HARROGATE, Tenn. — The Lincoln Memorial University (LMU) Abraham Lincoln Institute for the Study of Leadership and Public Policy and the LMU Duncan School of Law (LMU Law) will present the annual R. Gerald McMurtry Lecture on Oct. 26. The program will deliver three hours of dual CLE credit and take place from 9:30 a.m. until 1:30 p.m. in the LMU Law Courtroom (601 W. Summit Hill Drive).

The program will feature LMU Law professors Melanie Reid and Akram Faizer as well as noted Abraham Lincoln scholar and Anderson University professor Brian Dirck. Reid will discuss Abraham Lincoln’s “Almanac” murder case. Faizer will discuss the ethical dilemma facing Lincoln when he was asked to represent a slaveholder seeking the return of his slaves. Dirck’s topic is Lincoln’s ethical relationship with the law.

Dirck is a professor of history at Anderson University in Anderson, Indiana. His first book, Lincoln and Davis: Imagining America, 1800-1865 offered a comparative analysis of the two Civil War presidents. He has since published Lincoln the Lawyer, a study of Lincoln’s legal career, and he edited Lincoln Emancipated: The President and the Politics of Race. In 2012 he released two books, Lincoln and the Constitution and Abraham Lincoln and White America. He earned a bachelor’s degree at the University of Central Arkansas, a master’s in history at Rice University and a Ph.D. in history at the University of Kansas.

Faizer teaches U.S. constitutional law, first amendment law, administrative law, estate law and property law at LMU Law. He writes prolifically in the area of constitutional law with special emphasis on the difficulties related to integrating historically marginalized groups such as racial and ethnic minorities, migrants, gender minorities and the poor. He joined the LMU Law faculty in 2011 and was named Professor of the Year in 2012 and 2013. Faizer appears frequently as a legal expert on local news broadcasts. Prior to joining the LMU faculty, Faizer was a practicing litigator in Buffalo, New York, at Barclay Damon LLP. He earned his Juris Doctorate from the University of Notre Dame Law School and holds both a bachelor of arts degree in international relations and a bachelor of science degree in physiology from McGill University in Montreal, Canada.

Reid is the associate dean of faculty and teaches criminal procedure, criminal law, criminal practice, federal criminal law, torts, national security, conflict of laws and comparative law at LMU Law. Prior to joining the faculty of LMU Law, Reid was a trial attorney in the narcotics and dangerous drug section at the U.S. Department of Justice as well as an assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of Florida. She is a former law clerk for Judge Charles Wilson of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. In 2016, Reid was a guest lecturer at Liaocheng University, Shandong Province in China and discussed select topics on constitutional law, comparative law and criminal procedure and evidence. She received a Fulbright U.S. Scholar grant to teach U.S. criminal law and procedure at the University of Latvia Faculty of Law in Riga, Latvia, in 2018.

The lecture will be simulcast to the Abraham Lincoln Library and Museum on the LMU Main Campus in Harrogate, Tennessee. Three hours of dual CLE credit is available for attorneys for $35 and $30 for LMU Law alumni. Registration includes CLE credit, coffee, refreshments and a boxed lunch. For more information or to register, contact April Hurley at 865.545.5339 or by email at April.Hurley@LMUnet.edu.