and follow-through, took courage. I expect you will receive substantial blowback, some vituperative. It’s a well-researched and well-reasoned essay, but most of all, it’s urgently necessary. That you elected to publish it reflects to your and Harvard’s credit.

Thank you again for your courage in these times of so much institutional and personal cowardice.

Peter Goldman, Ph.D. ’72

The editors should be ashamed of providing a forum for a Yale extremist to launch a personal attack on a distinguished Harvard graduate on purely partisan political grounds. The premise of this tirade is transparently leftist and not worthy of a publication supposedly designed to provide information to alumni about their alma mater. Few of us expect to be confronted by an overt personal attack on a graduate of the University. This was not journalism but calculated slander.

Leslie Jacobs, J.D. ’68

Science and Funding

Veronique Greenwood writes that after Professor David Liu was unsuccessful in finding “other avenues” for securing adequate pay for his lab members, he began dividing his salary among them (“The Scientist in Ceaseless Motion,” November-December 2025, page 36). Annual pay for many Harvard graduate students and other lab workers still comes in below the cost of living in Boston. Some of these lab workers have families, and all are adults with bills to pay in one of America’s most expensive housing and childcare markets.

Pay for laboratory workers is low at most U.S. universities, and NIH funding policies also play in. However, Harvard is a leading university and should show leadership on this issue. The requirement to accept years of below-cost-of-living pay to advance in science favors those with outside resources, which reinforces demographic divides between scientists and other Americans.

Another article in the same issue states that Harvard’s endowment exceeds $2 million per undergraduate (“News in Brief,” November-December 2025, page 18). Surely Harvard can afford to explore “other avenues” to pay the workers who contribute so much to Harvard’s discoveries and prestige.

Ilana Goldowitz, Ph.D. ’15

Rachel Ruysch

Thank you for the insightful piece on artist Rachel Ruysch (“Lush Life,” November-December 2025, page 30) with the full-page reproductions of her beautiful, scientifically significant works. The exhibit of her work gives her the credit she’s due.

The timing of your article is fitting, because Still Life of Exotic Flowers on a Marble Ledge (page 33) was donated by our Uncle James Moffett ’63, who died in September. He would be pleased to know his bequest to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art was seen by so many people in Boston and that the Museum of Fine Arts brought together the largest number of her works compiled since her death in 1750.

Gordon Readey and Alexandra Readey, M.B.A. ’06

Thanks for your lovely article on eighteenth-century Dutch artist Rachel Ruysch. It was fascinating to learn that Professor Charles Davis can study her floral art for scientific purposes.

Professor Davis might also want to consider seventeenth-century Franco-Flemish artist Jean-Baptiste Monnoyer, who like Ruysch specialized in floral oil paintings with animals. Given how similar their work is, perhaps Ruysch was even inspired by the earlier Monnoyer.

Jim Berkman ’77, J.D. ’82

Letters on Antisemitism

I was delighted that two of Harvard’s esteemed alumni took the time to critique my letter in the September-October issue, which outlined simple, clear, and lawful ways Harvard can fulfill its obligation to reject antisemitism and protect Jewish students. I was less impressed with the words of their comments (November-December 2025, pages 68-69). Mr. Hecker offered nothing but insults, calling the letter “mind-boggling,” “beyond oxymoronic,” “draconian,” and—the ultimate insult—“Trumpian.” Does Mr. Hecker believe that if the KKK marched through the Harvard campus yelling “death to the Blacks” or another group yelled “death to the gays,” Harvard should and would protect their free speech at the expense of the targets of their hatred?

As for Mr. Brodsky, if he thinks an Israeli political pledge that the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea should be under “Israeli sovereignty” is somehow morally equivalent to Hamas’s pledge to murder every Jew now living in Israel (which is the true meaning of making the Jewish state “free from the river to the sea”), then perhaps he has forgotten that two million Arabs now live under “Israeli sovereignty” without ever being threatened with death.

Mark Rutzick, J.D. ’73

Robert Hecker ’69 writes in the November-December issue a letter (page 68) mocking a prior letter from Mark Rutzick ’73 in which Mr. Rutzick argued that Harvard should prioritize student safety over unrestricted free speech. Mr. Hecker argues, “If I were to point at a fellow Harvard student in a hostile crowd and shout ‘Kill that Jew!’ the law would be down on me instantly and the University would kick me out in a heartbeat.” The evidence is overwhelming that [this] is incredibly naive. We have seen multiple examples of crowds threatening both Jewish students and other Jews at Ivy League campuses and throughout the world. The consequences have rarely included expulsion or arrest.

Douglas M. Cohen, M.B.A. ’93

Wadsworth House

Dear Primus VI,

I enjoyed your summary history of the recently renovated Wadsworth House (November-December 2025, page 60), but you have left out one of its most elegant occupants. It is the sculpture of Arno, a greyhound who was owned “in the flesh” by Horatio Greenough, an American sculptor in Florence, Italy. The marble Arno was owned by Edward Everett, when he was Harvard’s president in the mid-1840s and lived in Wadsworth House. You can see the sculpture today at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.

Marjorie B. Cohn
Weyerhaeuser curator of prints emerita Harvard Art Museums

Rivalries Rethought
 

With two degrees from Yale, I’ve long reveled in the rivalry between our universities. Over the last year, Harvard in particular has been attacked viciously, spitefully, and unjustly by the current administration, resisting with courage, leadership, and iron principle. I am humbled with admiration and gratitude to Harvard to the point that this year, I am splitting my donation to 50-50 between Yale’s and Harvard’s alumni funds. I stand with you!

Jamison Suter

Regarding Speech

Joanna Weiss ends her article “Harvard Faces the Future” (which might hopefully be better titled “Harvard Faces the Present”) in the November-December issue with statements by Harvard College Dean David Deming that provide a perfect encapsulation of the inconsistent position Harvard has adopted regarding free speech. He says, “We want all of our students to feel like they can speak their mind.” But he has just been described as saying that he trusts that students will navigate the line between heightened scrutiny on conduct and the urge for self-expression. The message is clear: expression is not free, but rather highly constrained, with disproportionate (and, as the article points out, highly effective) disciplinary consequences for infractions. By the way, how does he intend to enforce the Chatham House Rule, henceforth regulating classroom discussion with little impact likely beyond encouraging snitching? 


Haynes Miller ’70

 

Errata

In “The Scientist in Ceaseless Motion” (November-December 2025, page 36), Nicole Gaudelli and Andrew Anzalone were identified as former doctoral students in Professor David Liu’s laboratory. In fact, both were postdoctoral fellows.

In “Europe’s Mystery Languages” (November-December 2025, page 10), the German word for “mother” should be spelled mutter, not mütter, which is the word’s plural form. Additionally, in German, nouns are capitalized; we omitted the capitalization to ensure style uniformity.