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Philip Hamburger

Philip Hamburger

Chief Executive Officer


Philip Hamburger is a scholar of constitutional law and its history at Columbia Law School. He received his bachelor’s degree from Princeton University and his J.D. from Yale Law School. Before coming to Columbia, he was the John P. Wilson Professor at the University of Chicago Law School. He also taught at George Washington University Law School, Northwestern Law School, University of Virginia Law School, and the University of Connecticut Law School. Professor Hamburger’s contributions are unrivaled by any U.S. legal scholar in driving the national conversations on the First Amendment and the separation of church and state and on administrative power. His work on administrative power has been celebrated by organizations like the Manhattan Institute and the Bradley Foundation, among others.

A Key Ruling Against Social-Media Censorship

By: Philip Hamburger July 5, 2023
This July Fourth there was special reason to celebrate. Judge Terry Doughty issued a preliminary injunction in Missouri v. Biden, which stands to become one of the most important free-speech cases in the nation’s history. At stake is the federal government’s use of social-media platforms to censor Americans. Officials kept most of their censorship regime secret through two election…
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How the Government Justifies Its Social-Media Censorship

By: Philip Hamburger June 9, 2023
The organization I lead, the New Civil Liberties Alliance, represents plaintiffs in Missouri v. Biden, a lawsuit challenging the federal government’s campaign to censor speech on social media. For years, officials at the White House, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Department of Homeland Security, the Central Intelligence Agency and other agencies have pressured tech companies to suppress “misinformation.”…
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How the Supreme Court Set the Stage for the Jan. 6 Riot

By: Philip Hamburger January 5, 2023
On the second anniversary of the invasion of the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, it’s worth considering how politics—and especially presidential elections—have increasingly become like warfare. A pair of developments—one legislative, one administrative—have raised the political stakes. In the 20th century, the Supreme Court simultaneously expanded Congress’s legislative powers and allowed them to be exercised…
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